2 Wheels Maybe

The Sodium, the CSC, and the Sondors  Before we get to the bikes - two explanations. First, I've been drinking coffee with motorcycle guys lately, and I'm jonesing more than usual for an electric motorcycle, so I may over-do-it with this post. Second, for an around-town motorbike, I've established my acceptable speed/range/price and examine all new bikes through that filter. I've landed on 45mph/40mile/$3,500. As much as I love being on two wheels, I don't have a big desire or the time to travel hundreds of miles per day burning up the highway. I just want a bike I can hop on and scoot about town as part of daily life. Now, let's get those wheels rolling! Sodium Xubaka (50mph/37-50miles/over $7,000) Click pic for Xubaka link So, let's start with the weirdest of the three - the Sodium Xubaka (I hope that is the French spelling of "Chewbacca". If so, they should offer a furry brown seat and a bandolier as options.) The coolest thing about the Sodium ...

Yes, I know it's been a while. 2WheelsMaybe has been on a hiatus, but I've still been riding and gathering info for future posts. For those of you who've been hungry for more 2WM content, here is my first attempt at a mountain bike trail video. Enjoy, have fun, and keep pedaling, amigos! (All three of you!) I hope to see you again soon. Click here! May you be well and have a much better new year!

After two years of hauling my less-than-svelte behind around, the Juiced has earned an upgrade in the stopping department. [I wasn't planning on writing about this, but Jim from Jim's Obsessive Cycling Disorder asked if I'd share my results from this cheap caliper swap and I figured I'd just share it with everybody. Thanks, Jim!] See Jim's Brake upgrade here I've been commuting on the OceanCurrent  for two years now. Other than cable adjustments and switching to thorn-resistant tubes, it's been an impressively maintenance-free bike. But the brake pads are almost gone and I wanted to upgrade to hydraulic brakes before winter sets in. So I started looking at ready-made hydraulic brake kits like this: But e-bike brake levers have a built-in electric switch that acts as a motor cutout when you apply the brakes, so the set pictured above won't do the trick. I had to find another solution or pay a much higher price for an e-bike specific set of brakes. A litt...

I recently had the opportunity to make an e-bike video for the National Solar Tour. Over the course of a weekend I shot a few hours of video and edited it down to just over five minutes. (It was great fun and took a whole lotta time!) The hardest part was all the info that hit the cutting room floor. I had a writing professor once tell me that editing meant that I had to get used to killing my babies. That's how I felt with this, even if most of my babies were boring, long winded, and poorly filmed. The same professor told me to write [or create video] about what I know, so I made a video about the e-bike I've been commuting on for two years now - a Juiced OceanCurrent. It's a bike I would happily recommend to anyone; however, it was discontinued two years ago. Find all the South Plains entries here In its absence, here are some bikes that are very similar in specs and price in case you're looking for such a thing: A  sampler of simple e-bikes for commuting (under $1600...

Woohoo! It's here! Click here to see the South Plains Solar Tour Recently the coordinator for the local solar tour invited me to be a part be a part of this year's tour. YES! I am thrilled to be a part of it and wanted to share the work of a bunch of talented and knowledgeable people who are involved in sharing sustainability practices here in the Lubbock area. So, please click the link above to see the local tour. (If you're looking for me, I'll be the dork with a bike.) If you want to see what's going on all across the country, just go to NationalSolarTour.Org . For those of you who are curious about ebikes, I'll be posting a followup to the video on both blogs ASAP. Thanks for checking the tour out. May your day be wonderful and lead to a better future!

First ride - Saturday evening Taken at 9 am Taken at 5:30 pm Really, I went backwards. It all started with this youtube video: Klunkers 3 on YT      I've watched the video a few hundred times or so. The big guy on the yellow bike with no cables, shifters, or brake levers became my idol for a week or two. The video made me want a klunker. Specifically, it made me want a yellow Transition Klunker , but that bike was no longer being produced. It didn't take me long, though, to figure out that the TK was mostly an upgraded copy of on old straight-bar Schwinn frame. A little web surfing let me know that Schwinn is still producing a version of that bike for industrial use and I could buy a new one for around $450. (And it comes in yellow!) But I'm too cheap for that kind of fun!      Then, I rediscovered the Rat Rod Bikes forum and found a lot of people building bikes based on used Schwinn Heavy Duti frames they purchased from a forum member. So I bought one a f...

The bike showed up on Craigslist a few years ago for $10. I recognized it as a fairly odd bird. Grizz was nice enough to pick it up for me. I looked online to figure out how to fold it and learned a whole lot of cool stuff about it. Can a folding bike look epic? (From the 3rd ride) I also figured out that it had led a very hard life. In order to fold it, you had to remove the seatpost. And someone had installed an oversized seatpost very forcefully. After a few days of working to remove the seat post, I figured out that the frame had no intention of folding, the gears had no intention of shifting, and the brakes refused to brake. At the time I had two other folding frames that were much more agreeable, so I drenched the folding points in penetrating oil and the Fuji went into storage. While the Fuji sat motionless, I got the first of the folders together and on the road. A friend borrowed it and liked it so much that he decided to keep the bike rather than the friendship. (Serious bum...