Posted by Jack "Ghost Rider" Sweeney On January - 28 - 2010
I’ve been asked to do some background research for a railway advisory group. This group is interested in gathering a variety of information for a major rail carrier relating to both recreational cyclists/travelers and multi-modal commuters (bike/rail) for the purposes of developing new stops, routes and procedures for moving bikes and cyclists aboard trains.
Although I’ve spent a lot of time traveling via train (I don’t fly), I’ve never traveled with a bike…nor have I had the opportunity to go multi-modal. Anyhow, what I’m hoping you could provide is your experiences using trains and bicycles together. The kinds of information that would be useful are:
–how are the bicycles stored or secured onboard? In a separate cargo car or mixed in with passengers?
–any fees you might have encountered while bringing a bike onboard
–hits/misses in the experiences you’ve had. Was it good and efficient or a nightmare of logistical headaches…or somewhere in between?
–what was the purpose of your travel: for recreation or for commuting purposes?
–any specific policies or procedures that worked or needed improvement?
–whatever else you care to add about your time onboard
Please indicate where you used a rail service in your comments…and thanks in advance for participating!
Posted by Jack "Ghost Rider" Sweeney On January - 26 - 2010
Here’s an interesting one sent in by longtime reader Phil:
So, this afternoon, a co-worker and sometime bike-commuter and I were talking about riding/commuting and car-pooling. I suddenly thought, why not bike-pooling? This lead to wondering about numbers of riders “bike-pooling” to work via tandems or the likes. People living along the same route to work could “share” a tandem.
I’ve heard of “commuter trains”, where folks gather at a convenient starting point and riding en masse to their job(s), but haven’t run across anyone doing the tandem number. Anyone experienced such a thing? Good idea or not? I would imagine various logistics would need to be ironed out — work start/stop times would have to mesh between the two participants, among other things.
Let’s hear your thoughts and experiences in the comments below.
Have a cycling-related question? Just Ask Jack! Click on the link in the right-hand column to send me your questions.
When I was a kid, I recall my cousins and I would ride bikes around with the two of us on the banana seat. Good times…KHS has had this bike in their line up for a few years and since the day that I laid eyes on it, I’ve wanted it. However, being a responsible adult, there are some obligations that I’ve had to take care of. But now I have the funds to pull the trigger and I can’t wait to buy it!
Back in December, we took delivery of one of Swobo’s newest creations: The Baxter. The striking form and stellar fit-and-finish should come as no surprise. It was planned and laid out by Sky Yeager, a renowned bike designer. Now it’s time for me to talk about my adventures. My very first impression? The bike itself feels a bit like a fast cruiser bike. I like it. A LOT.
The night I assembled the Baxter, it had started snowing. In fact, if you look closely, you can see some snow on the floor of the breezeway:
This snow would set the pace for the vast majority of my trial run with the Baxter. With 700×28 tires, I was just a little concerned.
The first morning out, I decided I should probably ride to the bus stop, which is about a 3 mile ride for me. The upright position is great. You are up and above most compact cars on the road. You’re aware of everything around you, and the surprisingly bright, pulsating integrated seat-post tail light meant that I was getting a whole lane to myself in the dark, wee hours of morning. For short trips under street lights, I use a Blackburn Flea on strobe mode as my only headlight. It was my only accessory for the first few days.
With just a little snow on the ground but more in the forecast, I decided that I’d ride the Baxter all the way home from work without the bus, a trip of about 15 miles. It had warmed up to 19 degrees, and I have ridden the whole trip in far colder. With my backpack stuffed full of extra layers from the 3*F morning commute, I had a significant load on my back. The upright position is pretty much non-negotiable. A stiff and cold headwind meant slow speeds, dry eyes and windburn, but some shallow snow was enjoyed!
Let me make this pretty clear. I’ve tried riding that distance (at speed, in traffic) on my wife’s Electra Townie before. While the Baxter isn’t quite a “beach cruiser” like the Townie, both bikes force you to ride upright. This is usually a recipe for disaster on longer, quicker-paced rides.
The Baxter comes with an Alfine hub, which shifts smoother, doesn’t complain when you shift it under a load, and overall feels a lot more sturdy than the Nexus internally-geared hubs I’ve used in the past. It handles somewhat aggressive riding, shifting while out-of-saddle hill-climbing and other abuse very well. On my long commute, this was a welcome feature. In Urban Kansas City with all its hills, the 8-speed gearbox was also a life-saver.
It’s worth noting that this is the second most expensive part of the bike next to the frame. Buying a wheel laced to an 8-speed Alfine would cost as much as a whole entry-level bicycle at a reputable shop, so it most certainly contributes greatly to the Baxter’s $1099 MSRP. It’s also worth every penny. The only maintenance I performed in a month and a half of riding salty, slushy grime was a periodic wipe-down of the bike and re-lubrication of the chain. Even at near-zero temperatures, shifting was precise and predictable.
First gear is good for climbing, but it’s nowhere near as low as the lowest gears on my road bike or mountain bike (both with triple cranks). The highest gear (97 gear inches by my calculations) is plenty higher than my mountain bike (84 gear inches), but doesn’t hold a candle to my road bike’s massive 52×12 top gear (114 gear inches). The Baxter should go well over 25 MPH at 100 RPM cadence in its top gear, but given the wind resistance of sitting bolt upright, that seems terribly generous unless you have a great tailwind or a long downhill journey.
The next thing I did was try to test-fit my Cascadia fenders and Sun-Lite rack. This is where things got a little tricky, requiring some of the oddball hardware that came with the fenders to move the fender-stays away from the massive disc-brake calipers. A few washers here, a long bolt there, and things finally came together. Add-ons aren’t quite as straight-forward when you’re dealing with disc brakes, but any bike shop should be able to help you get these accessories installed if you can’t figure it out. One thing Sky did when designing the frame was include copious amounts of eyelets for things, including separate eyelets in the rear for a fender and rack and accomodations for two water bottle cages. Urban errands were definitely taken into consideration with this bike.
With the slow speeds, slush and snow, I didn’t feel like dealing with the fenders. They’d just clog up. I left the rack on for the duration of my test, though, and used the spring-clip to hold a mud-guard in place. Really, I’m a pannier guy at heart.
This was my first time riding a bike with disc brakes more than a few miles. I certainly appreciated the pizza cutters in the weather conditions we had. As expected, they stop the bike promptly, but they’re not overbearing, even in horrible, slippery slush.
By this point, it should be pretty clear that my apprehension about using the 28mm Vittoria Randonneur tires in the snow was all for nothing. While the skinny, lightly-treaded tires weren’t nearly as sure-footed as the knobby, two-inch-wide monsters on my mountain bike, they held their own very well…
… until the snow got more than two-to-three inches deep. Then, the bike gets buried. Note those bright, reflective sidewalls. This photo, unlike most, was taking with my phone and the light reflecting off the tires is from the tiny LED “flash” on my phone. On a side note, I’m not sure that even a purpose-built snow bike would have gotten me through this stuff very easily, as deep and loosely packed as it was. I had to walk a ways after taking this pic.
The Baxter was absolutely perfect for my usual winter multi-mode commute, where I use the bus and bike combined to get around town. For short errands and rides of under 5 miles, the Baxter is an awesome ride. It’s versatile enough for daily use, pretty enough to show off to your friends, and an absolute blast to ride. Everywhere I went, I got comments about it.
I used the Baxter every single work day of my test period, well, at least until January 8th when I got laid off. When I got home, I used the very clever built-in bottle opener under the saddle to crack open a cold one before beginning the job hunt.
Please click here to read our review disclaimer as required by the Federal Trade Commission.
Editorial by RL Policar: The Swobo Baxter is considered a DEMO bike, meaning it will be going back to Swobo once testing has been completed.
I was laid off almost two years ago, luckily, I found a job within two weeks. However, my new job was located 37 miles away (one way) making commuting on bike extremely difficult. I considered multi-modal commuting, but the transit system in LA really blows. It would have taken me two hours to get to work! That basically left me with using my bike to run errands and recreational riding.
I ended up switching jobs again putting me in a position to dust off my trusty commuter bike and start hitting the roads of Orange county. I’m planning to start riding once there is enough light for me to ride safely during the evening. My commute will involve riding the Santa Ana river trail and I’m guesstimating that I will save at least 15 minutes and lots of aggravation.
So I’m wondering if this economy affected your bike commuting, are your riding less? Or are you riding more since it is cheaper to ride a bike? If you had a car, would you consider riding your bike up to an interview? Did you have to get rid of any bikes since times are hard? Please share your story by leaving a comment.
Posted by Jack "Ghost Rider" Sweeney On January - 18 - 2010
So, just what was in that massive bike box the other day? Well, after wading through a cubic yard of packing material, things start to be revealed…
And, after a couple hours of hardcore wrenching, the RANS Hammertruck was assembled and ready to roll:
What IS that machine? Imagine an Electra cruiser ran off into the woods with a Surly Big Dummy…this could be the product of such a tryst. The RANS Hammertruck is a newish player on the cargobike market, with many visual and cargo-handling cues from the Xtracycle but also wildly different. Now you may know that we’re huge fans of the Xtracycle platform around here…so there will be inevitable comparisons between it and this Hammertruck. In any case, we’re very excited to be able to test the Hammertruck for a couple of months before sending it back to RANS.
The manufacturer specs list a quality component roster, and this bike is rated for a whopping 525 lbs. of rider and cargo. Suggested retail price is around $2000. We’ll provide more details in the coming weeks in our “first impressions” article.
In the meantime, feast your eyes on the cargo-handling portion of the Hammertruck. The side bags are shown in “rolled and stowed” mode, but rest assured: once they are deployed, they are HUGE. Also shown are the optional side runners for increased cargo capacity. This machine looks tailor-made for hauling a giant load of whatever you can stuff, strap, cram or wedge into or onto those hefty racks and bags:
Please click here to read our review disclaimer as required by the Federal Trade Commission.
Posted by Jack "Ghost Rider" Sweeney On January - 12 - 2010
Asisourtradition here at Bikecommuters.com, I figured I’d post a photo of the biggest, most unwieldy bike box I’ve ever received at our secret East Coast testing laboratory:
What’s in that massive box? Kitty wants to know…
With a little luck, I’ll have preview photos sometime during the weekend. In the meantime, stay tuned — this should be interesting, to say the least.
Posted by Jack "Ghost Rider" Sweeney On January - 11 - 2010
A couple of months ago, the folks from Jango Bikes loaned us one of their new folding bikes, the Flik V9, to test out. We previewed it here.
I’ve had a chance to ride it quite a bit — never got to try the true multimodal approach (bus/bike or bike/train) with it, but did pack it into the trunk of my wife’s car on days too rainy in the morning to brave the first half of my commute.
Well, how did it perform? The bike itself is a blast to ride…I’ve always been enamored with folding bikes as they seem to bring a smile to my face whenever I get a chance to ride one. I found the gearing to be quite adequate for my commute — no real hills to tackle, but plenty of range with the 50T chainring and 11-34 9-speed cassette.
There seems to be plenty of adjustability in the bike itself. While the handlebars don’t move up and down, the seatpost has plenty of range and the bike fit me fine. I think about 6 footers or so are the top limit for riders of this bike, however, and smaller folks will appreciate the bike even more.
I’ve read a number of accounts from other folding bike users that it seems to take a lot of effort to spool up such small wheels as compared to a fullsize bike. I certainly didn’t notice that — the Flik gets up to speed effortlessly enough for urban riding. This is no race bike, to be sure, and isn’t designed to be blazing-fast. Overall the ride was smooth.
One oddity I did notice was that sometimes as I was clipping along, I’d hit a bump and the rear shock would reverberate in time with my pedaling. I believe this is referred to as “pedal bob” in the mountain biking world. While it didn’t throw me off my game or really interfere with my forward progress, I found myself chanting “boingyboingyboingy!” in my head as I bobbed along. The rear shock is adjustable for preload with a knurled dial on the upper body of the shock, but even at its tightest setting, the bobbing was noticeable.
The front and rear shocks do smooth out the roughness of road surfaces…I’ve long believed that suspension components are overkill for just about any commuter-friendly bike and add unneeded complexity and weight to the bike, but in many cases they DO serve to make things a bit more comfortable. The spring-damped front shock (not adjustable) felt a bit clunky, as if the headset was loose. If I could, I’d specify the bike without these extras. The entire range of Flik models come equipped with the rear shock, but the front end of the 8-speed models (T8/V8/V8i) is rigid.
The shifting was flawless…Shimano 9-speed trigger shifter controlling the Sora rear derailleur over a SRAM 9-speed cassette. I had no issues whatsoever with that.
Likewise the brakes — Tektro IO cable-actuated disc brakes, with the front brake equipped with the DiscBlock lock (a hardened steel pin that fits through one of the holes in the disc for casual theft-prevention). The discs performed quite adequately, even in the rain. Disc brakes make a lot of sense on commuter bikes — able to stop reliably in rain, snow and mud and they cut down on expensive rim wear.
One riding issue I did have with the Flik is heelstrike against the derailleur guard and driveside chainstay. With rather large feet and the short, widely-bowed chainstays of the Flik, I had a tendency to clip the bike with my heel as I pedaled. Careful foot placement as I got used to riding the bike definitely helped, and of course folks with smaller feet shouldn’t have as many troubles with this area as I did.
The V9 comes stock with a cantilevered rear rack that folds along with the rest of the bike. It’s not rated for too much cargo (5kgs), but is plenty strong enough for a sack of groceries or light commuting load. I was unable to test the rack with traditional panniers, but Jango’s parent company Topeak makes a great rack bag with folding panniers that clips to the Flik’s rack. Slung underneath the rack is a pouch for a reinforced nylon storage/transport bag for the folded bike:
The V9 also comes stock with front and rear lights. The rear light was missing from the loaner I tested, and the front light is…well…fairly ineffective. It isn’t bright enough to navigate by, and may be set too low to provide much “see me” effect for motorists.
On some other sites, folks have decried the lack of fenders on this bike — I’ve got to say that not having fenders on this bike is NOT the dealbreaker others make it out to be. After all, those small wheels are so far away from the rider that they couldn’t possibly splash you with muddy water (smirk)! This bike is probably not the first choice for a sloppy, rough-n-tumble rain-soaked commuter anyway — it’s more geared toward someone who needs a small, apartment-friendly machine to get around the city rather than braving the worst Mother Nature can throw at us.
How easily does this bike fold? Well, take a look at the following video:
It’s a 4 second process to fold the bike into “storage mode”…even less for “shuttling” mode. Amazing! A lot of great engineering went into the design of the folding mechanisms…it couldn’t be simpler (or faster). Having experienced other folding bikes, I can say that the Flik simply blows away the competition in terms of getting the bike ready for transport. But how does it compare in size to a more traditional folding bike? I asked my friend Ken if I could borrow his Dahon Curve folder to make a comparison shot:
As you can see, the Dahon packs down into a smaller overall package. Other Flik users have expressed concern that the folded bike doesn’t fit as easily into small car trunks as other folders, but I was unable to find a small car to test. Nor was I able to bring the Flik onto a city bus or train…although I did wheel it into a few stores with no problems and no concerns about bulk. To be honest, I’ll happily sacrifice a little extra size if it means that folding this bike up is so effortless and fast! By the way, I weighed the bike as provided to me — it weighs right at 35 lbs. Not the easiest bike to schlep around…luckily it can easily be wheeled around in storage and shuttling modes.
So, is this the ultimate folder? The jury’s still out on that — there are so many great folders on the market these days, most of which I have never had the chance to ride. Perhaps my biggest issue with the Flik is price: with an MSRP of around $1500, the Flik is not an inexpensive machine. And, I’m not sure the parts spec on this bike justifies such a price. For about the same price, a base-model Brompton (considered the gold standard in folding bikes) could be had, as could any number of handsomely-appointed folders from Dahon and Bike Friday. I understand that engineering such a unique folder costs quite a bit more, and the technology used to facilitate that folding (cartridge-bearing pivots, camlocks and safety collars) adds to the cost. I’m afraid that some folks will take a look at the mostly-generic parts spec — with a couple of name-brand standouts like the Continental reflective tires, the Avid Speed Dial brake levers, SRAM cassette and Shimano Sora derailleur — and be turned off. It’s a toss-up — does a bike like this NEED high-end parts? I’ll be honest: the low-end and generic stuff sure performed without a hitch.
Hits:
- Effortless and fast folding mechanism
- fun, stable ride
- comfortable
- easy to store
- comes with basic accessories (lights, rack, storage bag, bell)
Misses:
- price
- low-end parts
- heavy
- not as compact as other folding bikes
We’d like to thank Jango for giving us the opportunity to try out the Flik — despite its shortcomings (mostly minor), it has definitely encouraged me to add a folder to my personal commuting fleet. Take a look at Jango’s other models by visiting their site.
Please click here to read our review disclaimer as required by the Federal Trade Commission.
Posted by Jack "Ghost Rider" Sweeney On January - 11 - 2010
Our friend Jim Shirk forwarded us an article from Daily Kos…a company in Northampton, Massachusetts that hauls trash for the municipality using pedal power. Take a look at the original article by clicking here.
(photo by Alex Jarrett…borrowed from Pedal People)
Now THIS is the kind of business that should be receiving Federal stimulus money — while this type of setup wouldn’t work in a lot of places, especially in a very hilly area, there are myriad applications to be tapped, from food and product delivery to trash-hauling, urban cleanup, peoplemoving (think pedicabs or the like) and plenty others.
