Re: [CR]Stopping a fixed gear in Ted's day.

>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "ternst" <ternst1@cox.net>
> To: "Elizabeth & Warren" <warbetty@eastlink.ca>
> Sent: Friday, December 08, 2006 5:36 PM
> Subject: Re: [CR]Stopping a fixed gear in Ted's day.
>
>
>> Ok guys and gals, here's the skinny "when WE used to ride" hah!.
>> First: Be careful on putting brakes on the front round blade forks and
>> how hard you stop.
>> Not all those old forks have design line crowns and the round blades will
>> flex somewhat more than the oval road blades and remember that's why they
>> put the uneven line on the lugs to break up the stress riser lines.
>> Putting a road fork in is not that bad an idea if you use the bike a lot.
>> The rear bridges also are not that strong, so it's nicer to put /make up
>> a clamp arrangement that that won't squeeze your seatstays and do damage.
>> I don't think I would ride a fully restored vintage frameset and bolt on
>> frame clamps, etc. to ride around on.
>> Learn how to glove your wheel and ride for show and around on flatter
>> ground. It would be a shame to damage a primo bike by putting brakes on.
>> Warren's finder CCM on "E" is nice and those brakes work?
>> Those old contraptions some times can be adjusted to stop fair, but
>> remember kiddies, the hard core riders grin and tell you brakes are only
>> to moderate , modulate, and slightly control speed, they are not there to
>> stop.
>> What the hell, you some kinda sissy? Snicker, or so say the hotshots when
>> pulling beginner's legs.
>> Back to the track. I keep getting side anecdoted.
>> By the way, 50x16 is 25x8 or an 88" gear as we used to measure with 28"
>> wheelchart. That was a most popular gear for average fixed racing. 26x8
>> was for the good guys on road, and the team race and six-day gear of
>> choice, which was called 91. The sprinters used 25,24,23x7 which had more
>> leverage from chainwheel
>> to crank end so had a slightly quicker jump, but not the rolling of the
>> larger chainwheels for longer distance races. The smaller CW's "died"
>> sooner and you had to push a little harder to keep them rolling than the
>> big chainwheel that rolled longer and it was just a little easier in the
>> team and mass start long events.
>> First you need to get nice heavier duty gloves so they don't wear through
>> too fast. Best to use two so you become ambidextrous, just in case.
>> You stop the front wheel with your glove and a firm flat palm/hand which
>> is forced down on TOP of the front tire with the pressure to stop as you
>> need by placing your forearm behind the bar , flat palm on tire, and the
>> wedging/pushing your forearm against the bar like a lever and fulcrum.
>> If you do it hard enough, you can lift your back wheel off the ground
>> real easy if you practice it when standing next to your bike and
>> executing the discipline correctly.
>> At first you will have a little bruising or a soreness in your forearm,
>> but pretty soon you toughen up and you get so hard you can eat brick ice
>> cream and rock candy.
>> Now as Popeye's playmates you are ready to ride faster and practice
>> quicker stopping.
>> Oh yeah, remember to loosen your toe strap before you start slowing so
>> you can get your foot out and not fall down on your osteoporitic hip.
>> That's why we never put the top of the strap in the loop so we could flik
>> the strap open on the downstroke with our thumb just before we start our
>> stopping.
>> All you old fogies ain't getting any younger except in your mind and when
>> you look at the Playboy calendar.
>> As you start gloving the wheel, the reason you keep you hand flat is to
>> prevent sidewall friction and wear on your sewup tires, too much rubbing
>> and you could damage the sidewall casing.
>> Rider's have grabbed the front wheel and locked in extreme cases for a
>> panic situation.
>> While gloving your wheel, it's important to slide your butt backwards on
>> the bike proportionally to the intensity of braking.
>> This keeps your balance better and puts weight on the back wheel so it
>> doesn't skid as easily, because as your doing this you are gently back
>> pedalling to resist the motion at the same time.
>> It's the gloving and simultaneous backpedalling with backwheel weight
>> done skilfully that gives you the quickstop!
>> Your non-gloving wheel is steering and holding your body weight back on
>> the saddle to balance you out, to make this tricky sounding manuver much
>> easier and fluid. Guys with bigger butts could be called pearshaped like
>> the guy in the old cartoon strip, but in our street parlance we referred
>> to them as BA's
>> After awhile it becomes psychosomatic, the braking that is.
>> Like the guys in the plumbing shop two doors down from our bikestore used
>> to tell us,(they were all fat, cigar smoking redneck kinda guys) as they
>> always came out and kidded the riders when we had 10-12 guys out front on
>> the sidewalk in their cycling attire going for training rides, that we
>> all had size 60 chests and size 2 hats.
>> So bikes rider being notorious for not having any brains anyways or they
>> wouldn't be riding bikes, could obviously do the track bike fast stopping
>> without thought.
>> You knew I could tie all this together, just like a bike race strategy.
>> Yeah it always felt faster when wet, but gloving didn't work worth a damn
>> in the rain, so we always sloed down in training, but when caught out in
>> rain during a race you REALLY had to be careful on oil sliks, painted
>> street letters/lines and stuff like that. Many a rider and bunches fall
>> down go boom with track bikes because it was an accident waiting to
>> happen. But it was fast and fun.
>> Hope this gives a little better idea and trust youse all will chime in
>> with a few of your war stories and we can have some timely timeline
>> exchanges for our very own.
>> There I go, right back to team race mode.
>>
>> ----- Original Message -----
>> From: "Elizabeth & Warren" <warbetty@eastlink.ca>
>> To: <classicrendezvous@bikelist.org>
>> Sent: Friday, December 08, 2006 3:03 PM
>> Subject: Re: [CR]Stopping a fixed gear in Ted's day.
>>
>>
>>>I think you really needed to develop that braking skill to survive. Have
>>>a look at this original condition 30's CCM racer on ebay.
>>>
>>> #*http://tinyurl.com/yat8og
>>>
>>> *It came stock to the public with a 50 X 16 fixed gear and those
>>> Endricks are the rare Dunlops with 647 mm beads. (no replacement tires
>>> there.) I think that's over 90 gear inches. Inagine the potential horror
>>> when you flip the wheel over to ride the 18 tooth freewheel and start
>>> downhill. Near certain-death on todays urban streets.
>>>
>>> It has the rear Phillips boat-anchor brake of course. You just had to
>>> heave it into the gutter and maybe it would catch a sewer grate.
>>>
>>> Warren Young
>>> Wolfville NS.
>>>
>>> Kristopher Green wrote:
>>>
>>>> Chuck Scmidt wrote:
>>>>
>>>> One additional note here: you just know that if today's bike
>>>> messengers knew about how the hard men (Ted's a Charter Memeber)
>>>> braked the front tire with their hand back in the day, they'd be all
>>>> over it.
>>>>
>>>> ______________
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> Yup.
>>>>
>>>> http://tinyurl.com/tty7m
>>>>
>>>> Kristopher John Hicks-Green
>>>> Olympia, Washington (State)
>>>> United States of America