sjh - mountain biking running linux vegan geek spice - mtb / vegan / running / linux / canberra / cycling / etc

Steven Hanley hackergotchi picture Steven
Hanley
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email: sjh@svana.org

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Thu, 05 Jan 2006

Yet another bike in the making - 18:33
Diamond Back Steel MTB Frame
Diamond Back Steel MTB Frame (Full Size) 		So although I have a lovely steel hardtail mtb and a Duallie, as we all know the correct number of bikes to own is N+1. I have been looking around for another steel mtb frame for a while, hopefully one I could purchase cheaply (rather than paying AUD $750 for something new) that I might be able to use as the basis of a single speed mountain bike. Sure I have a really light Giant XtC Team Aluminium frame sitting in the shed, however I would prefer to never ride alloy hardtails off road.

Diamond Back used to for years make steel hardtails throughout their bike range, my sister's mountain bike is a 1994 model Diamond Back Topanga, Sam owns a similar vintage Diamond Back Apex, basically they made a lot of rather nice, rather light, steel mountain bikes. I have from time to time checked to see if anyone on Ebay Australia or the Trading Post was selling one of these bikes or frames, however so far have had no luck.

A few weeks ago someone mentioned they had a 1994 vintage unused Diamond Back Ascent frame for sale for AUD $125 in my size. Bargain I thought and snapped it up. The frame (pictured to the left) is in perfect condition, gorgeous blue with gold spiderweb pattern paint job that was popular back then. One thing I have to give some consideration to is the dropouts, currently they are too vertical for single speed use without the use of a chain tensioner. I am tempted to give Wayne Kotzur (the guy who has fixed 3 of my other frames in the last year) a call and ask him to replace the dropouts with some Campagnolo Horizontal Dropouts or similar which would allow for geared or single speed use fairly easily.

I have just been looking around for other parts and currently I have two rim brake (no disc bits on the hubs) front wheels sitting in the shed unused and two rim brake back hubs, I also have two deore cranksets and a bottom bracket to go with one of them that is fairly new. I am already well on the way to building up the bike with those parts. I am unsure whether I should get disc brakes and a new hub for the front or not. Ahh well it should be fun.

[/mtb/gear] link

Pub Bike - 16:50
To join the annals of eccentric but interesting bikes with the couch bike I saw a link the other day to the ultimate Pub Bike. The joys of experiencing beer and cycling, and you do not even have to go to the Pub as the Pub can come to you.

[/mtb] link

Cookies'R'Us - 16:24
I was reading something on Saturday that made me want chocolate chip cookies, so I googled for a recipe, found one (with notes) and baked myself a batch of chocolate chip cookies, using oats rather than nuts.

They turned out fairly well, a soft texture, almost like a cake but still crunchy, this is due to the rise induced by the baking soda. I can understand why nuts or some other variations (adding fruit, etc) may be worthwhile to make them a bit more interesting as a biscuit. Maybe some rice bubbles in the mix would be good also. They went down fairly well on the Tallaganda ride I did on Monday, though when I was eating the cookies at home my milk consumption was rather high as they really did go down better with a glass of milk.

[/leisure/food] link

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