Thursday, June 25, 2009

Framed!

The replacement frame from Giant has been at Absolute Bikes since Tuesday, but I haven't had a chance to pick it up until today. I blame having the bottom bracket faced and chased, rain, and a fun ride down to Prescott on the motorcycle. But, today I rode over and picked it up after work, and built it up with a 9 speed drivetrain, an upgrade from the 7 speed on the old frame.

What, how else did you think I'd get it home?

In all, building it up went fairly well, until I started messing with the gears. After about an hour, I decided it was close enough to take it on a test ride around Soldier's Loop. Nothing on the bike failed, which is good, but, I need to do two things. First is find a flat bar to replace the riser bar I have now. The new frame has a very tall headtube, and even without any headset spacers, the bars are so high now that I'm almost upright on the bike, which doesn't leave me much control on technical sections.

The second thing I need to do is find the person who decided to make 9 speed drivetrains an industry standard, and beat him to death with a chainwhip with a 9 speed cassette attached to it. Why is everything nice made for 9 speed drivetrains anymore?

But all that aside, I got my bike back!


My and Alex's bikes overlooking Jerome and the Verde Valley, on our ride down to Prescott yesterday.


Mileage: 14.5

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