Bikeforums.net is a forum about nothing but bikes. Our community can help you find information about hard-to-find and localized information like bicycle tours, specialties like where in your area to have your recumbent bike serviced, or what are the best bicycle tires and seats for the activities you use your bike for.Novakane
08-20-12, 04:18 PM
I do not normally like to laugh at other people's troubles, however an incident I witnessed earlier made me chuckle inwardly.
I was in pedestrian mode, walking back from the store, waiting at a crosswalk for the light to change.
There's a fellow on his fixie repeatedly trying to look cool and do a track stand at the red light and failing miserably.
I take a look at his bike, the stickers are all off so it's an unknown steel frame, I can see that the braze on cable stops have all been roughly hacked off and it has no brakes so I immediately dislike his "build" for the purposeful damage to what was probably a nice frame and the lame attempt at making a now hideous bike "cooler" by running with no brakes.
My distaste increases as I notice he's spray painted the track cog, chain ring and the CHAIN with crappy bright coloured paint that is naturally peeling off all over the place.
Rims where black Mavics and clearly the only unmolested part on the bike.
Don't get me wrong - some fixies can look pretty slick, but this was NOT one of them, and seriously - leave the darned brakes on there... At least the front ones for the inevitable rear tire blow out from skid-stopping all the time.
If you want a clean look, get a cheaper frame that didn't have brazed cable stops - don't wreck a good frame! Buy a coloured chain or cogs if you want that sort of thing, and properly prep the surface before spraying on the other parts so the paint might actually stay there.
A little part of me dies any time I see one of these clueless hipster machines built by someone who doesn't know anything about bikes and they've just hacked it all up and spray bombed it with little thought.
Anyway, I digress...
After the light changes he starts his slow wobbly way through the intersection, and this is where the karma for wrecking a vintage bike comes into play - the non drive side crank drops right off onto the pavement and he has to try to stop with his feet (no danger of being hit, and even though he'd already travelled 10 feet he wasn't going fast anyway). He then awkwardly rolls backwards and tries to pick up the crank without getting off the bike, which naturally doesn't work. I'm not sure what he planned to do with the crank in his hand while still on the bike if he had managed to pick it up that way.
Guess he's a pedestrian now too. :lol:
I was in pedestrian mode, walking back from the store, waiting at a crosswalk for the light to change.
There's a fellow on his fixie repeatedly trying to look cool and do a track stand at the red light and failing miserably.
I take a look at his bike, the stickers are all off so it's an unknown steel frame, I can see that the braze on cable stops have all been roughly hacked off and it has no brakes so I immediately dislike his "build" for the purposeful damage to what was probably a nice frame and the lame attempt at making a now hideous bike "cooler" by running with no brakes.
My distaste increases as I notice he's spray painted the track cog, chain ring and the CHAIN with crappy bright coloured paint that is naturally peeling off all over the place.
Rims where black Mavics and clearly the only unmolested part on the bike.
Don't get me wrong - some fixies can look pretty slick, but this was NOT one of them, and seriously - leave the darned brakes on there... At least the front ones for the inevitable rear tire blow out from skid-stopping all the time.
If you want a clean look, get a cheaper frame that didn't have brazed cable stops - don't wreck a good frame! Buy a coloured chain or cogs if you want that sort of thing, and properly prep the surface before spraying on the other parts so the paint might actually stay there.
A little part of me dies any time I see one of these clueless hipster machines built by someone who doesn't know anything about bikes and they've just hacked it all up and spray bombed it with little thought.
Anyway, I digress...
After the light changes he starts his slow wobbly way through the intersection, and this is where the karma for wrecking a vintage bike comes into play - the non drive side crank drops right off onto the pavement and he has to try to stop with his feet (no danger of being hit, and even though he'd already travelled 10 feet he wasn't going fast anyway). He then awkwardly rolls backwards and tries to pick up the crank without getting off the bike, which naturally doesn't work. I'm not sure what he planned to do with the crank in his hand while still on the bike if he had managed to pick it up that way.
Guess he's a pedestrian now too. :lol: