HID = High Intensity Discharge light

The problem is that those things put out some nasty EM either from the element itself or from the ballast. They oftentimes interfere with wireless setups especially given the close proximity of the two units.

If anyone happens to be riding in Ventura County, CA, I've got a hill for them. Wildwood Avenue in Thousand Oaks. Super steep, mildly twisty, and no cross traffic. I hit 52MPH without pedalling, on a Trek 1200. I thought my knees would have crimped the top tube. Now we call it quits at anything over about 60KPH on the tandem.

As Galileo proved a long time ago, the mass of an object does not affect how fast gravity pulls it down-->they're all still accelerated at 9.8m/s/s. The only thing would be the frontal surface area, affecting the drag.

I later read in the thread that this has been hashed a million times already... I too go much faster downhill than the rest of my family. Just coasting I pass them like they were standing still and no they are not on the brakes. I don't like going super fast... I can't help but thinking "what if I crash"
D

I think there's a difference between free-falling through air, and rolling down a hill. I could be wrong, but our tandem certainly rolls faster downhill than my single bike does. And the extra wheelbase does wonders for stability.

Exactly. Rate of acceleration is the same, but you have to take air resistance into account. The frontal area of a heavy person is almost identical to the frontal area of a light person. With more weight, the force of acceleration is more (it takes more force to accelerate a heavier weight at the same rate) but the impeding effect of air resistance is not more.

To me it seems that after I hit 50 - 52 mph pedaling is pretty much worthless. At that point just tucking down and getting as little wind resistance as possible seems to be the best. So far my top speed has been 57.5 mph. I'm hoping for 60 this year. Not sure if it will happen or not, I'm going to be missing the extra 30+ pounds on when going downhill, going to be loving it going up though.

Thank you.

Man, on my MTB I spun out in 44-11 and only hit about 42!! Good work

pretty sure galileo used a meter to measure time not distance. i wonder how far that tower has to lean before you can ride a bike down it.

There's an electrical sub-station near a microwave antenna about 18 miles into one of my routes. I have actually made it to 308 MPH in that stretch.

Also, there was one weekend where my riding partner replaced the battery in his computer. I was able to keep up with him while doing only 16 MPH while he was traveling at 23 MPH. He slowed down considerably when the LBS reprogrammed his computer however.