Dear scrod,

What's the warranty on Dodici frame goods? Like leaders?

every bike i get, gets a good knife scratch right away so theres no pouting later on. i like my bikes pristine, but after the first one is there, you become rational about the incoming ones, and only 1/10th get noticed by people drooling on your bike

3 year warranty against defects.

This may be a stupid question, but what is the difference between say.. a $50 FSA Chainring, and a $150 Zen racing chainring? Other than weight, would I be risking anything going for the cheaper option?

The Zen ring is machined/finished much nicer, looks fancy and may be a little stiffer.

So in other words, not that big of a deal.

can't tell if serious


the fsa ones are really that round and hard? aren't the zen rings like, waay nicer metal? is it all hype or do zen rings stay rounder longer? like, much rounder, much longer?

You can get a used zen on ebay for $55-$75

Can I use a tire bead jack in lieu of 2 or 3 tire levers? Should I carry both?

Tire bead jack puts tires on, doesn't take them off.

/scrotnod

The FSA rings do seem softer than Sugino 75 or Zen rings. The one I used for a couple of months already had visible wear/marring on the teeth, where my 75 ring still shows none after a lot more use. I've never used a Zen ring.

Thanks notscrod.

Scrod,

I want to open up about something. I've "battled" acne for pretty much the past year. Fairly recently I visited the dermatologist; he wrote me a prescription for an antibiotic and 2 creams. In the meantime, I'll be applying the cream and taking the antibiotic. My question is this: how would you cope with it? It's not going to go away for a while and I am very self conscious about it. Kids don't make fun of me but I am sometimes avoided because of it.

Thanks in advance.

I had sporadic bouts of acne for a while when I was a teenager. Not ridiculously bad but bad enough to make me self-conscious about it. Everything I got from my dermatologist either dried my skin out to the point where it would literally crack or it did nothing at all. Then I went vegan and my acne literally went away immediately. I'm not vegan any more (although I was for just over 8 years) and I'm not suggesting you take on a change of diet as serious as veganism - but changing up your diet a little bit will very likely help.

If you eat a lot of fatty, salty or fried food, cut back. Eat some fruit and raw vegetables, for ****'s sake! Stay hydrated. Too much caffeine will dehydrate your skin and cause your body to overcompensate by releasing oils, which it turn make you break out. Drink organic milk, as the overload of hormone additives found in typical milk will wreak havoc on your skin (and the rest of your body). Also - sugar substitutes are a common cause of nasty skin reactions and zits, especially in young people. And lastly, lay off the crystal meth. That **** might be fun for a while but it will make you ugly.

*knocks on wood*

I've never had an acne breakout, and I don't do jack about skin care.

How hard should I go on my road ride tomorrow?

Gotcha. I've already tried to cut as much fatty foods as possible. I never though of organic milk! Cutting meth will be hard though.

Do you think I should follow through with the dermo's suggestions?

mine went away in my mid thirties. SORRY MANG U R SCREWED

I can sympathize with you though, my sister deals with it though...

I hear you. Thanks.

I always prefer letting my own body take care of minor ailments and try my hardest to avoid any type of medications. Some antibiotics tend to kill the "good" bacteria in your body too, which causes your immune system to become very sensitive and easily upset. A lot of those acne creams just confuse your skin and prevent it from doing what it should be doing naturally.

Anything with added hormones will cause all kinds of turmoil in your body, especially considering that you are young and full of hormones already. Hormone levels in found most chicken and red meat are ridiculous too - go organic when you can and I bet you'll see a difference. Think about it this way: when a girl goes on the pill, she almost ALWAYS immediately gains weight, gets acne and gets depressed or moody, due to the sudden unnatural overload of hormones.

Point taken. Thanks for everything!

No prob, man.

I know I'm teetering on the edge of a rant here but the amount of bull**** the food industry pushes down our throats is terrible. When animals are fed growth hormones and a bunch of other crap so they can mature faster to produce more milk and become carne asada without hanging around spending the factory farm's money for years and years, those hormones and chemicals are passed on to whoever consumes their meat and drinks their milk. It's the reason my 12 year old nephew can grow a mustache and why we're all becoming so ****ing fat and passive in this country.

i really think diet is a huge part of it and scrod nailed it.

i'll open up too: i used to be super self-conscious about the moderate to bad but not terribly severe acne i had, and while no one teased, i'm sure it accounted for some of the girls turning me down or guys deciding they didn't want to be my friend. what you learn as you get older is that those are the kinds of people you don't want to associate with anyway, so the self-consciousness is best left behind as soon as you can get over it. i know you don't feel like you're still a kid, but give it a few years and you will feel that way.

what sucks is that while my face is relatively much clearer at my geezery age of 27, it's just moved to my shoulders and upper arms. which is ****ing gross. and it's never the whitehead super quick developing and super fast healing stuff, it's the deep under the skin painful hard pack detonators that entrench themselves slowly over a number of days or weeks and then grow in pain and won't pop ever unless you go all army corp of engineers on them.

none of the medications worked for me, and while i sometimes use some ex-girlfriend's neutrageena exfoliating acidic crap that she left in my shower(girls man WHY) i can't ever really tell that it works or doesn't work. and it sure seems as though it doesn't on my arms and shoulders.

Should I push hard on tomorrow's road ride?