Kickstand for Big Dummy
 

I'm really tired of loading the Dummy on an angle, the load just never gets on right. So I'm going to invest in a double kickstand, the contenders are the rolling jackass, the one Yuba mundo stand alone and xtracycle kickback.
I've heard that the kickback has issues with the Big Dummy, and not sure how the stand alone would work on the Dummy.
Any thoughts on which to get? I don't want to waste money but I use my bike for my business so th kickstand is an expense which makes the Jackass an option.

As most in the cycling community believe, if you can afford the best, get it. The RJ stand is what you're looking for. What is your business by the way?

Here is what I use;

http://thelazyrando.wordpress.com/20...-i-ever-spent/

Here is my review of the xtracycle kickback:

http://thelazyrando.wordpress.com/20...ckback-review/

The Rolling Jackass appears to be the best solution, but I've been fine with my $7 kickstand so I'm going to keep using it.

Thanks, I think I'll go with the rolling jackass, it's just hard to hit the buy now button for a $350 kickstand. I make and sell soap, it's heavy, deliver it on my bike whenever possible.
Here's a link to the dummy loaded and the set up. http://www.soapandsong.com/page/page/4037473.htmThose are some older pictures, I'm currently hauling more stuff to the market, can't see it in the picture but I bring a 15 pound umbrella stand. Been doing the market for about 3 years now, been in business for 12, used to have a trailer, the dummy is so much better. Once asked the guy at UPS what my boxes weighed-125 pounds that day.
I keep the wide loaders on the dummy all the time because it's usually boxes I'm hauling. I have had a regular kickstand since I got the dummy, one from the first batch, and it is just leaning too much when loading, I also have to remember to balance the load while loading going back and forth, had a box go over a couple of weeks ago while loading and messed up some items and irritated me.

If you keep the wide loaders on the Dummy full time and don't run an IGH you eliminate my two biggest objections for the kickback stand. The RJ is much nicer though and for your application the heavy duty construction and remote deployment lever might be well worth it in the long run.

The Stand Alone for the Mundo is pretty nice. Comparing the designs, it might be more stable than the RJ. However, I think (but I'm not sure) that it only works with the Mundo's particular mounting plate. I might be mistaken on that.

For more impartial feedback on the Rolling Jackass, take a look at these folks: http://civilizedconveyance.blogspot....?q=centerstand and their Flickr set: http://www.flickr.com/photos/4010027...7624170409140/

Yeah, I also don't think it would work with a BD, it's designed for a plate in the center, the BD has a plate on the side.

I just can't imagine a situation that would make pay 350 bucks for a kickstand :eek:

PS.: Yeah, see this video, about 10 seconds into the video it shows that the Yuba stand is attached with two bolts to a plate in the middle, between stays. That won't work with a BD.

Re your Kickback review, I'm using the Xtracycle Kickback on my Big Dummy, Rohloff hub, 38/16 and Rohloff tensioner. I do not have chain rub issues with this set up.
What chainring/ sprocket combo are you running?

Would you buy a motorcycle without a kickstand?
Would you buy a car without a parking brake?
What about a wheelbarrow with only one rear foot?

If you need to transport cargo with a vehicle, you need it to stay put and upright while you load and unload it. A good longtail build costs what, $2000+? And you complain about $350 for a top-of-the-line part that's stronger, more stable, and easier to use than anything else on the market, providing a function that is absolutely critical to the central purpose of the bike?

The kickback is nice for light-duty loading, but if you're really going to go crazy it's not enough.

Also, remote deployment is the sweetest thing ever.

-Dave
civilizedconveyance.blogspot.com

I've looked at the rolling jackass before but it is hard to hit the buy now button for a $350 kickstand, but again it's for my business and so it will be a deduction. I get a lot of comments and picture takers at the Farmer's market because of my bike. The vendor next to me wasn't impressed because she thought I only rode a few blocks, when I said 8.6 miles (one way) she was impressed. The market is every Saturday of the year and I also deliver to UPS and local stores on my bike whenever I can so it really is something that will make life easier. There's times when I can hardly hold the bike up the load is so heavy so the deployment is a factor.
I don't know what chain ring and sprocket is on the bike, it's what came with xtracycles original dummy set-up.

You have just earned your MBA: Master of Bad Analogies. Even assuming a $3,000 build (which is more than average build) a $350 stand is over 10% of the bike cost. Does a motorcycle kickstand cost over 10% of the cost of the motorcycle? Does a car handbrake cost over %10 percent of the car's cost? My BD cost just over $2,000, why would I put a $350 kickstand on it is beyond me, sorry. I'm not saying it's a bad kickstand, it just costs way too much.

I have a Yuba side kickstand on my BD. If I had the need for a dual stand I'd get the one from Xtracycle. Remote deployment? What's next? Airbags?

trunk monkey.

If I had the money, I would get the Jackass, I regret buying the Xtra stand. Just a few days ago, I took off the right side wideloader to more easily cruise our city trails and I remember why I don't take it off usually. It is a stupid design, I don't know what the folks at Xtracycle were smoking but it was some bad stuff on that day. I never compare the cost of an attachment like a kickstand to the cost of the bike, I compare the cost to the usefullness of the product. If I needed really nice shifters on a crappy bike then I would get them, knowing I could transfer them to a better bike later.
Other than the terrible design of the kickstand, I do love the stability of the bike though I did add another piece to widen the kickstand on the side I load heavier pipe on. Did I mention how hard it is to deploy if I am using both sides of wideloaders? I had to add a piece to the front so I could catch the kickstand with my foot because I can't reach it with the wideloaders on.

38 x 16 with Rohloff dual pulley tensioner. The guy I got my Kickback from had the same setup and had the same rub. A number of other BD owners have reported the same thing. If that was the only issue I'd probably still be using the Kickback, but added to the other functionality issues it was simply too many negatives to justify using it.

I have one of the first batch of BD's made. It's possible that something has changed.

from the tech manual

so maybe the 17/40 combination offers better clearance ?

Mine is an '08, 18" frame.

The analogies weren't about the price of the stand as a fraction of the bike cost, although I can see how my comments could have been read that way, sorry for the misunderstanding (god help me with the puns).

I had two points:

1) Any mode of stuff-conveyance without a good way to hold it steady while loading/unloading cargo is broken. Of course the design of one vehicle vs. another makes the engineering problem of holding it steady while stopped more or less difficult, and therefore more or less expensive) to solve.

Cars/trucks/tricycles have cheap "stands" because they already have three or four points of contact with the ground, all you need is a parking brake. A motorcycle or bicycle, however has the added complication of the stand needing to provide a third (and maybe fourth) point of stability which must be off the frame axis. Motorcycles have relatively inexpensive stands due to having some width in the frame so the stand doesn't need to be a lateral structural member. Bakfiets and the Madsen are similar. Xtracycles are inbetween those and a normal bike because there's a little width (which it utilized by the KickBack), but it's really not enough for large loads. The Rolling Jackass solves the engineering problem without relying (much) on frame width. That's why it's expensive.

2) Even if it costs 10% of the cost of the bike, it provides much more than 10% of the usefulness of the bike. To look at it from the other side, if you love everything else about your longtail and the only thing that frustrates you is loading and unloading because it won'st stay upright, then for a mere 10% premium in price you can reduce your daily frustration by 100%!

Good deal!
-Dave

The RJ costs what it does because it's made in small batches in the US. If it was made by Xtracycle in Taiwan it could be sold quite a bit cheaper. Functionally the most important improvement of the RJ over the Kickback is the fact you don't have to uninstall and reinstall it every time you add/remove your wideloaders. I do that multiple times a day and it was a HUGE PITA. I have no issue with the RJ's price and if I carried different loads I'd probably buy one. I've been getting by with a $7 kickstand so I'll keep rocking that until it fails.

The remote deployment is useful if you carry very heavy or very precious loads. You may not need that feature, but I wouldn't knock a guy like Val who knows a lot about bikes and put a ton of energy and $$ into making a great product. A product that is far superior to the flawed design sold by Xtracycle.

Hell,any competent welder/fabricator could make up a centerstand as good or better as the RJ for half the price.It may be a decent piece but still no where near 350 bux.But hey if it makes some feel better,???

Timothias, Really? Have you tried it? Designing a kickstand or anything that fits many bikes is not easy. Takes time and trial and error.

It costs absolutely nothing to make a post like this and requires absolutely no backing up with action. As soon as you are selling a comparable stand to the RJ for 50% of the cost let me know.

Hear hear.

I was going to do exactly that for a one-off for myself, but since I have only limited tooling available these days it was going to take a serious investment, much more than $350, to get my stand. Not to mention the time spent designing, prototyping, testing, redesigning, etc. With a growing family and a decent (but high-hour) job my time is much better spent either working or being with my family and using the proceeds to pay the guy who already figured that stuff out for his time.

I certainly pondered the idea of tooling up and going into business. Frankly, I think Val should start collaborating with a frame builder or machine shop (I believe the steel bits of the RJ are already being outsourced to a frame builder) who has some experience in manufacturing process optimization. I think the price could be brought down significantly even while keeping it stateside if the amount of handwork was cut down.

Joe Ahearne may be someone Val would want to talk to. He does very impressive things with steel, has some experience managing subcontractors (his Cycle Truck is made by Co-Motion), and really wants better centerstands out there. In fact he's importing the Ursus stands because he couldn't find a reasonable one readily available on the market. I'd love to see Val and Joe put together a made-in-USA wing-type center stand (like the Ursus, Pletcher, etc.) for short-chainstay bikes and work out manufacturing issues on the RJ and offer them both at ~$150-200/ea.

Seattle-Portland collaboration ahoy!
-Dave

I Don't have enough post to sent PM's so I'm posting
When I don't have a huge load I use the LHT with panniers, I can carry a lot of stuff with them, in the past I've had 2 gallons of distilled water in addition to other groceries. Got the panniers at performance, they no longer carry the exact ones I have but these are similar http://www.performancebike.com/bikes...0_20000_400103 IF I could only have one bike it would be the Dummy but I got the LHT for faster long distance rides, although I'm a proponent of "style over speed" and don't go a whole lot faster on the LHT.
But if you can't afford or or not ready for a longtail there's a lot you can do with a good set of panniers.

This has all certainly been interesting and amusing, and I probably don't even need to say anything, but what the heck. I did make sure to point this thread out to my good freind Colin ( haulincolin.com ), who is an excellent fabricator and welder, and who subcontracts the basic fabrication work on the stands for me. He has also been a tremendous help with design issues. If you look here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/haulincolin/ you can see some pictures of stands in process. With all this history between us, I think I will keep my collaboration local. Nothing against Mr. Ahearne - I have met him, and discussed centerstands at lenght with him; he's a great guy, and a dedicated bike creator - but Colin's my man.