Lens Hero

So I got a link to a website called, lenshero.com. I thought I'd take a look. Turns out it's pretty slick.
I am just learning about cameras and don't know a whole lot yet. So the comprehensive list of lenses they had allowed me to actually put in the exact lenses I have. Then they suggested a lens to fill in a gap I have. I was thinking about a 40mm or so fixed lens that would help out a bit in lower light situations. They suggested a 50mm lens that actually makes some more sense. So that's pretty cool.
Learning camera stuff, I need all the help I can get, and this is a good resource. As I get more into shooting, I'll be back to look at other lenses. Head on over and check it out!

The Salsa Fargo

Hey All,

I have been riding a Salsa Fargo for a little while now. Before you get too much farther, I have to admit this is a biased opinion. (Hard to have an unbiased opinion. If there was no bias to it, it's just the facts, ma'am.) So far I love this bike. I've worked in shops and have had several bikes in my time, I classify myself as a "bike geek."

I seem to be amassing bikes as I go. They get replaced and disappear and recently have been showing back up. The Fargo is the first bike I have ever owned that actually makes me think about getting rid of bikes. It's the only bike I've ever owned that I truly feel could be the ONLY bike I own. That would be thinning the heard from 7 to 1. (Or 7.5 to 1.5 if you count the Skate Bike.)

The Plan:

First off lets cover, real quick like, what the Fargo is intended to be. Salsa has been cultivating a line of bikes based on this wacky "adventure by bike" mentality, which is 10lb Awesome in a 5lb bag! The Fargo is intended to be a drop bar adventure touring bike. The geometry is designed around using the drop bars, 29'r wheels, a higher riding position and, on my version, a non suspension corrected fork(more on this at the end). In comparison to a rigid 29er it's a little longer in the wheel base and has a lower BB height. Both of these are the "touring" inspiration of the adventure touring theme.

My Bike:

I'm 5'8" with a real 30" inseam. I test rode a Medium Fargo at University Bikes in Boulder. (Side note: The folks at U-bikes were awesome and let me rock the Fargo on both 29x2.3" tires and 700x38 tires, they were stoked on the bike and stoked to show it to some one.) On the medium I was pretty sure my wife and I's plans of curating a family would be in danger on uneven ground so I went with the size small. On the test ride I was struck by how the bike changed personalities. Like Jeckyl and Hyde, when the bike had the 2.3's it felt stable and confident and a little disappointed that there wasn't any single track on my test route. When we put the 38's on there it felt fast and nimble ready to go tear up the nastiest of urban/suburban commutes. So I ordered my size small frame from U-Bikes and got back to spec'ing the parts.

The Build:

I built up my Fargo a little different than the stock complete from Salsa. I had some specific intentions for my bike, those being:

• Commuting - paved, dirt road, single track and deep gravel on my 5 mile commute
• Fully loaded touring paved and mild unpaved
• Gravel road exploration
• single-track

I went with a large sweep bar, the Origin 8 Space Bar. I've never ridden drop bars off road but they didn't give me tinglies, in a good way, on the test ride. So, I went with something else I'd never tried. Brilliant, I know. I also went with a touring crank. A Truvative Fire-x, because I could get it with a 48t big ring, for those paved loaded descents. Sram X-9 thumb shifters/drive train changes the gears and some Mavic hoops on XT hubs rounded out the bike, ish. Avid BB7's to reduce the pucker factor and I also got a front and rear rack and Planet Bikes Cascadia 29er fenders. (Which are awesome fenders.)

I specifically targeted the Fargo for it's versatility. The 29 wheels give me a ton of tire choices. I wanted disc brakes for the touring and single track. Plus a slurry of braze-on's for racks, fenders and bottle cages meant I wouldn't have to rig up everything.

Single-Track:

Stable and confident, I was able to take loose off camber corners faster on the Fargo than on my 26" full suspension rig. I also felt a lot more stable in deep gravel both up hill and down. However, with the lower BB I clipped more pedals and the 48t chainring has a couple "custom" shift ramps. The added confidence from the Fargo did translate well back to my 26er.

Commuting/Touring:

With the ability to swap from a 700x32 to a 29x2.3 I was able to change routes and tires to match my mood and any sides trips to and from work. The added stability translated well in the bad weather. I had a lot of trouble with the high rake on the front fork getting the front low-rider rack mounted level. I ended up putting it in backwards to get it close to level. Which worked for a 100 mile touring weekend and for trips to and from work. Also with the low location of the braze-on's on my seat stays there was a lot or distance to cover from the rear of the rear rack to the bolts.

This allowed a slight wobble on the loaded rack at 35mph. 40 turned out to be as fast as I was willing to go. I think a stronger rack, like a Tubus (or the new stuff from Salsa, more later) would not have had this issue, nor a larger sized frame. I think I gave up some efficiency on the road most of the tour, but got a lot back when we turned off the pavement and did less walking, when I caught up.

Gravel:

As a gravel machine it did well with the bigger tires. I have to take a lot of pavement to get to the gravel around here so I started out with the 700x32's. In doing I clipped several rocks with the pedals, granted I ride a larger pedal. However when I switched over to my 29x2.3's and tried the same route, it went much better. I didn't loose as much on the road as I expected and gained a lot more on the gravel.

Conclusion:

I LOVE this bike, did I mention that? Should be enough but for those that don't want to read

all of the above, (in the words of Inigo Montoya) "Lemme sum up".

Fast, stable and confident off road and in bad conditions but low BB height. Great for touring (thank you low BB height.), commuting and all kinds of rides. Getting racks to fit is a challenge but can be over come. Disc brakes allow easy wheel changes to accomodate the tire options. I appreciate that this bike takes me places like the above picture.

New to the Table:

Salsa has not given up on this bike by any stretch. They have revamped the fork/frame geo to allow the option of a suspension fork and their new Anything Cage. Also Salsa has a slew of new racks that will work much better than anything I have tried up to now. Also, it come in Ti as well. Yeah, so combine the 'I'd sell all of my bikes but this one' mentality with a Ti version over Chromo. Think about that for a second and picture your garage with A bike in it, clean, tidy, spacious. Yet you can't seem to get that grin off of your face, weird.

Recommendation:

If you plan on riding a bike to something that isn't pavement, and riding from there, ever. Buy this bike. LOVE IT!

P.S. I warned you it was biased.

P.P.S. I'm working on kid toting solutions currently. As soon as The Kiddo has an 18" circumference head and I have something to put him in I'll let you know what has worked well for me.

Time RXS Pedals

Hey All,

I have been riding a pair of Time RXS pedals. The ones I have (or had he said in foreshadowing manner) are the entry level pedals in the RXS line. I got them for one basic reason, they were

the cheapest thing I could get my hands on and they were relatively light. I was building up my road bike at the time and wanted a 3 bolt "Look" style cleat that wasn't a Shimano or a Look. These guys don't really need any help selling their product and it's what most people have. I like to be a little different, that's why this is "as close to a regular guys opinion" as I can give. Here is a picture I sourced from Amazon.com, which looks like they took from QBP.

The pedals quickly got recalled as the cap at the spindle, with the RXS logo in the picture, would come lose and the pedal would fall off the spindle. Really the kind of thing that would only be an issue for a New Fred, not the thing a mechanic would miss. You SHOULD notice anytime something clicks, thunks, creaks or wiggles and take care of it immediately. Parts don't just fall off. JRA is usually your falt. Once I had the pedals back they worked pretty well. Also Time was super good and fast about getting them repaired and sent back to me.

The biggest issue I had with the pedals for the first year of ownership was that they were a bit stiff at spindle and maybe too light. As the back of the pedal didn't always hang down. This was worse after getting them back from the recall and never got much better. They may have been just a skoash tighter due to concerns about the recall. Not a huge deal except that you could hook the front of the cleat into the back of the bottom of the pedal (this would be opposite the top front where you should clip in). So it felt like you were about to lock in but never could. When you would look at the pedal it was upside down. Bummer. But for the first year of use this was my only complaint. The cleats were easy enough to walk in, but wore out. Like all cleats they wear out. Mine lasted about a year. I walk a lot in my cleats and the fracture in the cleat was due to walking not riding. They were easy enough to find at several local shops, always a plus. They were a bit expensive but I bought in kind of a rush. Online they are more reasonably priced. I had little or no trouble setting up the pedal and was able to get the spindle under the ball of my foot well and adjust the Q-factor so I could keep my knees in line.

The final demise of the pedals came not that long ago about a mile from my house. I was stopped at a busy intersection in the left turn lane. When I stepped back onto the left pedal I placed the cleat slightly on top of the crank as it was in the forward most position. As I pushed down on the pedal and the crank rotated down pushing my cleat and shoe outward to where it should have been. Then, there was a snap, the sound of plastic hitting the ground and my foot quit moving. I pushed ever onward through the intersection before I was able to asses the carnage. When the crank pushed the cleat/shoe outboard, the toe of the cleat had hooked on the inside triangle of the pedal, in the wrong spot. When it shifted outward the triangle snapped off, as you can see in the image above. The broken part still lives in the intersection. (Well, maybe not as they are rebuilding that as we speak, er write, er read. Or, as I write and you eventually read.) It looks like there is a stress riser at the two points where the fracture propagated from. These stress risers, or sharp corners, are due to the parting line on the molding tool that creates the parts. Hopefully it has been, or is being, designed out as I sent images and a description to Time, that should be all they need! As of this writing I haven't heard back, weird. I have read from Zack Vestal, over at Velonews.com in this article, that this is a noted problem on the RXS line of pedals.

I got about 2.5 years of life out of the pedals. All in all I would recommend the pedals. They rode nicely and were easy to set up and pretty cheap. They felt very stiff for the price and were pretty light. I liked the nice wide platform coming from Speedplays the tensioned float is a nice change. If you like a positive feel to a moving heal, totally personal preference. Honestly, I worry more about things working and being comfortable than the weight, that can easily be looked up by you. And, if you get a set I've got a great set of back up cleats you can have!

The Moby Wrap

***UPDATE***

Quick update on the Moby after the trip home to see the family. It is even better than I expected. Two big things. One, we didn't take a stroller so that saved us a whole checked bag, keeping our entourage at 3 checked bags including the car seat bag (highly recommended and borrowable if your're near by). With the two carry-on's strapped to the rolling checked bags in each hand and the car seat on my back and the kid on my front, in the Moby, I was able to move our whole setup by myself. Awesome.
Thing number 2: With all my metal in the carry on and The Kiddo in the Moby, I was able to walk right through security at DIA and IND without taking him out or stopping. This one thing, in my opinion humble and co

rrect as it may be, makes the cost of the Moby ($35 or so) worth it.

As you can see by the picture, he loves the thing. This is us at 100 Acres in Indy. Outdoor Art. At least it was a nice walk.

***UPDATE ABOVE***

Hey,

So, mostly I'll focus on bike stuff, why? Well, that's because I like bike stuff and I use it and I wanna talk about it. But, tonight I sit up waiting for my 7 week old son to wake up so I can put him back to sleep. He has Colic. I hate saying it cause no one really knows what Colic is, but it really sucks for parents. So any tool that makes dealing with it easier, I'm down for. There are all kinds of things that people swear by for Colic, mine is the Moby Wrap.

First off, what is it? Well, it's a long, 6-8 feet maybe, strip of fabric that's about 2 feet wide. I haven't measured, you don't seriously think I have time for that? It's a slightly stretchy cotton fabric. You fold it in half length-ways and, as the name says, wrap it around you in a very specific way. Depending on how you wrap it you can position the child in a variety of spots for a variety of ages. This thing will even lock down a pair of twins to your chest. Check out Moby's website for all the config's.

http://www.mobywrap.com/


I set it up so Hunter, The Kiddo, sits chest to chest in the middle of my chest. This frees up my hands to do stuff, like carry two beers at the street fair, or get things ready for bed time. All well and good, but what does that have to do with Colic?

Well, safely "jiggling" (Definitely not shaking) a Colicky baby can help soothe them. This thing allows me to walk around, the house, neighborhood or street fair without blowing out my arms and safely soothe The Kiddo. Our boy is asleep in moments after starting for a walk in the Moby wrap. As a frazzled parent of a Colicky Kid, having a reliable go-to solution for crying is a life saver. Also, even on a hot summer evening crowded street both of us only end up with a slightly damp chest. Just enough to wrinkle a t-shirt, but not enough to feel wet. The wrap also rolls up fairly small to go into a diaper bag, way more convenient than a stroller.

All in all, for a Hippy looking get up, it's great. We were pretty disappointed when The Wife and I thought we lost it. We are heading home for the 4th of July and will be traveling with the Moby. If something of note comes up, I'll get it up here. And, just so every one knows, The Wife found the wrap at a sale for pretty cheap to get us started. But there was no doubt, when we thought we lost it, we were going to buy another one at whatever price we could get.

I'm anxious to write about my Fargo, but I want some pics and such and would like to do it right, and not half asleep. Ok, I'm off to try and get some sleep. Talk to ya!

Only the Beginning

Hey All,

So, I'm a regular guy (I think?). But I do stuff, and I use stuff and that causes me to generate opinions. Seems normal. So I've decide to share those opinions with you, the internets. In an effort to focus things, I won't start now, but in the future I'll review stuff I use and things I do here. You, the reader, can take those reviews for whatever you want. (OK can't hold off, first opinion, I probably won't care how you feel about how I feel.) But, I'm a critical thinker and love an intelligent discussion about anything. So pipe up.
Anyhoo, I ride bikes, fast ones, slow ones, commuter ones, little ones, big ones even skate ones. I'm cheap, a Dad, a volunteer, a beer drinker, an outdoorsy and lazy. So, if something I use for these things is exceptionally average, crappy or awesome, I'll talk about it here. In a "To Be Continued" teaser vein, I've got the following things to talk about (in the future):

The Salsa Fargo
Hightech's Solarpod
Gmail
The Moby Wrap
Time pedals
Water/fire resistant flashlights
Google Docs and Microsoft's version
Apple products

Mmmm, now your interested! I really like some of these things and really dislike others. You'll just have to wait and read the reviews to find out which ens is which.

That's all for now, I'm surprised you've made it this far. Talk to ya!