Another porteur

I've had this Trek 720 for about 4 years. It's a super sweet frame. 1983 was a good year at Trek. A couple years ago, I put some high-rake forks (painted by buddy Patrick) on it and Alex made me the sweet rack. Last year, I bought the Swift Industries bag. Sweet bag. Pretty much rain-proof. And egg-proof too.

Most of it's life with me it's been built up as a fixed gear. In the last couple years I really only get into the fixed gear in the winter when I need a studded bike for ice. Now that winter is over I decided to porteur-ize the bike for tooling around town.


It's got the Nexus 8-speed hub, Albatross bars, and a low stem with lots of reach to push the bars out. It's pretty comfy. I've really been into platform pedals, tennis shoes, jeans, and headphones lately. Maybe it's just a phase, but I dig it. I rode Liza's hacked Fuji this week too.

When you set up a bike with swept-back bars and platform pedals and a big-ass turdy IG hub, it's hard not to chill out and enjoy being on a bike in a way that feels like only a bike can make you feel: I'm in no hurry when I'm rolling like this. And with the spring and the sun coming on, and some good music, I end up taking the long way home. Slowly.


I had a single speed mountain bike for a few days before the chain exploded. It's getting track dropouts at the moment (literally, I think there is a very good chance that Glen is brazing the new dropouts on that bike as I type this). That bike will be a platform pedaled beauty too -- for trail riding and chilled day time cruising. Pics to come.

Another production porteur in the 2010 line up?

Thanks to Jan via Alex for tipping me off. Looks like Electra is joining the big-company, porteur-esque bike plan. Looks like their calling it a Ticino.

Nothing on the official Electra site, but some bike shop has this page up, which is where I lifted the pics from.

This is great to see another big company getting into practical bikes.

I've never been a fan of the Electra style -- super slack cruisers just don't do it for me.

Although the design of this new bike looks to be taken from the Rene Herse photos in The Golden Age of Handbuilt Bicycles, it appears Electra is still sticking to the ultra-slack seat tube. I have a hard time figuring head tube angle from a photo, but that appears pretty slack too. That said, there's shitloads of fork rake, so there's a good chance the front-end may handle nicely with a load.

Dig the cranks, a nice facsimile of the TA Cyclotourists. Or maybe they are TAs? Nice hammered fenders. Bar-end brakes, downtube shifters on the men's bike. Beautiful ladies frame -- not sure on the shifters on the ladies frame.

Geez. Nicely done from an aesthetic point of view. I wonder how the HT/ST angle will impact the handling. I hope Bike Quarterly can get their mitts on this to test it.

Round up

Last Friday, Willy, Patrick, Joe, and I rode the first half of the Midnight Century. It was too hot for that kind of tomfoolery. Joe was smart; he bailed at Liberty Lake and went back to Spokane on the trail. Willy, Patrick, and I pressed on. It was about 98 F. I drank lots of water. Probably about 2 gallons. But I only peed once at the end of the day. Not good. Coming up Sands Road, I was getting a bit rummy and sort of spacey. A couple miles later we came to the top of a hill where someone was watering their lawn. There was also a fruit tree in the yard. We broke our "don't stop longer than 5 minutes rule" and soaked in the sprinklers and hung out under the tree. That made all the difference.
The t-shirts are hanging in Object Space, they are part of a show that Bruce Hormann has put together a show, "Punk Art Retrospective 197?-2009". I lease a space in the Object Space building from Bruce for my day job so I've been watching this show come together. I wasn't into punk when I grew up here in the 80's, but this collection is still really fascinating to me. Spokane had (and still has) a rich sort of underground culture. I don't know how else to classify it, "underground," "punk," "non-mainstream?" I don't know, but looking at the zines and band fliers that span the last 20+ years I am sort of regretful that I didn't explore more of the edges of the music scene in Spokane as I grew up. This show captures a local piece of historical perspective that I think is important. The care that Bruce takes in cataloging the hundreds of pieces that have been dug out of attics and basements and back rooms by his friends is impressive. You should go and you should donate a few bucks to the donation jar so Bruce can continue to do shows that no one else in town would or could do. Opening reception is tomorrow night and the show runs through the end of the month. Hours are 4pm till late-ish. It's at 1818 1/2 E Sprague.

This is Jens. He's German. He's 23 and he's travelled more miles on his bike since he was 16 than I'll probably ever travel. He rolled through town on July 18th, which was fortunate for him since it was my birthday and we were having a backyard movie and cake. It was also fortunate since July 18th was also his birthday.

A couple interesting Jens facts:

• His first tour was across Europe when he was 16
• When he was 19 he rode from Turkey to Vietnam, via Iran, Pakistan, over the Himalayas, through China, and Laos. I needled him for a couple hours on this trip. Amazing stories. His way into China and how he had to work the visa system is impressive and took some serious guts.
• Zoom in on his bike pic there and you'll see a little box taped to his head tube. It's a recharging unit his buddy made for him. It contains a couple cell phone batteries. During the day he charges the batteries with his dynohub, then at night he has a bit of juice for charging his phone or other small devices.
• His bike is hearty. Tried and true stuff there.

Here's a porteur from Specialized. It's called the Globe Live. Whoa Nelly. I don't want to say I told you so, but I called this one.

On paper they've done a really good job with their first attempt. We can't give them too much credit, since the design has been well-known for over 50 years, but the fact that they got the essential details right is heads and tails above what other big bike companies have done when they attempt a practical bike (ahem-Simple City-ahem). The Medium and Large sizes have low trail to handle the front load. It ships with fattish tires (35mm) and full aluminum fenders (that's a big deal); it's got nice components, not junk - a chain guard. The fancier versions have 8 speed internal hubs, with the fanciest running Alfine and disks.

In my opinion, there are two screw ups. Clearly, it should be a steel bike, but that's really just my preference and not a screw up. Though, some would argue that a properly raked and tapered steel fork would make for a much smoother ride than the fork that ships with it and I'd agree with them.

But here's the nits:

1. The Small size uses 700c wheels. It's got to be expensive to spec different sized wheels when your doing huge runs on these bikes, but you can't get the front end right on this bike when you shrink it and put 700c wheels on it. The small size looses the low trail and therefore looses the handling characteristics of such bikes when you load them up. If you buy it. Don't buy the small.

2. The rack will wobble if you put too much weight in it. It's not triangulated properly. As Jan Heine noted on an iBOB thread discussing this rack:

some people still don't understand triangulation of racks - this one is a  perfect parallelogram with slanted sides. Put a heavy load on it, and  it'll try to flatten out, going down and toward the back. And since  it's not supported at the top, it'll tend to swing sideways, too. 

All the same, I think this is a great effort by a big bike company. At $600 the single speed version is tempting. The multi-geared versions use an eccentric bottom bracket for tensioning. And the super version uses a belt drive! Pretty sensible, that.

I had more to say. But for the love of Pete. I gotta stop. If you read this far. Thanks.

Reworking the Trek 520

About a year or so ago, I had some work done on a 1983 Trek 520. It's been a good tourer and fun townie bike, but since building up the RB-T, it's a bit redundant, and I like the RB-T as a front-loader, fast, urban, trails, S24o'er, do-everything bike.

I've been wanting to build up a more traditional porteur for a while. The plan with this bike is to build a trailer for it too so I can haul bikes and crud for P2P. It will also haul a kayak for local jaunts to water fun time.

It's got a SRAM S7 internal hub. I've built up bikes around a Sturmey Archer 3sp and a Nexus 8 speed hub, and the SRAM is the least fussiest of all as far as setup, install, and tuning is concerned. Super simple.

In addition to the canti brakes, the rear hub has a drum brake. The brake is actuated with a down tube shifter. The idea is for long descents when hauling a heavy load -- I can keep the speed manageable without over-heating my rims.

The fancy inverse brake levers are for wank-points. The front rack, of course, is from Alex.

The bars are albatross and they're too high. I may have to destroy one of the cork grips and put a shorter stem on there. That's the dirt drop that was on the bars when I yanked it off the turd. I regret not fussing with that more as I built it up. Maybe I'll get some real porteur bars for it too some day.

It's a pleasure to ride. The CdV tires are like riding on pillows. Loads are easy in the front.

Liza says there's too much crap on it.

Porteur for the Masses

Joel Metz's Kogswell P/R. Click the pic to to Joel's site.

I'm not sure if this is a prediction or a hope or just wishful thinking, but here it is: I think 2009 or 2010 will deliver a mass-produced porteur-style bicycle. By "mass-produced," I would like to think Trek or Specialized, but I'm not that delusional. My buddy Alex has put his money on Surly or Raleigh. Raleigh may be a good bet considering the interesting bikes they've put out in the last couple years, namely the low-trail One-Way and the tourer/uber-commuter, Sojourn -- both of which ship with a Brooks saddle.

Anyway, here's why I think a porteur is ready for the mass market. I think it's an ideal "first adult bike" bike. By that, I mean, the porteur, if executed correctly, could be the bike that the 18-35 year-old, non-bikey folks would buy to run errands and be comfortable with for longer rides. And I think you could do it right for around $1000.

To be clear: I'm not talking about a take over of the mass produced comfort bikes, really, I'm talking about a blip on the overall industry of mass-retail bikes. But look what's happened with fixed gear bikes. Just about every mass-manufacturer has a fixed bike in the game now; just because they are shipping as single-speeds, doesn't alter the fact that the aesthetic/drive behind the bikes is the fixed sub-culture. Let's just hope that the mass producers don't over style the bike as they have with the fixed thing and forget the elements that make a good porteur work: namely low-trail and integrated front rack.

But, for style, the porteur delivers. Check out Joel's bike in the picture at the top; the classic porteur-style bars, reverse brake levers, front rack. It just looks cool, not mean-racey-gonna-intimidate-you-cool, but sensible, urbane, and smart cool.


Alex Wetmore's Kogswell P/R

While the bars, levers, and rack look cool, they also are designed for hauling loads up front. Put a net up there and your messenger bag or any bag, and the bike handles amazingly well with a load. People that buy the porteur can begin to replace short car trips the day they bring this bike home.

Joel's bike doesn't have this, but I think it's important: the bike should ship with an internally geared hub for zero-maintenance and ease of use. Again, talking to Alex about this online, he's convinced that the Nexus 8spd or the Sram 7 speed are the money hubs for this bike. Jamis has shown you can package the nexus in a mass-produced bike and still keep the cost down. In fact, Alex points to the Breezer Uptown as a good example of a bike with an internally geared hub and a generator hub-driven light for the $1100 price point.

The integrated fenders are a requirement as is a generator hub and light. The tires should be slightly puffy for a comfortable, but quick ride. Unlike a "comfort bike" or even the style of the Breezers, which, in my opinion sit you too much upright and make longer trips (>5 miles or so) arduous, a well-designed porteur puts you in a position on the bike that is suitable for longer rides.

Seems like this could ship for the $1000 price point if spec'd smartly.

If we get the Trek Porteur, let's remember where this started as we read the finely honed PR for it: this bike started with the French. In the 30's or so.

But looking at the history in the US, Joel Metz has been riding these bikes for over a decade. He has thrown in tons of input into Kogwell's design of the P/R, which is the first non-custom production versoin of the Porteur. It would be hard to imagine the P/R at all with out Alex, Mark, and Jan at Bicycle Quarterly publishing a bunch of data, photos, and history of the porteur design. Really, the Kogswell P/R has started the grassroots movement of a production porteur, and Matthew Kogswell deserves credit for actually sticking to it and bringing this bike to market.

This last shot is Adam Alpern's Kogswell P/R. Click the pic to go to his Flickr site -- great photos and great hand-made messenger bags.

Bicycle Delivery Potential in Downtown Spokane

I had lunch with some buddies yesterday at the "High Nooner" downtown. I'm notoriously early for everything. I've learned to always give myself 15 minutes to deal with bike issues. And I rarely have bike issues, so I'm usually early. We were to meet at noon. I got there at 11:50. As I sat outside the 'nooner waiting, I watched the delivery folks run back and forth to their cars. I counted 4 delivery people, but there may have been a fifth. In the 15 minutes I waited (car people are always always late... 5 minutes late, is late ... aren't I an annoying bastard?), I saw two of the 4 return and go out again. This means they are doing some short downtown deliveries.

Downtown Spokane is an ideal bike-delivery area. I sat and waited. My mind churned on the idea of converting the downtown deliveries to bike delivery.

The delivery area: south to the hospitals (8th or so); west to Brown's Addition; North to, say, Indiana; and East to Hamilton or so -- but maybe further east into some of the Industrial Park area off Mission/Trent. Note: no huge hills. In addition, most of this area is traffic-lighted (and timed lights at that), so with fit riders, you're not looking at a huge difference in delivery time.

The bike: a portuer, like Kogswell has just made.

A portuer is based on the design of French bikes made in the early-mid part of the last century. They are optimized for handling a front-load. Front loads for this kind of stuff is nice, so you can see it as you bomb around and it all lays/stacks flat and wide. Notice the big old rack on the front of that bike in the picture. Build a rack like that that fits the little bus tubs that High Nooner packs their lunches into. Make them stackable and you're good to go. Drinks may have to be canned instead of foutain. Instead of a derailleur system, use an 8 speed internal hub for easier maintenance. Dynohub lighting, integrated front wheel lock, and center kickstand would complete the package. An easy-to-ride, park, and lock bike.

The money part: Converting car-drivers to riders is surely cheaper in the "true-cost" sense, but who knows what kind of arrangement "High Nooner" has with their drivers. If they are simply paid an hourly wage to deliver with no compensation for insurance, gas, car maintenance, then the owners would not save money with bikes. But again, looking at "true cost," where those costs are not absorbed by the workers, even with the cost of the bike (around $1200 complete) would pay off in the long run. And if you really wanted to get down to brass tacks, there is a cost to having 4-5 more cars on the road for two hours every work day. That cost is absorbed by all of us in health, taxes, wear/tear on roads, insurance, etc.

By the time my buddies got there and we had ordered and sat down, I pointed out the delivery guys running in and out of the building. (These folks also take precious parking spots in open meters in front of the building as well as in the full parking lot on the side of the building). I mentioned to my buddies that this place should consider converting some of the downtown deliveries to bicycle delivery.

My buddies are used to hearing me mention this kind of stuff -- where everything should be done by bike -- so, I got the courtesy nod and smile and we were onto other matters.

If I was the king of the world...

I would require all citizens to have at minimum, one bike outfitted with a basket capable of transporting at least one half-rack of bottled beer.
Such a bike, especially if ugly and not-steal-worthy, is an essential component for all households.
We have this old Fuji outside, under a tarp, at the ready at all times. It's really uncomfortable to ride for more than a mile or two, but it's perfect for quick grocery runs and for hauling our daughter in a trailer.
Many "serious" cyclists only have their 'road' bike and their 'mountain' bike, or maybe their 'rain' bike... typically such a bike requires the usual ritual to ride: suiting up, special shoes, etc. You miss out on a lot of spontaneous riding opportunities when you are required to "gear up." Additionally, a beater with a basket is made way more useful when you put fenders on it. Come to think of it, all bikes are way more useful when you have fenders on it... At the moment, I don't own a bike that doesn't have fenders. Seems like an essential piece of gear that is just crazy to go with out... yet 90% of new road bikes do not have room or eyelets for fenders.
So, if you don't have a beater, spend some time on craigslist or at Goodwill and pick one up... get a wald basket and some fenders and you're ready for a ride at the drop of a hat.