Salivating for mid-block crosswalks, more armored bike lanes, daylit intersections, and more on the west coast, too.

I recently bought a junk bike. I want to slowly fix it up myself for two reasons: 1. To have a nicer bike. 2. To learn about bike maintenance. I'd like to improve it slowly (weeks or months) while keeping it functional. What order should I consider improvements?

I'll elaborate. When I first bought the bike, I tuned the brakes (linear pull). I struggled. I realized brake tuning was difficult because my wheel wasn't aligned. In retrospect, I should have straightened/replaced the wheel before tuning the brakes. I'm wondering if there are any insights you could provide about the order I should tackle this project (e.g., wheel alightment before brakes).

Before the advent of fossil fuel-powered transport, travellers crawled across the surface of the planet slowly. The world, back then, was bigger; getting anywhere at all was an adventure in itself. Today, the world is small. I can live my life in London, UK, and still attend family events in Sweden, where I'm from, several times a year. I can have my cake and eat it.

That is, if it weren't for one thing: the climate. The emissions released by aeroplanes mean flying in them is among the most carbon-intensive things most people are likely to ever do. Trying to avoid these emissions, I have experimented with ferry and train travel between the UK and Sweden for over a decade. But plane is almost always the cheapest option. So what about cycling?

[...]

But not all environmental benefits are measurable in emission units. "The bigger picture takeaway [with a long-distance ride] would be getting the conversation in people's minds," Yanocha says. "You would automatically think 'oh, I'm just going to fly', [but] actually you could do this on a bike."

Cycling helps us appreciate nature, says Brandi Horton, vice president of communication at the US non-profit Rails to Trails Conservancy. "When you're zooming around in your car or you're on the train or you're on a plane, you are not going slow enough to notice what lives [around] you. When you're off the highway... you suddenly see something entirely different

I'm thinking about commuting by bike from home to my french classes, but the thought of my bike being stolen worries me and I'd like to hear your opinion.

I think that Onguard's Pitbull 8003 U lock would be good enough for my current situation, since my class only lasts about an hour and my bike would be inside the school.

I paid around $450 for my bike years ago, it's an aluminium road bike with shimano sora shifts. Would you say that it could eye catching?

I'd be glad to hear your thoughts!

Another win for older tech?

I doubt these will take off. They do look cool Af while shifting imo

Once I read that it could be good to have 2 helmets.

• One to deal with freezing/cold temperatures
• One to deal with hot/warm temperatures

I guess that both types can be used for cooler temperatures.

What is you opinion about that ?

Do you have some suggestions of helmets, some models you like, or even different advices to share with us ?

Ok, so here's my problem.

I own quite a few padded shorts, ranging from $30 - $250 (bibs), and they feel great for the first 2-3 hours, then I get really uncomfortable in them. Not pain, but quite uncomfortable.

I was able to ride 200km wearing only compression shorts with no padding, but I think I got lucky.

Regular shorts/underwear always have issues because of the seams, so they aren't viable.

I heard that triathlon shorts are lightly padded, so they may offer a nice in-between.

Does anyone wear them? How do they compare to traditional cycling shorts?

Yesterday i finally whip up the courage to try commuting with bike, i planned the 40km round trip to visit my mom and go grocery shopping on the way back,, planned the route with as much residential street as possible, and that was a fun experience! While there's a lot of "woah, ebike"(where i live a proper ebike is rare, even though mine is converted) and "you travel from that small town? That's insane!" from stranger, what's not fun is the ride on some stretch of the road.

I live in a small town outside the city, a lot of the road going out of the town is pretty much 1 lane each way, no cycling facility for the whole country(Malaysia), the road shoulder is narrow to non-existent(the line is basically bordering between road and grass/dirt) if not filled with potholes/cracks/sketchy road maintenance/bump made by tree root, and motorist often driving very fast even on narrow road. Luckily more often than not they does give me a lot of space when they're passing(thanks to motorcycle culture), but those who don't is very discouraging for the whole experience, mostly it's the one riding moped that pass me too close for comfort with 30/50kmph faster than me(no thanks to motorcycle culture).

I planned to do it often, first by doing a no-car sunday, then slowly switch to commuting to work(also 40km round trip), and eventually cut down car use to only just a day or two a week or only on long distance travel, but this experience kinda made me second guess the whole plan. It's also quite tiring, i can still feel the fatigue today.

So how did you guys that do the commute able to keep going? Any advice on that end?

also works on downtube

This is a photo from two years ago, i stood there for a good minute wondering how the hell and why this weird cycle path was there. It is in southern France, on the climb to Col d'Ecre, bit north of Nice.

Take a guess, i finally fully understand.

Follow up as I got the tire off the rim after work. Definitely seems like it's starting to split. But only on one side. Is this indicative of being pinched by the rim? Ridden on asphalt trail 95% of the time.

I couldn't find almost any tutorials on how to disassemble or service this particular eBike motor (Bafang M400), so I just started removing screws and pulling out parts while taking a ton of pictures.

I found two dirty, rusty bearings that I cleaned and re-greased, along with all the gears, and then put it back together. Not only did I manage to avoid breaking it, but the noise seems to be gone as well. This was by far the most intimidating bike repair I've done so far. I've serviced every other part before, but I hadn't dared to touch the motor until now.

It also turns out that the motor is much better sealed than I expected, so I'll happily continue doing deep river crossings with the motor half submerged in the future, just as I have done until now.

Was going to go for a simple ride tonight. Noticed this strange wear on my tire right next to the rim. Is this bad/a big deal?

Update: thank you all for your quick replies! I will be not be riding it and change it out. My rim is definitely very slightly bent, I can feel it when I ride. Definitely need a new bike since I know I'm too heavy for this bike.

When we were kids, you may have had a honky-horn with a bulb on the end, perhaps you had bells with gears that strike multiple times as they unwind like one of those self-propelled matchbox cars. Maybe you unscrew your bell halfway so the cracks on the trail ring it as you weave through a crowd of other trail users. Or maybe you ride a folding bike through the airport with a little electric horn. Perhaps you're the best kind of DIY redneck and have fitted a literal tugboat horn to a bike trailor so you can scare the bejeezus out of a coalroller after they dump a load of black smoke on you.

Whatever it is, I want to know about it and why you chose it.

When i went onto my first solo cycle trip some years ago (from germany to marseille, france), my coworkers joked that i should ride mont ventoux. I had no idea what mont ventoux was, but read it up. On that trip i happened to cycle around this mythical mountain, looked awesome, but i never seriously considered going up ever.

On two more cycle trips i cycled around mont ventoux on different routes, and it always looked just so cool from afar. This trip i wanted to hit mont ventoux, but i got sick basically on the western foot of it. I rode in recovery mode east past it, through the valley, looked awesome again. I then continued towards the high alps but eventually decided to turn around because of the weather forecast, back south into the prealps of provence.

And today i actually got to ride it. I rode it from Sault, because that's where i was coming from, which i guess is not what the OG's do or consider "riding mont ventoux", but cycle tourers are aloud to do that, haha.

Lots of roadies going up there. And it lived up to its name, it was real windy. In the morning at the bottom of the climb one roadie told me that it might be too dangerous to ride to the summit today but thankfully the wind chilled out a bit as i was going up, and also the cloud that had covered the top went away.

Picture is bit below the top on the descend to Malaucene. That glider plane was going nuts, that stuff looks absolutely crazy.