I recently started a new job. It is less than two miles from my home and one of the biggest perks for me is that I can now ride my bicycle to work. This isn’t the first time that I have bicycled to work. There were a few months in the spring/summer of 2006 that I would occasionally ride my bicycle to work. It was then that my commuter rig started to take shape.
My commuter bicycle started its life as a pile of beaten up parts at a police auction in 1999. I paid $35 dollars for a 1995 Specialized Hardrock.
The Good:
- Shimano Alivio parts group with 21 speed drivetrain
- quality Chromoly frame and fork with plenty of braze-ons
- quality alloy wheels with stainless spokes
- more relaxed frame geometry than a modern purebred mountain bike
- frame that is straight, sound, and true with the disclaimer below
The Bad:
- the bicycle was a disassembled mess of parts
- the top tube of the frame was badly dented by what would appear to be a sledge hammer.
- the bike is ugly.
At the age of 17 I was into mountain biking and needed a tool to help evangelize my friends into the sport. For a $50 investment and donated suspension fork “upgrade”, I had a spare bike that I used to take others to the local singletrack. When opportunity struck I was able to replace my main ride, a 1997 Gary Fisher Big Sur, with a 1999 Schwinn Homegrown. The Big Sur had to be sold to help pay for the Schwinn, but not without first swapping the drivetrain. I sold the Big Sur with the better, more visible STX-RC rear deraillier, but with the 21-speed Alivio drivetrain, so my Hardrock could have a 24-speed drivetrain. This allowed me to swap out wheels with my new Homegrown. After slapping on some 8-speed grip shifters, the bike did not get used much from 2000-2006.
The opportunity to ride 14 miles to work along a beautiful road by the lake caused me to drag the Hardrock out of the garage and outfit it for a commute. In the time that my bike was neglected, I moved four times and lost the rigid fork. The garbage Scott suspension fork the I had “upgraded” to had degenerated into a very heavy rigid fork, it had old knobby tires that still held air, and desperately needed a tune up. I got spousal approval to spend money on a rack, clipless pedal shoes, pump, and tires, and I was able to borrow some 15 year old panniers from my mom. Once the bike was fitted with some narrow, high-pressure slick tires, my lunchbox was lashed to my rack and my workwear was stowed in the panniers, my commuter rig was born.
It didn’t take long to find some areas for improvement. One morning it rained lightly for maybe 15 minutes. I didn’t get very wet from the rain, but the resulting puddles left my socks and work clothes sopping wet upon arrival at the job site. After that ride, I installed full fenders, and now I laugh at puddles. After the fenders, my gearing started to annoy me.
I never used the lowest three gears of my mountain bike cassette, and I could not make the minor adjustments necessary to maintain both speed and cadence. Installing a much more closely geared road cassette solved that problem and I highly recommend that anybody riding a mountain bike on the road do the same. Another improvement was the installation of a rapidfire shifter for the front deraillier. It really makes the stop-and-go riding of the city easier when it is possible to make three quick, accurate shifts of the front deraillier to approach and leave intersections.
Fast forward to present day and after a four year hiatus, I am riding to work again. This time I want to do more than just ride to work, I want to get rid of my car altogether. For that to happen I need more room to carry things. I need to maintain the ability to pick something up from the store on the way home from work and to be able to occasionally shuttle tools back an forth. I don’t want to have to plan my trips to remember to grab a set of panniers or have the constant bulk or drag on my bike of fixed baskets or panniers always carried “just in case.” I don’t like being any more crippled by a strong headwind when I am running late than I already am, and I would also like to be able to better capitalize on a tailwind with taller chainrings up front. Right now the top speed on my bicycle is 29 mph. I would like to be able to travel at the posted speed limit of 35 if the mood suits me.
The solution for my spontaneous cargo carrying needs are folding baskets. I just installed a Wald 582 folding basket on the right side of my rear rack and I am very happy with it. I intend to buy three more. One will go on the left of the rear rack, and two more will mount to a lowrider front pannier rack. These folding baskets are great. They will hold a paper grocery bag when you need them to and they fold down to an inch thick when you dont. They are very sturdy for their light weight. In addition to this lovely quartet of disappearing baskets, I intend to mount a large, quick-release basket above the front two folding baskets to attach before a big grocery or farmer’s market run. The new rack and basket system will also be a perfect place to mount lights.
The limitation with this setup compared to spending $600 more for an xtracycle, is that I cannot carry even one child with me without a trailer or top-tube mounted child seat. I have 3 kids, so this problem is one that I may have to solve with another cargo-specific bike that I am working on. I would also like to have electric assist for the winter, or for when I am really loaded down.
