July and Early August BLAHG. Heavy on the helmets, and stuff about wool grips.

Look at the bicycle rider. This is how far it has come.

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After 27 years (since their intro in 1999), Shimano has discontinued its 9s Dura-Ace  BES, which loyal readers and probably only them will know stands for bar-end-shifters.

They're following the market, listening to the bean counters, doing the "sensible" thing that big companies always seem to do. Unclear on the concept of "grandfathering" something in. No loyalty to the longest-standing Shimano part in their line, and the only thing that kept it alive for the past decade has been the demand on triatlon bike funny bars..but they're all electronic now, too.

Next, we predict the extinction of the BL-400 (Tiagra level brake lever), which is the second best thing Shimano makes, behind the M310 ALTUS derailer. On one hand, the ALTUS is easily replaced, tho, and the BL-400 isn't. It's a road drop-bar lever. In an overreaction, but a sincere overreaction, to the BES news, I asked Spencer to order 500 pairs of the BL-400.

Spencer: "Shimano has fifteen left."

Me: "OK, that'll do."

Maybe more are on the way. The D/A BES were high-end, and high-end now means 10speed PLUS and electronic. The BL-400 is low-to mid "end," like the Altus, and maybe that protects both of them some.

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My granddaughter loves orange and tigers, so sometimes I look for tiger things. She outgrows shoes, so I looked for "orange tiger sneakers for children" and found these. Don't harp on the cheesy face, harp on the paragraph below the bullet-points. There must be some logic to it, some reference that I don't get, but I like the surprises along the way.

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ann patchett fifteen minutes, worth it]

I know 15 minutes is a long time. I am not posting this link lightly.

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At some point we may have a tiny line of organic cotton T-shirts and possibly baggies or shorts or something. It is not easy to "arrange for same" in the U.S. We can't just buy blank O. Cotton T's from a retailer, and it's near-impossible to find them with pockets, and then there's the volume we'd need, and we want them to be affordable and really good—Brooks Brothers quality, even, so this is where we're headed. Years ago we had a ROSCO BUBBE anagram contest, and Ana Candela, whose first name is a palindrome, submitted a few dozen, and they were all dormant until sometime late last year, and then Olivier came up with this label. You know how we like those backwards Es; and it's still several hurdles away from reality, but we've rec'd samples and are making a few changes before ordering. 

Some history of WALD.

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Bruno Bischofberger obit/Andy Warhol and Jean-Michel Basquiat

Dick Cavett interviews Salvadore Dali...with Satchel Paige there on the sofa, too.

If the idea of Salvadore Dali and Satchel Paige BOTH being. inteviewed by Dick Cavett doesn't get you all juicy, then you are well under the age of 65.

Short talk with Satchel Paige about his age.

If you don't know who Satchel Paige was, don't bother, no shame, just saying don't open it.

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I don't know who Danny is, but an aluminum rim would have a flat spot, at worst. "Danny fantastically managed to keep it upright..." is an interesting statement on three levels. I'd like to have seen, "Fantastic Danny managed to keep it upright..." or the less likely, "Danny managed to keep it fantastically upright..."  I basically think there's no bad way to arrange these words.

"...after whacking this fantastic pothole..." 

"after whacking this pothole fantastically..."

etc.

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Listen, I know myself, I know my weaknesses better than anybody else does, but I am not wrong about my distrust of current typical bicycle helmet brain-protecting technology. I was an early adopter of the Bell Biker (1975). I later got an MSR (late '70s), and I've owned and worn and "sworn by" helmets for decades, but then I learned more and got smarter and madder at the CPSC, the bicycle industry, and the bicycle media that drummed the best helmets--or at least the best helmet--out of existence, and continues to rally around EPS (styrofoam)-based helmets while all other sports that require brain protection have moved far beyond it.

I've posted my "statements" on helmet tech before, so if you know what I think, don't read the bold text below:

EPS Helmets Are Fine, Not Great.

 

Between your brain and the inside of your skull there’s the cerebro-spinal fluid, a 1/4-inch to 3/8-inch watery slosh zone. It’s a shock absorber good enough to protect your head from light to medium bonks, but when you crash and your head hits the pavement, your brain pushes through the slush and slams against your skull like a platform diver sticking a head-first landing in a four-foot pool.

 

Brains need a cushioned, longer, slower stop to save them. In the language of helmet testers, a longer and slower stop “flattens the acceleration curve.” That’s why trapeze artists land in long, bouncy nets and pole vaulters and gymnasts land on cushy foam. It’s why cars have crush zones and air bags, and bicycle riders ride fat-soft tires on bumpy trails.

 

Almost every bicycle helmet made since the early 1970s has relied on EPS (street talk: Styrofoam). It’s a great insulator for picnic beverages and a poor shock absorber for brains. It’s too hard. In those early years of hardshell helmets, there were a few cushier foam helmets made by small companies (notably the original Skid-Lid), but the EPS helmet juggernaut and the cycling media convinced cyclists that these other helmets were dangerous, so 99 percent of today’s helmets rely on EPS.

 

EPS is available in various densities, but most helmet makers use the hard stuff, so they can make slimmer helmets. Feel the EPS in your own helmet. You can mark it with a fingernail, but it compresses only with a blow hard enough to risk your brain. A pole vaulter, gymnast, or diver landing on a big block of bicycle-helmet density EPS would quit the sport. A hard plastic cover over an EPS landing pad would make the landing harder by distributing the force, so the EPS compresses even less. So why is EPS covered with a hardshell the default construction for bicycle helmets?

 

Because it’s light, cheap, easily molded, and Job #1 for helmet makers is making helmets that pass the Consumer Products Safety Commission’s (CPSC) impact test. If it doesn’t, it not a legal bicycle helmet.

 

For this test, an 11-pound magnesium fake head is covered with a helmet, turned upside-down, and dropped onto a metal plate from a height that generates a impact speed of 14 miles per hour. It’s a fishy test for two reasons.

 

The first fishy thing is the impact speed (14mph, or 6.2 meters per second). If you’re 6 feet tall, your temples might be 5 feet, 8 inches above the ground. An object free-falling from that height hits the ground at a little over 12.5mph.  At this point, it sounds like the 14mph requirement is conservative, erring on the side of protecting your brain even more. But this is where the fishy comes in. When you crash your bike, your head isn’t free falling and won’t hit first. Your pedals, handlebar…and the wheels may get in the way. Your thighs, butt, arms, and shoulders usually hit before your head does. If you land on your shoulder you might break your collarbone, but your shoulder blocks your head from hitting the road hard. The starting head height is lower than 14 feet and it’s not a free-fall, so the impact speed is less than…you might think.

 

The second fishy thing is that the CPSC impact test is a pass/fail test for skull cracking. But impacts lower than skull-cracking threshold can still cause concussions, or the far more dangerous subdural hematomas and subarachnoid hemorrhages—two types of bleeding that can wreck your brain or kill you.

 

Imagine jumping off a ladder or the hood of a car and landing (on your feet) on hard ground or asphalt. You’d absorb the shock with bent, springy knees. In a bicycle crash, when your head hits, it relies only on that 1/4-inch to 3/8-inch mote of cerebro-spinal fluid, and a helmet lined with fairly rigid EPS covered with a stress-dispersing (not shock-absorbing) hard shell.

 

 Alternatives to EPS

 

There are at least dozens and maybe hundreds of foams, open-cell and closed-cell variants of different densities and spring-back characteristics. One, Ethylene Vinyl Acetate (EVA) has been used for running shoe midsoles for decades, because it cushions well and —better for you but worse for the earth, because it lasts forever. 

Some skateboard helmets still use foam, and in theory they’d be better than EPS bicycle helmets at preventing brain damage at less-than-skull-cracking impact speeds. But as it stands now, nobody makes a bicycle helmet with the right combination of foam and thickness that will pass the skull-crack test and cover low-speed impacts, too. If helmets didn’t have to pass the CPSC’s skull-cracking test, they could better protect brains in most crashes.

I don’t recommend doing what I’ve done to address this. I’ve used a big screwdriver to pry the EPS out of existing helmets. Then I’ve filled the new gap with various adhesive-backed foams that allow longer travel. They’re firm but cushy. I’ve used packing foam, backpacking pads of EVA, and spent a few hundred dollars on Amazon for ten other foams with convenient adhesive backing. I’ve bought memory foam pads designed to velcro into motorcycle helmets, and they fit just as nicely into these gutted bicycle helmets. These are personal experiments. It would be foolish of me to recommend them, because you might do a lousy job of it.

 

There are at least four alternatives to EPS and DIY-Foam, all of which are used in below-the-radar bicycle helmets. They’re all light, airy, geometric structures that don’t densify. If brain-protection is a concern, they’re worth looking into.

1.     WaveCel. Radiused zig-zags (the “waves”) cojoined to share the load. Light, airy, no densification. Wavecel.com.

2.     KOROYD. Think of plastic drinking straw tubes magically welded together. Light, airy, no densification. Koroyd.com

3.     720Protection An airy plastic hexagonal structure used in helmets made for the European market. No densification.720protections.com.

 

All three of these oriend their different technologies inside the helmet in a way that minimizes the cush, which, to a hobo like me seems like an odd way to go. They’re rigid when you push on them. They feel like wood.

 

4.     Air! A Swedish company, Ventete, is now offering a foldable, inflatable helmet. It’s too early to say when or even if it’ll be available in the U.S. It has passed European helmet standards, but might not pass the CPSC skull-cracking test. It’s has Keep an eye out and save your dough, because it costs about $350.

One problem with all of these is that they’re patented so they can be monetized. They’re not open-sourced, and I’m not saying they should be. No company is going to spend millions figuring out better impact-absorption solutions and then let its competitors copy them for free. Helmets with these better-than-EPS shock absorbers cost…in the neighborhood of $400.

 

Another problem is how to attach them to the inside of a hardshell. So far, they all use EPS, not to help them absorb shock, but to hold them in place.

 

There’s a marketing problem, too. The public assumes any helmet that’s legal to sell is a safe one. If that were true, brain injuries would fall by 90 percent. As it is, most riders who’ve ridden and paid attention for a few decades personally know of, or have heard of cyclists who’ve been ruined or killed by head injuries while wearing approved helmets.

 

=== Apologies for repetition, but I did say don't read the blue if you already have.===

NOW: I think...in my honest opinion, the best helmet ever was the Skid-Lid. I thought it looked too dorky, and never used one. Mark here had one and liked it a lot, but then he got into the techy raciers helmets, and his Skid-Lid is long gone. The Skid-Lid was excoriated in the press shortly after its introduction, but it ticks all or most of the brain-protecting boxes, and if it was still made I'd wear one not "religiously," but maybe half the time, just not up climbs. 

I bought an old Skid-Lid from eBay. The foam had hardened, but it's still 10x more cushy than fresh modern EPS. But it was too big for my large head, so I took out the old foam and replace it with thicker and cushier new foam. I've spent a few hundred dollars on various foams (helmets being an obsession), so I have "plenty to choose from," as they say. Here's my helmet makeover:

 

 

I used shock cord. If I'm sliding along Main Street at 18 mpg and the lip of the helmet catches on a stub of rebar sticking up out of something, I don't want my neck snapped, and this stetchy cord will save me. It's EZ on and off, no buckling, could be refined or made adjustable, but this is basically fine.

The TWO acid tests for most Americans are weight and looks

The original SKID-LID weighed 300g / 10.6oz

My custom weighs 315g / 11.11111oz

Half an ounce more, and don't pretent you'd prefer that in kg.

OK, it doesn't stand out like a regular helmet. Skid-Lids came in Black, White, and Yellow.  Nobody here wanted to wear this, so wore it myself and Vince took the photo and didn't bother to tell me it was...jaunty.

I am trying to get in touch with D30, the makers of the fancy shock-absorbing materials, but they don't respond. I think that ANY current bicycle helmet lined with EPS or anything else could be made better instantly by subbing in D30 (or perhaps many of several closed-cell foams). But I can't get thru, so oh well. Still, the site is worth a look, if you're concerned about brain protection. 

Here's a NOS Specialized Team Skid Lid I bought an modified with some of that D30 stuff. It's a small shell, so no room for more, but D30 seems to be good, or at least is promoted as so, so maybe this is enough:

 

https://www.d3o.com/

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Here's another alternative to Big Styrofoam.

The problem IS: $59 for each helmet, fine, but it's also $59 for shipping each helmet. I tried to order four, and it came to four x $58, or $236. I can't contact the seller. I think this helmet has potential, but as you can see, it is sold only as a retro-event helmet. 

I think there is a commercial feel-good opportunity for somebody out there, but how to you market a MORE PROTECTIVE HELMET, when the CPSC rules essentially rule it out? If I were younger and richer and smarter and directionless in life, I'd be all over that.

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Does anybody know what kind of wood this is? Walnut?

Maybe 50 of you know, maybe I'll get 50 responses, maybe there will be 15 different guesses, maybe along with the guesses will be 30 unrelated questions, maybe I won't have time to thank everybody for their responses, and the unthanked ones will be miffed. There are many reasons to not even ask, but I sincerely want to know, and I know there's a lot of knowledge out there that I don't have, and I think it's really nice when somebody or several take the time to try to help, and so...thank you in advance? And no problem in any case. It's a table my wife bought  painted and is stripping, that's all. And she was wondering, and I said I know how to find out...

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The Choco bar was named for a Shonen Knife song: I Wanna Eat Choco Bars.

I heard this first in 1986 or something. Shonen Knife still exists. They're bigger than we are. For more info, there's always google.

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Bob Dylan's Idiot Wind. I think its about gossip, but who's to say?

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Grips. Listen, I tell you, the highly respected and thoroughly loved millenials and olders around here, through no fault of their own, are making me feel like a freak for my preference-to-obsession for wool grips. I don't see the appeal of high-friction rubbery plastic. It's not what I want to feel when I hold onto my bars, but different strokes, etc.

On THAT topic, I've just recently make a "next-level breakthrough." On my Appaloosa, I'd recently changed bars and needed new grips, and since it was my own bike and one of several and I was in a hurry, I did a bad job of the main grips (still feels world-class), and an ultra-quickie job of the foregrip. I laid down a stubb of orange bar tape and added a stubscrap of wool on both sides. I rode that for 3 weeks, all the time thinking I should put more into it, but who has the time? Then two days ago I saw a whole bunch of waste-strips from Mark's customers grips--the leftovers from cutting the wool rectangles we have down to size. I grabbed about eight of them and stuck them sloppily on the bare spots of my foregrip, not trying to fully cover the bar spots, because with straight strips laid down hastily on a curved part of the bar, that just wasn't in the cards. I rode home and loved the "strip effect," and I would love to see Blue Lug's superior version of it, but here are some pics to show you what I'm talking about. Hightly recommended. Just buy some wool, don't care much, get creative, outdo me (easy, I'm sure), and there you go.

Materials.

Ready for action.

Tape isn't even necessary, but everybodys should have some stubs around, or a spare roll or two.

Gaps are the point! Imagine the air flow, the cooling.

Ready for twining, but it doesn't need it. Seriously--the stickyback wool adheres well and over time seems to grow into the bar tape.

Small mammals' view of the underside.

DId the left side, less fancy, all fine.

 

Top view right grip.

 

I'm done, ready for some timed hill-sprints on my way home tonite.  It took 20 minutes including shooting. Feels great. The shellac over wool is far out there even for me, but we've done it upon request to a few customers' bikes, and it feels nice and bristly, like Original Listerine, or a salt water ice bath. May affect sweat absorption, but you know?--it's still way better in that way and others than ocean forever plastic.

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These are flies I've ties the past three nights, mostly after 10pm. Therapeutic tying, I need it.

I'm slightly ashamed of the bead heads, but as I said, these were thera-flies, and I had some hook made to accept bead heads, and I wouldn't tie them on anything else. Other materials: Pheasant tail feather barbs, copper wire, peacock herl from the side of the tail feathers, Hungarian partridge lower back feathers. These are all size 16.

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Thanks for getting this far, if you did. It's not a great one, but none of them are great. The links are good.

 

OH! Just last night we got photos of a nearly ready production SILVER front derailer:

In side view inside prototype cardboard box.

Two diff views (will be labeled SILVER and RBW) on a nice naughahyde surface.

That's all. December? Maybe.

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