Spinning Wheels and Getting Nowhere

   To say that recently things haven’t been going too smoothly in my little area of the cycling world would be an understatement!

   A few weeks ago, I was riding my Cannondale SuperSix on the hilly roads around Green Lane Reservoir and Pennsburg, PA, and was getting out of the saddle to climb up a short, steep incline. All of a sudden, I heard a nasty pop in the bottom bracket and found both of my feet/pedals were now in the downward-stroke position – definitely not what a crankset is supposed to look like!

   For a couple months I had been failing in my attempts to find the source of an annoying creaking sound in the bike's bottom bracket area. I had tried cleaning/re-greasing/tightening processes on both the pedals and the chainring bolts. I had also applied a bit of grease to all contact points between the chainrings and crank spider.

   With no positive results, I disassembled the bottom bracket to clean and re-grease the spindle and contact points of the edges of the sealed bearings. The creaking would go away for 30-40 miles of riding, then gradually return. I had written in this blog about Cannondale’s issues with their BB30 design and the insert this model bicycle required to convert to Shimano’s Hollowtech system, and put a couple drops of penetrating oil around the seams of the insert, just in case that might be a possible problem area, but no dice!

   Since Bikesport is a Cannondale dealer, I thought the mechanics there might be familiar with this bottom bracket and its difficulties. They knew about the BB30 glitches, but the insert that my bike has should have negated those. One of the guys suggested a more viscous grease that they use, which was red in color and created a gruesome bloody look when I worked it onto the problem parts with my fingers.

   Well, I certainly didn’t anticipate what happened during the test ride – I just figured the sound would either disappear or not. There must have been a hairline crack forming on the inside of the spindle, as I definitely would have seen evidence of it forming during my initial installation or the two other cleaning/greasing processes. I suppose the grease had temporarily muffled the sound of the crack opening and closing as it twisted inside the BB shell, until it finally snapped under the force of my standing on the pedals.

   I ordered a new Ultegra crankset and figured that I might as well purchase a new bottom bracket to go with it. There was a bit of a frustration period when the online store, ProBikeKit, misplaced my order somehow. In the meantime, I was frequently riding my Colnago - I love that bike, but it is significantly heavier and lacks a few teeth on the largest cassette cog, which makes climbing that bit more difficult. 

   A few days ago, the new parts finally arrived, and I think the updated Ultegra cranks look great on the Cannondale. Most importantly, the bike was whisper quiet during a 35-mile test ride!

   I fully expected to have Brendan’s Tommasini finished a couple of weeks ago with photos of the completed project ready to share. Unfortunately, the first-generation C-Record rear derailleur I ordered from France had a worn-out cage return spring. I made contact with an eBay seller from whom I’ve made purchases for other builds, and he had a “for parts” Chorus derailleur from the same era. He sent me the return spring from that derailleur, but I was disappointed to find that, although the spring was the correct length and diameter, its tail pins were on the same side (see red arrows in photo below), instead of 180-degree opposition (green arrows).

   The result was that, when I put the derailleur back together and rotated the cage into the proper position, the back tension was either too little, causing chain to droop, or too much, twisting the spring in on the center bolt and hindering its ability to turn smoothly. I also knew from past experience that this would eventually ruin the spring completely by bending it out of shape!

   Luckily, I have found the correct replacement spring from a dealer of vintage small parts in the U.K. – and I’ve been trying to be patient waiting for it to arrive!

   My friend Lenny had originally planned to drive down from Boston to visit Philadelphia and was going to drop off his De Rosa bicycle at my place. With all of the appropriate parts ready to go, it should have been an easy day’s work swapping out his vintage Campagnolo Super Record parts with a more modern Centaur group. It was a good thing he ended up changing plans and decided to ship the bike here, because there were a bunch of little complications that would have left him with disappointment and a long, empty-handed drive home.

   I immediately realized that we had not double-checked what type of mount the De Rosa had (clamp style) for the front derailleur, and of course, the Centaur group had the wrong one (braze-on). I then found that the drive-side cup of the bottom bracket would not budge, so I was off to Bikesport for some extra leverage help.

   Finally, when attempting to true the wheels, one of the rear spokes had been over-tensioned by the previous owner and “POP!” Of course, the Campagnolo bladed spokes had to be specially ordered, as they are not of an off-the-shelf design. The rear wheel also had an asymmetric shape, so spoke lengths are different on each side.

   I was a bit stunned to hear the Campagnolo spoke kit cost over $100, until I realized that was a complete set required to build a wheel. I found a mini kit for much less, with included a pair of spokes for the front wheel and a couple for each side of a rear wheel. Lenny and I both thought it would be a good idea to have a few spares on hand, just in case another spoke would break in the future.

   Here is a quick shot of Lenny’s bicycle before I had to partially disassemble it for return shipment:

Next time around, I'll share news of an interesting twist to one of my “on deck” projects.

New York Groove

We kind of skipped directly from winter to summer here in the northeastern U.S., with a few spells of very heavy rainfall thrown in, so on one cooler day with no precipitation predicted, I decided to put my bike in the car and head up to NYC for a long ride. As usual, I parked in Fort Lee, NJ, and pedaled over the George Washington Bridge into Manhattan. Originally I planned to board the Metro-North Railroad at Williams Bridge Station and then hop off at Brewster, NY, to ride the 50+ miles back down the connecting Putnam, North County and South County Trailways.

   Unfortunately, the upper trail of the Hudson River Greenway, which leads to the bike crossing on the Henry Hudson Bridge, was closed, and I would have had to do a circuitous route to reach my intended station. This would have put me way off schedule and eventually had me leaving north Jersey during peak rush hour – not a good idea.

   Luckily, I had planned an alternate ride, just in case bad morning traffic or some other mishap would pop up to cause a schedule change. About a year ago I had read about a group restoring the historic Kissena Velodrome in Queens, and I put it on my mental list of future riding destinations. I also wished to visit The High Bridge, a stone-arch structure over the Harlem River that is now a pedestrian/cyclist-only route but was originally built in 1848 as an aqueduct to bring fresh water from West Chester County to the booming young city of New York.

   The Bridge was (I thought) conveniently placed along my route, as I could take it from my location up on the eastern palisade of Manhattan, directly across to the Bronx, from where I could connect to the Queensboro Bridge. Unfortunately, the paved lower trail at Inwood Hill Park continued around the north end of Manhattan all the way back down to the bottom of the cliff side, not far from Columbia University’s Baker Athletics Complex on the south bank of Spuyten Duyvil Creek.

By the way, why is the upper end of the Harlem River called Spuyten Duyvil Creek? That just doesn’t seem to make any sense! It’s not like the creek is an entirely different body of water, or of a significantly different size in comparison to the river.

   Anyway, I ended up having to cross the river close to water level then weave my way up through University Heights and Roberto Clemente State Park. This Pirates fan found it a bit sacrilegious to have a park named after one of Pittsburgh’s all-time most loved players located in New York, but I didn’t dwell on it as the road pitched upwards.

   When I reached Morris Heights, I found myself retracing the route Sue and I had taken along University Avenue during our epic ride up the South County Trail to Sleepy Hollow and back via the Old Croton Aqueduct Trail. This time I continued over I-95, instead of making the right turn back to the G.W. Bridge and soon found signs marking the approach to The High Bridge.

   The 123-feet-tall span, which was part of the Croton Aqueduct, had been closed for over forty years and reopened in 2015 after a $61.8 million restoration. Originally there were sixteen stone arches, but to improve navigation on the Harlem River, the five arches over the water were replace by a single steel arch. The herringbone brick pattern of the walking surface is gracefully crowned to aid water runoff and features an antique handrail and attractive lamps that mimic old gas streetlights.

   I was soon off through another area I knew well, zig-zagging down 167th Street to head south on the Grand Concourse, not far from Yankee Stadium. I hooked up with the Willis Avenue Bridge to return to Manhattan, then headed down 2nd Avenue, which had a painted bike lane that, for much of the three miles I was on it, had a safety buffer zone separating it from traffic.

   My legs were starting to feel it as I climbed the noticeable arch of the Queensboro Bridge, but I thoroughly enjoyed the long downhill on the other side, as well as the impressive Greenway along Queens Plaza:

   From there it was a rather uneventful 5½-mile ride on local streets, although they were in really rough condition after the hard winter, and my butt was taking a beating! I later found that the Flushing Bay Promenade had a much better name than it deserved, as the surface featured many areas of broken or loose pavers. It was nice to be near the waterfront, even if it had seen better days, and to be away from the traffic for a couple of miles.

   I knew that I was into the home stretch, as I could see the Mets’ Citi Field on my right, and crossed over Flushing Creek. I was soon on College Point Boulevard, named after nearby St. Paul’s College (seminary), and made a left turn over to Kissena Boulevard towards the similarly named park, home of the velodrome.

   Known in the cycling community as the “track of dreams”, the Kissena Velodrome was built in 1962 by Robert Moses. Kissena racers dominated the 1964 Olympic Trials at the velodrome, taking five of eight places. Unfortunately, the popularity of track riding dropped off, and after a couple decades of neglect the concrete base of the track had fallen into a weedy, broken state until the city renovated the site in 2004. The velodrome now sees regular use throughout the summer with a twilight racing series. However, the track seems to be in need of another round of maintenance, as the surface coating is uneven and gaps have opened in the concrete sections due to winter heaving.

For an overview of the velodrome site, click on the video below. Give it a second to load, then hit the arrow again, and be sure to use the full screen icon in lower right:

   Although I had over thirty miles of riding in my legs at this point and lacked the “snap” that I would have wanted to sprint around the track, I enjoyed myself immensely on (comparatively) gentle banking. I’ve ridden on the Lehigh County Velodrome before, but the banking of the curves is higher and steeper - it can be pretty terrifying, even for experienced cyclists. 

   After catching my breath, I unwrapped a half PB&J sandwich that I had stored in the back pocket of my jersey and enjoyed a quick lunch before starting my journey back to Fort Lee. I took a slightly different route back through Queens, heading across Flushing Meadows.

   I veered right and then, just to change the scenery a bit, returned on streets pretty much parallel to my inbound route.

Through the girders of the Queensboro Bridge I could spy the Chrysler Building, a personal favorite.

   When I once again reached Manhattan onto 60th Street, I was considering a ride through Central Park before connecting with the greenway near 100th, but I was making good time north along 1st Avenue’s bike lane, hitting green lights consistently, so I stuck with it for a while before finally cutting over just above the park.

   It had been a couple years since I was last on this section of the Hudson River Greenway, and I was disappointed in its condition, as this asphalt-paved section was consistently broken with tree roots pushing up through it. I was reminded of my miserable experience last year on the Henry Hudson Trail (name coincidence?).

   The climb up to reach the G.W. Bridge was pretty grueling, and I was reminded how much city riding, with the constant stopping and starting at intersections, takes out of your legs. I don’t remember ever having a cramp in my quads, but I felt a nasty seizing in my left leg on the last little rise up to the parking lot at Fort Lee. Good thing I had gained enough momentum over the top in order to coast to the car!