Tag Archives: cycling

New Budnitz Bicycles Flatbar Test & Review

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A few weeks back, John Young, Sales Manager for Budnitz Bicycles http://budnitzbicycles.com/ offered to have me test ride the new titanium Budnitz Flatbar http://shop.budnitzbicycles.com/products/titanium-straight-bars. Disarmed with a huge smile, I was powerless to refuse.

The Flatbar

 
Rise: 0mm
Sweep: 12º
Width: 630mm
Weight: 230 grams
Clamp Diameter: 31.8mm
The test bar has precise marks for length trimming. It also has a finely textured surface area for stem clamps. The bar weighed in at 260 grams on my digital scale. I later discovered fine finishing debris inside the bar’s ends after mounting. All was easily wiped and blown out, but I didn’t weigh the precious dust. As I said, this bar is new.

The Bike
Time came to choose a test mule. Hmm. I couldn’t bear to tear down my No. 1′s cockpit, it’s set so perfectly. For an alternate test mule, I did, however, have to amputate the No.1′s Budnitz stem, as it’s the one stem I have with a clamp 31.8mm in diameter. I gazed over the quill-less of my quiver, the bikes sans quill stems.
A '97 Moots YBB, made the year my bro Tony and I rode the Emerald Bay trails in Orange County with Sara Ballantine http://www.saraballantyne.net/about/index.htm atop her Moots sponsored YBB. We ran into an angry 6 foot long rattlesnake after introductions.

A ’97 Moots YBB, made the year my bro Tony and I rode the Emerald Bay trails in Orange County with Sara Ballantine http://www.saraballantyne.net/about/index.htm atop her Moots sponsored YBB. We ran into an angry 6 foot long rattlesnake after introductions.

A custom Moots Psychlo-X YBB with disc brakes and an original Jones H-Bar.

A custom Moots Psychlo-X YBB with an original Jones H-Bar.

My 1st titanium frame, a '95 Bontrager Ti Lite with Sweet Wings cranks, a Modzilla converted Rock Shoks Judy disc fork, and a 28 spoke radially laced rear wheel I built with a Bontrager asymmetric ceramic rim and a Chris King rear hub designed by Keith Bontrager to be the 1st King hub approved strong enough for radial lacing. I've ridden thousands of interstate trail miles on this frame, a gift Danusia gave me in 1995 after my '92 Gary Fisher Procaliber with a Rock Shox 1 (with pink stickers!) was expertly stolen from our garage.

My 1st titanium frame, a ’95 Bontrager Ti Lite with Sweet Wings cranks, a Modzilla converted Rock Shoks Judy disc fork, and a 28 spoke radially laced rear wheel I built with a Bontrager asymmetric ceramic rim and a Chris King rear hub designed by Keith Bontrager to be the 1st King hub approved strong enough for radial lacing. I’ve ridden thousands of interstate trail miles on this frame, a gift Danusia gave me in 1995 after my ’92 Gary Fisher Procaliber with a Rock Shox 1 (pink stickers!) was expertly stolen from our garage.

A '96 Bontrager Road Lite single gear with a White Industries ENO eccentric hub.

A ’96 Bontrager Road Lite single gear with a White Industries ENO eccentric rear hub.

A 2004 custom Sycip Crossdresser, the 2nd Crossdresser made, except with different paint and chainstays. The bike is made of stainless steel, tubes mated by Richard Sachs lugs. Because of a shortage of stainless road chainstays, My Crossdresser was made with stainless mountain bike chainstays, which are too great in diameter to fit the Sachs bottom bracket lug, so my bottom bracket is welded, yet sports a painted lug to match the real ones.

A 2004 custom Sycip Crossdresser, the 2nd Crossdresser made, except with different paint, BB, and chainstays. The bike is made of stainless steel tubes mated with Richard Sachs lugs. Because of a shortage of stainless road chainstays, my Crossdresser was made with stainless mountain bike chainstays, which are too great in diameter to fit the Sachs bottom bracket lug, so my  bottom bracket is welded, yet sports a painted lug to match a real one. The Sycip brothers have a good sense of humor.

My delayed, but essential point is that the Budnitz Bicycles Flatbar will do justice on everyone of these unique steeds. Yes, I called them mules, but that was legerdemain. And this gorgeous bar will turn any mule, … well, most, into a stallion.
Right. So. Which steed got its horns … rather, which bird got its wings?
A 1995 WTB Phoenix, a frame handbuilt and signed by Steve Potts, which I built up as a ’69′er after I bought it in 2005. It has a Salsa unicrown steel fork, which attaches an Avid disc brake and places me deep in the bike’s sweetspot. The inertia and angle of approach of the 9′er wheel guides me balanced in all terrain conditions. It’s a bike that ‘disappears’ under its rider, perfect for focusing on the Flatbar.

The Test
 
Del Monte Forest Trails: Poppy, Spider, 666, Ti, and Congress.
07:30 53* foggy and misting.
26 psi front, 30 psi rear.
Wet spider webs awaiting.
Heading out, I noticed my torso position to be a touch flatter and forward, perfect for speed, climbing, and blitzing down. With the Flatbar, the Phoenix cockpit felt very solid, balanced, and precise. That established, my intention on the trail was to discover how much the Flatbar would flex. With a rigid fork on a trail of drops, I quickly observed less flex in the Budnitz bar than in the aluminum Mary bar that otherwise guides the Phoenix. The Budnitz titanium stem was instrumental in the WTB’s solidity in the narrows and, naturally, in its aesthetics.

The mountain biking and trail riding applications of this titanium flat bar are wide reaching. Its dimensions are spot on and it will last a lifetime … beyond that, actually. I project that its urban application reaches even farther. The Budnitz Flatbar is suited to any bike one would choose to negotiate the impermanent moving portals among people, their automobiles, and the narrows.
Buddhaspeed,
Cary
PS John mentioned that another newly designed Budnitz Bicycles product might find me for review in September. Disarmed again with a huge smile, I am again  powerless to refuse.
Flatbar on Budnitz No. 1

Flatbar on my Budnitz No. 1

© Cary Gossett and Rollin With Outta Colon, 2012. All Rights Reserved.
Oh, sorry about the paragraph spacing. Looks perfect before posting. WordPress spaces posts however it likes, regardless what I do. WordPress? You there?

Target

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 To ride where I do, you have to be a willing target. One for aimless autos transporting their mindless automatons with cell phones grafted to their hands and faces.

One for rigs spewing acrid after-burn that immediately sets up shop in the peeps, schnoz, and windbags, our most naturally efficient system for toxin transport to blood and brain.

One for frigid, mist-laden gales that bite and _always_ blow against. One for spider webs that cordon off the trail every few feet and stick to lips, tongue, and lenses, and slow you down just from their weight and friction.

One for bees, who find the most beautiful of settings and fair of skin.

One for leash-less k9s that want nothing more than to savor your spinning meat.

One for mud that is primed to vector fauna scat and giardia down your throat. One for poison oak, whose urushiol resin stealthily hitchhikes on your bike and gear to squat later in red anger on your most secluded skin and membranes.

One for green vines, growing to lasso blood from skin and douse lenses with dew, blurring out all vision just atop the next technical drop.

One for woody vines that, like tangled moss underfoot, will uproot your balance in a heartbeat, that, like prisoners behind bars, will thrust out limbs and claw their way through your skin. One for wood that, occasionally confused with a meteorite careening from above, will squash your mellon in a flash.

And one for solipsism, whose foot soldier and equestrian adherents spew streams of fanatical invective, claiming the public trail to be their own exclusive country club.

Is it worth being a target for so many?
Damn straight it is!
And if you are local flora or being, you may be the indifferent target of this rollin photog.
Cary~

P.S. Almost forgot:

~Local rides don’t merely expose a biker to reveal a passive target, they also demand an active biker at the same time, one up to the Target Test.

Simultaneously keep in view: 

1. Trail floor for greased roots, squirrel-sized pine cones & stones, giant slugs, & horse stacks
2. Ankle & shoulder high flora for bone bruising branches, skin ripping thorns, & toxic poison oak
3. Endless eye high gooey & full spider webs & vines
4. Skull scalping branches & cones 

P.P.S. No one knows more about being a biking target than Lance Armstrong. Hang in there, man . . .  LIVESTRONG. 

© Cary Gossett and Rollin With Outta Colon, 2012. All Rights Reserved.

Post Toasty From My High School Friend

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    • Hope you are going well. I have over the past weeks been reading bits of your “Rollin with outta colon” blog. But not until today have I had a full opportunity to read it in its entirety as a large thunderstorm is rolling through that prevented us from hiking.

      I am so impressed. To have gotten so sick, but have the ability to be so positive is wonderful. You can take others to a higher level with your positive words of encouragement.

      It must have been so hard for you to have to retire early. Please educate me if you will.(or you can tell me it is none of my damn business) What caused you to get sick and loose your colon. Did you have Crohn’s disease? Was it the drugs you were exposed to as an Anesthesiologist? The body, nutrition and the lymphatic system interest me so much in my life as I keep fit for my body’s well being.

      I could really relate to you getting sick. After looking through your pictures you were very active. I can only imagine as active as I am if I got sick. I am proud of you for turning to photography and for especially not being one of those who just gives up. I have two friends with MS. One who is now well today who fought the disease and so far is winning. And then another who is just given in and does not try to get better and because of it she is now on a walker. Our bodies are amazingly strong machines.

      We spend about three weeks a year in Sedona at least. We have thought of buying a piece of land there to build on one day to have a second home. We just love it there. It is so beautiful. We had a second home in Scottsdale, but luckily during the high times sold it due to increasing crime there.

      Have you ever read any of the books written by Jordan Run? He is a naturopathic dr who almost died. He turned his life around through nutrition. I do not regularly mention this to all, but knew you were into your body.

      I just wanted you to know you encouraged me to want to stay stronger and to keep cheering you on to get stronger.

      Take care of yourself.

  • Cary Gossett

    21 hours ago

    Cary Gossett

    • Libby, thank you so very much. For all of it. Your words are so caring and encouraging, I want to post this on my blog! My 1st trip in years will be to Sedona this Oct. That’s the plan anyway. Have been going there 4-8 wks/year since 1996, with a hiatus beginning 2008. I know about 80 miles of bike trail there as I know the way around my house. So good to reconnect. May you long be plagued with good health. Namaste, C

  • Libby Tjernagel-King

    • That is so kind of you. People are really my heart beat.It meant a lot to me this last month when Rebecca graduated from hs. She gave a speech about loving others with no judging. She said in it she learned by example from her mom and that she has always watched me love others. She went on to say that she has never seen someone relate so well with others. It was very heart filling to me. I just hate how others can treat one another. I think I saw others differently after growing up in a very judgmental society in Amarillo. I am sure you know what I mean.

      Awesome to put it on your blog. It is so true what I said to you. You have a talent of encouragement.

      I am thrilled for you with your first trip to Sedona. I will be cheering for you as you work forward to that date. I love to bike and hike there. We have literally done all the trails in the area. And I know you will have awesome pictures to go along.

      Off to hike before our storms roll in. Take care and great to connect with you again.

Toolshed III: Modzilla Lives

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Today’s project is the resurrection of my Bontrager Ti Lite’s Modzilla fork that Speedgoat Bicycles built in 1995. Chris took a Rock Shox Judy SL, replaced the crown with a Paul Components CNC machined aluminum crown that can fit 1″ and 1-1/8″ fork steer tubes, then replaced the original Judy internals with air cartridges by Englund, now Total Air, if they still exist. The 2 massive crown bolts are torqued to 35 ft/lbs.

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Toolshed II: Snapped

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Today’s project was entirely unplanned. I snapped the head off a seatpost collar bolt while readying the Bontrager Ti Lite, the bike Danusia bought me ’93 as a replacement for my stolen Gary Fisher Procaliber, to receive the wheel with the special hub I built and posted about Thursday. The collar had* a machined slot with too narrow a division, preventing enough tightening to hold the seatpost in place before the clamp’s metal edges touched. That fact unknown to me at the time, I over-torqued the bolt, snapping its head off with a loud POP. 

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Toolshed I: King To Bontrager

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Today’s project is transplanting the guts of a Chris King 32 spoke rear road hub into a 28 spoke rear MTB hub made for Bontrager by Chris King in 1999. The Bontrager hub shell is the only King made shell that’s approved to withstand the load of non-drive side radial lacing, meaning the lace of spokes on the chain-free rear wheel side don’t cross over or touch one another hub to rim. I bought the Bontrager hub shell on ebay for $20 in ’05. It was unusual to find just a shell for sale, especially this one, as hubs are usually sold as complete units, with all the guts in place.

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About

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The shorter version:

Hi, I’m Cary. I have one irreplaceable soulet, Danusia, three cats, some health problems, and an ileostomy. When my body allows, I take too many photographs, bike, write music and words, and now, blog.

The short version:

Namaste,

I’m Cary Gossett, a physician and a patient.

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