Lights and brakes

Friday's ride was pleasant, but relatively dark. For the first time in perhaps a month or more, thanks to the far edge of Gustav, we had an overcast and slightly drizzly day. Well, OK, it actually rained pretty steadily while I was at work, but thankfully was dry during ride times.

This ride got me thinking... summer is almost over, and it's only going to be getting darker and rainier as the seasons change. Two important things come to mind: visibility and stopping ability. I'm particularly concerned about these issues because of my earlier loss of my good taillight, and the fact that my rear brake cable was making strange noises - and not working very well - when I used it. It would not be a good thing for that cable to snap during an emergency stop... although that is why a bicycle has two independent brake systems.

After a quick trip to the bike shop, I was all set to work on both issues. I already have a pretty good headlight, so I didn't worry too much about that. This light won't really work for true dark riding - when you need the road illuminated - but it does a very good job of making me visible. And it transfers easily to my other bike. What I did pick up was the biggest, brightest tail light I could find... and it happened to be 20% off! This thing has ten - count'em ten LED's. Two point out to each side (though still visible to the rear), and the other six point straight back. It's really two independent 5-led lights in a single casing, so you can set the top and bottom rows to do different things (solid, flash, sequence or random).

We'll have to see how this thing works in the real world. One thing I don't like is that I had to mount it on my seatpost, which puts it underneath my new seat bag. I'm concerned that this might reduce visibility, especially for people who are seated high up (large trucks, for example). I could clip it to the back of the bag, which would help, but now I'm afraid that it will snap off. I also don't like hanging it from my rack, because the rack's blinkie-mount doesn't stay put very well. I left my old light on the rack as a backup.

I'm considering adding a small blinkie like this one to the back of my helmet when things get darker. Perhaps it will help.

The other major bike work for the weekend was, of course the brakes. I picked up a pair of brake cables and some housing at the bike shop (same trip as the new blinkie), and in about a half-hour this evening I had the rear cable replaced. Now that I've seen the cable off the bike, I no longer think it was in danger of breaking, but it was certainly a bit stretched. There was also a light sheath over one section that had broken, and I believe it was this bit of plastic that was making the "unravelling cable" noise.

In closing, I'll give props to two very good website. The first is one that I have referenced for a very long time - the Park Tool website. They provide extensive repair help and tutorials on the use of their tools. The second I have only stumbled upon recently: BicycleTutor.com. This site has quite a collection of video lessons on a variety of topics. I'm just poking around this site, but I expect it will prove quite useful in the future.