aukmal

Windchill, Superflash, and Air-powered bike horns...

aukmal — Tue, 19 Dec 2006 21:41:00 GMT

As I rode into work this morning a few random thoughts ran through my freezing mind, "...I love this new Superflash light, I wish I could mount my Airzound bike horn on my roadbike, and geez it's freezing this morning, I wonder what the wind chill is today?" Below are my thought a little more fleshed out.

1) Planet Bike Superflash - These new little red flasher lights are super bright (I speculate that's why they call it the "Superflash"). If you are looking to increase your visibility at night on the road, pick up one or more of these things. The Path Bike Shop has them at $24 retail. Yes they are a little pricey, but are well worth the investment. I've got two of them on the back of my backpack to compliment the two other lesser flashers: four total on my backside.

2) Air-zound air horn - This could be the loudest bike horn in existence. You pump up the high pressure container which fits in your bottle cage, then mount the horn on your bars. The air-powered horn is loud enough to scare drivers through a closed window: I've done it before. However, I wish there were a way to mount it conveniently on a roadie-style drop bar. On flat bars, you can mount it and blast away with the thumb activated switch.

3) How does one calculate "Wind Chill Factor?" - According to some weather services, it got down to 38 degrees yesterday morning. Riding to work this morning at 5:30, it felt colder than yesterday (even my eyes were cold, which doesn't usually happen). I checked on the national weather service and found the calculation for wind-chill factor. It was updated in 2000 to make it more accurate. Assuming it was 38 degrees and I was riding at about 20 MPH, with wind-chill, the perceived temp was about 28-degrees (YIKES!). If you're interested, here's the formula: WC = 35.74+0.6215xTemp-35.75x(Velocity^0.16)+0.4275xTempxVelocity^0.16. There's a minumum wind speed of 3 MPH. Yes, I'm an engineer and these things are interesting to me.

Ran into Brian Lopes...

aukmal — Sat, 16 Dec 2006 06:06:00 GMT

...at the camera shop (Calumet Photo in Santa Ana). I was standing at the counter and a guy next to me asks, "...do you ride mountain bikes?" Mind you, I was in my work clothes: dress shirt, jeans...and 5:10 Hi Impact shoes. Semi startled, I say, "uh, yeah, how'd you know?" He replies, "...the shoes, how do you like them?" I respond, "I like the sticky rubber, but sometimes they are too sticky on the flats, do you ride?" He says, "..yeah, I ride mountain bikes too..." Talk about the understatement of the year...sort of like Pele saying, "...yeah, I play soccer..."

I introduced myself, he introduces himself as any other guy who nonchalantely (sp?), "...my name's Brian Lopes..."...finally dawning on me, this is THE Brian Lopes...duh! LOL. We must've hung out and talked shop about cameras and riding for about half an hour. Talk about a humble, genuine person. I was super impressed by how down-to-earth, and friendly he is.

Talk about someone who is one of the best, if not the best, at what he does, yet he takes the time to talk shop and share experiences about a common passion we share. One lesson I'm learning these days is that friendly, genuine people are scarcer to find than one would hope.

Brian, if you happen upon this blog, the pleasure was all mine today. Good luck finding a camera.

...wish I would've gotten his number to see if he'd like to ride sometime...lol...

Gerritt Slingerland may be Winston's hero, but Brian Lopes just made a great impression on me.

Photo notes (Shooting while riding with others)

aukmal — Wed, 13 Dec 2006 20:12:00 GMT

Hmmm...I'm starting to like the blog as a tool to capture useful information for myself and possibly for others.

Here's some info regarding taking action shots of riders, white balance, and bag to carry a digital SLR and 24-70 f2.8 lens.

The Canon has three White Balance selection modes: 1) Auto, 2) 6 preset light settings, and 3) full custom. I don't like to mess with the full custom and the auto setting doesn't seem to get the right white balance. I used the "Open Shade" preset as the basis for the shots before the sun hit the riders, then I did some manual work to warm up the colors a little. Even with the open shade setting the colors came out pretty "cool" (too much blue).

I actually like to use an attached flash, but since I was actually riding the trails, it's sort of difficult to get ahead of the group, set up, attach the flash, take the pics, break down, then catch up again. Easier to just take the pics sans the attached flash. I've found that the Dakine Nomad pack has enough space in the outside pocket to hold the camera and it's pretty easy to get access.

Commuter notes (12-11-06)

aukmal — Wed, 13 Dec 2006 05:34:00 GMT

Thought I'd start jotting down notes from my commuting experiences. I've been riding my bike to work for the past 3.5 years on average about 4 days a week 14 miles roundtrip. The first two years was on an Ellsworth Joker, then I picked up a Surly Crosscheck and discovered the joy of thin tires: sold the crosscheck and picked up a roadbike, my cheek met the door frame of a Honda Odyssey last year and I'm on the second roadbike.

Currently, I'm using a Light & Motion Arc Li-ion as my commuter light / night ride mountain bike light. I've got a LED AA powered back up light that works in a pinch (p.s. make sure your Light & Motion isn't on the recall list). I currently run two flashing red LEDs on the backside and think they work pretty well, although there's one at the Path Bike Shop that is super impressive...can't remember the name of it.

One of the great things about commuting is that it would take me just as long to drive to work, and probably cut years off my life.

Until next time

Aukmal