|
|
| |
 - Endorsed - Indifferent - Contested
|
| |
| The Nashville Statement
|
| |
|
|
| |
Name:Daniel
Home: Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada
About Me: I used to believe that evolution was reasonable, that homosexuality was genetic, and that people became Christians because they couldn't deal with the 'reality' that this life was all there was. I used to believe, that if there was a heaven - I could get there by being good - and I used to think I was more or less a good person. I was wrong on all counts. One day I finally had my eyes opened and I saw that I was not going to go to heaven, but that I was certainly going to suffer the wrath of God for all my sin. I saw myself as a treasonous rebel at heart - I hated God for creating me just to send me to Hell - and I was wretched beyond my own comprehension. Into this spiritual vacuum Jesus Christ came and he opened my understanding - delivering me from God's wrath into God's grace. I was "saved" as an adult, and now my life is hid in Christ. I am by no means sinless, but by God's grace I am a repenting believer - a born again Christian.
My complete profile...
|
| |
Daniel's posts are almost always pastoral and God centered. I appreciate and am challenged by them frequently. He has a great sense of humor as well.
- Marc Heinrich
His posts are either funny or challenging. He is very friendly and nice.
- Rose Cole
[He has] good posts, both the serious like this one, and the humorous like yesterday. [He is] the reason that I have restrained myself from making Canadian jokes in my posts.
- C-Train
This post contains nothing that is of any use to me. What were you thinking? Anyway, it's probably the best I've read all day.
- David Kjos
Daniel, nicely done and much more original than Frank the Turk.
- Jonathan Moorhead
There are some people who are smart, deep, or funny. There are not very many people that are all 3. Daniel is one of those people. His opinion, insight and humor have kept me coming back to his blog since I first visited earlier this year.
- Carla Rolfe
|
| |
|
email
|
|
| A Sad Combination. |
In April of this year my doctor had told me that I needed to lose weight. I had already been planning on purchasing a mountain bike to ride to and from work each day - so this cemented the notion in my head.
The same month I purchased a brand new 2005 GIANT™ Rincon™ - an entry level mountain bike. Not your K-mart special, but the kind you would buy at a cycling shop. It ran me about $600 Canadian after taxes - but I viewed it as an investment. I let the fellow talk me into a 17" frame because he said it would be more comfortable to ride. The bike was otherwise fantastic. It was a nice smooth ride, quiet, and met my every performance expectation. I should have gone for the 19" frame in hindsight, but I was not complaining.
Now, I was careful in selecting the bike - I wasn't interested in looks, I am too old to care really, I was interested in function - I wanted fenders and a saddle bag rack (referred to as a 'pannier' rack hereafter). Nothing could be simpler. They put both the fenders and the rack on the bike at the shop, and I never had a moment of distress with either of them.
On July 14th my new bike was stolen, I had already put almost 900 miles on it - and while I disappointed to lose 'her' - I had long since given up on treating the bike as a vanity item - it was a commuting tool, and it's absence sent me to the bike store immediately to replace it. I decided that I would bump up a category - the Rincon™ was a great bike, but I thought that having this opportunity, I should jump up one notch to a GIANT™ Yukon™ otherwise I would later regret having not done so. The Yukon™ had a few advantages over the Rincon™ - particularly the disk brakes. It had some nicer hardware and a few drilled out things to make the bike somewhat lighter, but the biggest difference was the fact that the brakes were of the disk variety instead of the standard plunger style.
My father has in his life passed on some tidbits of wisdom to me, and one such tidbit has to do with purchasing newer technology. His philosophy is sound - don't be the first person to buy newer technology - it usually takes them years to get the thing right. My father still won't buy a car with front wheel drive - but that is another story altogether. The important thing to note is that the reason plunger brakes haven't changed all that much in the past ten years is because that style of brake has reached a place where it works as designed, is entirely reliable, efficient, and even cheap to maintain because it is the common standard.
Disk brakes on bicycles are not the common standard, but are restricted to the higher end bikes. That means that all the additional gear one might purchase for their mountain bike (such as pannier racks, fenders, etc.) is readily cut and fit to non-disk brake bikes.
Here is where my post really begins. The Yukon itself is a great bike, but as there are so very few mountain bikes with disk brakes this year - there are likewise very few pannier racks that will fit a mtn bike with disk brakes. One company, Axiom, has modified some other design in order to make it 'disk brake compatible' - this is the image you see at the top - the Axiom Journey rack. When I bought the bike I phoned the store up, told them to put a rack and fenders on a red Yukon, and I would be down in an hour to pick it up. The only rack they had for disk brakes was this particular one - and there was no way they could put fenders on the bike (sigh).
The rack, to say the least, has not performed to my expectations. The plain-Jane cheapo rack that I had put on my old bike never gave me a lick of trouble - but this rack was so delicate, you had to set it up just right (which was no small task) , and even set up correctly it moved around, squeaked like a banshee, and a week couldn't go by when some crucial bolt or piece didn't fall off it. At first it restricted the movement of my rear brake. Once that was solved it started to lose bolts. Lose bolts I say, because there was no way to really secure it tightly to the frame. The resulting play between frame and pannier continually worked the thing loose. I had to tighten it all the time - but even doing so I eventually lost a bolt, then another. In the end, I became so frustrated with it I just took it off and began to use a back pack.
So I thought I would write a 'review' about how well the 2005 GIANT™ YUKON™ works with the Axiom Journey disk brake pannier rack. On a scale of one to ten, I give it a one.
Perhaps the rack works well on other cycles - I cannot say for sure, but if you have a 19" Yukon™ frame with the disk brakes - stay away from this rack. |
posted by Daniel @
8:57 AM
 
|
|
| 2 Comments: |
-
One thing I learned from my time in CAP Dan was; "Do not be on the bleeding edge of technology, it only causes problems" :)
Bryan
Mafia boss
-
Indeed - there is much gained by contentment!
|
| |
| << Home |
| |
|
|
|
|
One thing I learned from my time in CAP Dan was; "Do not be on the bleeding edge of technology, it only causes problems" :)
Bryan
Mafia boss