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Wednesday, January 28

Let's talk about sex...

Generally speaking I'm all for it. How about you?

Next topic....

I missed the Southern Cross race this last weekend. Unfortunately I chose to do The Most Horrible Thing Ever (which turned out to be The Most Horrible Thing Never) instead, but now having bailed on TMHTE I lost the bird in hand and the one in the bush. I can't believe I missed a course that was hard enough to have people belly aching about how hard it was.... twelve mile climb up a crunchy peanut butter covered road? I missed that? And how 'bout the hike-a-bike that was so steep that this guy chose to drag his bike to the top like an unruly canine badly in need of some obedience training?

Photo ripped from the "Pouched One", but credited to the letter H (Sesame Street influenced I guess)

At least he was dragging his bike with the derailleur side up and outta harm's way. This so looks like it woulda been my kinda race since I ride a single speed and can drag it on either side. Maybe next year.

Take a look at this:
That is dead sexy magna cum laude excelsior. This fork from Niner is all carbon from tip top to dropout bottom. It just says "I'm carbon through and through. I'm sexier than a combination of a late 70's Bo Derek and the space shuttle external tank *." I would be so all over this fork if it wasn't using the updated geometry numbers that Niner is using for 2009. Since I was using 2009 numbers back in 2007 (before they were cool) I decided to go against the grain and build my MOOTS around 2005 retro-style geometry . You just watch me. I'm bringing it back, all the way around the outside of the barn, up the hay elevator, and into the loft where I can get crazy whack funky with it. Close your eyes and picture it.

I surreptitiously stole that picture from bikerumor.com and conveniently cropped it for my own use. There was also this image posted in the same article:

One commenter had this to say: "That fork looks scary! Their method of load testing is virutally useless. They obviously don’t know the loads applied to a fork in the real world."

I am not sure if the commenter is in fact an engineer or perhaps one of the many unemployed armchair engineers that frequent places like MTBR, bikeforums.net, or hermaphrodite nudie bars. He did say that their method of fork testing was "VIRUTALLY USELESS", and since I have no idea how to use a fork in a VIRUTAL manner I must admit he may be onto something. I did my own google search to see how most smart people test fork loads during "virutal use" in the real world, but this is all I came up with:

Since the Niner fork would be useless in the conveyance of peas from plate to mouth I would say that it definitely fails the virutal pea fork test displayed above. Perhaps if the individual in the experiment could adjust the tangential angle of vectoral approach by inclining his support structure in a forward direction (number 22) the fork would be more successful in serving it's purpose as a pea transport device and fewer peas would be affected by the gravitational pull of the earth (number 20). Without further testing we may never know.

George from Bike29 chimed in with a comment to defend the "virutal testing" (not the virutal pea fork test), but I'd bet he's a bit biased since he'd say anything to get his hands on a glow in the dark baby blue carbon fork that matched his glow in the dark baby blue footie pajamas (size: Boy's Extra Husky).

I better get over to MTBR and post up something in the Beer, Vacations, 650B, and Other Virutally Useful Stuff board and see what this is all about.




*Sorry. If I woulda linked the images properly you woulda never looked at the image of the space shuttle external tank that looked like a boob.

17 comments:

Anonymous said...

I would say that it might be worthwile to simulate some side loading as well on that there fjork. Also, not much compression loading going on there either. Hmmm, maybe that is pretty marginal testing after all.

dicky said...

I was thinking that the static photo you see is only one photo of one test. Who really knows how many tests and of what type they did while testing the fork? I was mocking the fact that the guy passed a helluva judgment down on Niner's QC based on one photo... well, that and the fact that his spelling is as bad as mine.

Guitar Ted said...

Typically that apparatus is for simulating fore/aft type loads, you know.....the type your fork "sees" most often? Yeah....the kind of loads that can snap a fork off at the base of the crown or at the crown race where all the stresses are concentrated.

I have spoken with Steve and Chris about their testing, which exceeds European standards, known to be the toughest in the industry. If they say it passes the independant lab testing, then I say it's good enough for "husky" guys like George Wissel, or me. (Baby blue footie pajamas and all!)

Anonymous said...

What are the new Niner specs? Are they goofy like the 2009 Gary Fishers? I heard the new GF's are built around a fork with a 60mm rake...and they handle like sh!t.

Guitar Ted said...

Elk: The Niner fork is now corrected for 80mm travel (470mm axle to crown) instead of the 100mm the "old" Niner forks employed. Offset is 45mm, if I recall correctly.

F.W. Adams said...

Monsieur Le Dicky,

Thank you for the morning chuckles. I also enjoyed the pic of that poor chap dragging his ride up the hill. While it seems to convey a certain amount of dismay andsad resignation, he is still going and has not quit!

Peace!

jkeiffer said...

Oh god that was funny. Thanks for that. But you can keep your jibs at 650B to yourself. Or I might be forced to feed you peas via a not for such purposed utensil.

Namrita O'Dea said...

we missed you, too.

Big Bikes said...

I eat my peas with honey
I've done it all my life
It makes the peas taste funny
but it keeps them on my knife (or Niner fork)

-Anonymous

Elk, Gary Fisher fork offset is a meager 51mm. I raced both an old school geometry 29er this past season and a new school G2 29er. I prefer the latter.

-t

Emily said...

Seriously, Southern Cross was crazy fun and I am first in line for next year. The climb was delightfully lengthy.
After seeing that photo I am feeling very pro for having slowly staggered up that hill with my bike on my shoulder.

George said...

I have Kermit green footie PJs thank you very much...

Anonymous said...

Dicky- nothing to do with the above comments- How are the new Salsa bars working for your wrists? Same issues- rigid-Just ordered some fleegle's- and am curious about the sweep

dicky said...

I have been digging the Salsa's, but then again I've been riding suspended since early December. They do feel like they put my hands in a happy place, but I've been doing scads of other things in order to allow my wrists/hand to recoup, so I don't know if I can give the bars all the credit. Could it be the sweep? The carbon? The fork? One of the other things I've started doing in order to heal up??? Who knows??

F.W. Adams said...

My wife had wrist issues which were significantly mitigated when we switched her out to Ergon grips, FWIW...

FixieDave said...

trying to bump up your hits with using the word sex in your title....

wasn't expecting you to sink quite this low...

then again wasn't expecting you to ride a moots ether

Anonymous said...

my mother caught me masturbating to BowDerek. She took off with my best porno mag. That's when I took up biking. Now I bike to fork.
I love that fork.
I love to fork.
I gotta get me that fork.
What would my mother think if I was riding that fork.
I'm a forker.
bitch.

RickySilk said...

people say you look like mc hammer on crack dicky!