Roland's cycling page
Roland's cycling page |
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In the Netherlands, cycling is a common mode of transportation. It’s cheap, eco-friendly and good for you to boot. Almost everbody here cycles from a young age.
For several years I used a standard bicycle before I became interestedin recumbents. As soon as I saw my first recumbent bicycle, I knew I wanted to try it. (I think it was an article in a magazine about the windcheetah recumbent trike that spiked my curiosity). Because of numbness issues with standard bicycle saddles and the fact that it tends to be windy here further fueled my interest.
The opportunity to try came a couple of years later when I found a recumbent bike shop in Eindhoven (see bottom of this page). I’ve tried different models over the years, inclusing most Challenge models and the aluminium allweder trike.
When I first contemplated buying a recumbent, I tried a lot of different models during a test day at de liggende hollander. I then choose the Optima Condor model for several reasons;
I had the bike built with full suspension for a more comfortable ride. Magura hydraulic rim brakes provide excellent braking without cable flex.
The only disadvantage of this bike was the seat height. I’m 1.85 meters long, but my feet only just touched the ground. I don’t think that anyone below 1.80 meters could use this bike, although a front fork without suspension might make it somewhat lower and easier to use.
The range of 8x3 gears has proven large enough for both riding on level ground and climbing. When I first had the bike I almost always used the 42 teeth middle front gear. After I got used to it, I switched to the 52 teeth front gear. The small 32 teeth front gear has only been used for climbing up to a road slope of 15%.
I’ve been using a Radical Design Medium Rack Bag for years. It fits the bike well, and even holds two water bottles. But it is a bit small for getting groceries, so I later got a Large Rack Bag.
End 2007 I decided to get a lower bike that would be more nimble and comfortable around town, because my commuting and shopping is done in town for a large part. After a lot of browsing and test-rides, I choose a Challenge Hurricane with under seat steering. My reasons for choosing this bike were;
The lower seating position means that you have to be more careful at intersections where parked cars obstruct your view. But as a cyclist I tend to do be careful at intersections anyway.
My ‘hurri’ is fitted with disk brakes. After trying them on a rental bike, I wouldn’t want anything else. I like them much better than rim brakes, especially in wet conditions.
The bike is also fitted with a Rohloff Speedhub 14-speed internal gear hub. This has several advantages;
A gear hub might be a bit less efficient then a derailleur if both have a clean and well-lubricated chain. But this is hardly a real-world scenario. A typical derailleur chain drive loses 2–4% when squeaky clean, but can loose up to 20% when dirty. And studies comparing a high-end derailleur system to a Rohloff showed no drastic differences.
For city traffic and normal touring I think that an eight speed hub would have been sufficient. But it is nice to have the extra gears, especially uphill or with a headwind. The Rohloff also has a very good reputation with regard to durability.
The chain on my hurricane is almost completely enclosed. The chain doesn’t seem to pick up as much dirt as the chain on my Condor. But this can also be due to the fact that the Condor didn’t have a front mudguard, so the front wheel liberally sprayed everything behind it with muck when it was wet. But I think that a derailleur also picks up a lot of dirt, especially on a 20" wheel where it would sit a lot closer to the road.
At first I had a little trouble driving off on this bike, because the steering is a little nervous. But after a week of commuting I got used to it. It is much easier to turn tight corners with this bike. This is especially handy when driving through the city.
The last couple of winters were quite cold overhere. We also had much more snow than we’re used to. This trend seems to be due to global warming. This year we already had our first serious snow in November, which is quite early.
Since cycling is my primary mode of transport, all that snow and ice was not fun. I fell off/crashed my Challenge Hurricane recumbent several times during those winters, especially on icy spots hidden under fresh snow. Luckily on this recumbent the seating position is quite low, so I didn’t injure myself much except for some bruises, but I did get some damage to the bike. It is also not a very relaxing ride. The cyclepaths outside of city limits aren’t always cleaned, so after a couple of days it consists of a sheet of ice with ruts from cycle tires. And there were several days when the roads were just too slippery to bike.
So I started thinking about recumbent trikes. At de liggende hollander I was able to test the HP Velotechnik Scorpion. That test drive was só much fun I was immediately sold on trikes! It’s a bit like driving a go-kart. And of course it is very stable and not fazed by snow and ice. I decided to get a trike as my commuter bike. After comparing different models I settled on the scorpion.
At the right you can see me taking it out for the first ride. Very appropriately this was snowing at the time. :-)
I bought these bikes at a local recumbent bike shop, which I would recommended to everyone:
de liggende
hollander
Tourslaan 33
Eindhoven
tel. ++31 40
2424368
Copyright © 2010, Roland Smith rsmith@xs4all.nl
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