Is there something rotten in the world of mass produced bicycles?

[TimC]

On 2007-04-18, Bleve (aka Bruce)
was almost, but not quite, entirely unlike tea:
> On Apr 17, 10:21 pm, Zebee Johnstone <[email protected]> wrote:
>> In aus.bicycle on Tue, 17 Apr 2007 18:53:17 +1000
>>
>> rooman <[email protected]> wrote:
>> > The comment was made that some of these people were told by their LBS's
>> > when they complained of sore backs and necks and hands - "You are
>> > supposed to get sore when you ride a bike, its normal!!!)...sheesh
>>
>> It's the mantra of the 'bent rider of course, "No pain!".
>
> Which is ********. I've done a few hours in/on a 'bent, and been
> unable to walk for a day afterwards.

Did you ever ride one of those pedicab thingies in the city?

A horrendous design, combined with a terrible system of having to ride
whatever bent there was at the front of the line, independant of who
the last person to ride it was. The seat was a 5 minute job of
pushing to and fro until it finally slipped down enough for you to not
have your legs in your ears. The steering rods jutted out forcing
your knees to do a badger badger badger impression, and the gearing
didn't go sufficiently low for the hills and loads we were expected to
haul. They didn't provide pedals or cleats, so it was another 5
minute job swapping my private pedals over, lest I be forced to ride
with sneakers today. I'm just glad the motors *must* have been higher
than the 200W legal limit (either that or the "ergonomics" seriously
hindered my nominal 200W power output).

It took a few months after that gig before my knee pain returned to a
relatively sane level.

--
TimC
If a train station is a place where a train stops, what's a workstation?

 

[Shane Stanley]

In article <[email protected]>,
rooman <[email protected]> wrote:

> Seems he never gave you a full bike-fit, you came in for a measure

Yes, that's right.

> He never sold you a bike, and if you did get a bike from some where
> else you didnt bring it in for a "fit", at which time your bar height
> and seat position would have been established.

That's true, but he did give me some guidance with reference to my then
bike. I didn't go back for the old reason: once bitten, twice shy.

> So not sure what you see as "rotten", or how it fits in context here

It fits in the context of suggesting that problems are not just the
province of those who sell mass-produced bikes.

> other than you two didnt see eye to eye on things ( and your budget
> wouldnt allow it -you admit that was "tight") ... were you just tire
> kicking then...

Tyre kicking? I was up-front: I said I had a limited budget, and I
wanted to see if I really needed a custom bike, in which case I'd
probably have to wait until my budget was higher, otherwise I'd like
measurements I could use when shopping around. I said this when I
booked, and no-one suggested they didn't want to take my money.

And even if I hadn't, I was *paying* for his time -- how can that be
tyre kicking, for goodness sake? The sales spiel shouldn't have been
part of the process, to my mind.

As for not seeing eye to eye -- you mean because he was busy
concentrating on someone else a good deal of the time? We didn't
actually argue about anything that I remember; I was paying to hear his
opinion, and while I disagreed with some of what he said (unrelated to
fitting, I might add), I wasn't there for an argument.

> and now nitpicking for the sake of it?

Yeah, whatever. Rooman, I was treated rudely -- very rudely. If someone
treats you rudely, do you just bite your tongue when someone continually
sings their praises?

> No doubting JK is a character and in his own inimitable way doesnt
> see eye to eye with some folk, we all have that experIEnce as we go
> through life.... it makes things interesting.

Interesting indeed. FWIW, I counted the episode as money well spent on
experience.

--
Shane Stanley