Lights, Camera, Malfunction

A ride not to be. I hemmed and hawed about doing an early morning ride with the RCCS and Dave. I've had a cold and didn't relish another early morning rise, but by the time I got up to check the ride status, I was awake enough that I changed and hit the road to meet Dave. The plan was to ride from Heine's at E.Pkwy/B'town to just on the other side of Anchorage at a coffee shop off Lagrange Rd. I had promised to sing in church (that'll sound great with all the junk in my head) so I was going to ride out with Dave and turn around and come home via another route, giving me around 30 on the morning. It would also be a first run for my new 700c dynowheel with IQ CYO R that I purchased to use between several bikes, including the new one in case of a brevet in the future. Now it's sitting on the Blueridge, which has become the winter/dark trainer.

I met Dave and we headed through Cherokee, noticing how much brighter his Dinotte was than my IQ CYO. Frankly I was disappointed. Dave's light was *so* much brigher, and mine seemed to be doing this strange pulsing thing, which could be the nature of the new hub. Not good. I noticed a slight pulse at very low speed on my old halogen on the LHT, but not this much as more normal speeds (like 13mph or so) As long as I was up to speed, and by that I mean 18 or 19mph, the notchiness fell away; that's too fast to have to go for smooth lighting. Another thing not mentioned was that the standlight was not functioning. Sketchy. We headed into St. Matthews and right onto Westport which we would use for much of the route out. At that point, suddenly, I was in the dark. My light failed. We stopped and fiddled a bit and found no solution so I decided to turn around and head home, certainly not wanting to do the remaining 25m in the dark. Bleh!

Coming back through St. Matthews and Seneca the light was putting out this ghostly glow, showing that it was receiving some kind of power. Even more strangely, descending the I-64 hill, suddenly, the light came on again, and I think at the intended brightness. I rode nicely by Big rock with nice, bright front light. In no mood for adventure (and a bit cold), I climbed Millvale and went to Breadworks for coffee and a scone and ruminated on the travails of technology. OYLC wanted to work with me on the dyno (in lieu of me going with an experienced dyno shop like Hiawatha), and now they'll get the chance. Another thing not mentioned was that I crimped and heat shrank my own connectors for the new wheel. It could easily be a user error, but how do you explain no standlight?

So I'm back, at home, early, and I downloaded the partial ride from the 60cx to find that my top speed was 175mph, as well as having some significant goofiness of the map data in and around the parks. Technology. But 13m total it was.

Comments

David Crowell said…
Other than the few miles with you, the ride was solo, but it still felt really good. That was even more true once the sun was up enough to warm my frozen toes. :)

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