Update with new pics, and more ride impressions with the stock drivetrain before I (gasp!) electrify it.
I cut an inch off the bars, swapped in a B17 Select from another bike, and added the SOMA Porteur front rack I got from Ely at RuthWorkssf.com (thanks, Ely!). As I said before, everything about this bike sells the vibe of an old Raleigh 3-speed, just lighter/faster/better braking better handling. It can get up and go when you jam the pedals, but there's a "what the heck are you doing?" feel to it, like cruising down Hwy 1 through Big Sur in a convertible Mustang and remembering there's no point in rushing. The 2-chainrings-plus-guard has an odd effect on my shifting technique. Normally with a triple I run up and down the rings as I'm shifting in back, so that the chainline stays relatively straight. For some reason my brain understands this setup as 'big ring for most stuff, granny ring for steep hills'. I ride it as a 1x9 that happens to have a bailout in dire circumstances. Weird! Another weird thing is the cranks are 173mm and I don't notice it. I always ride 170 and really dislike 175, so I thought sure I would notice a 3mm difference but nope. This bike is set up a certain way, and my body/brain seems to adapt to it without a second thought of the differences from other bikes I've ridden. Interesting! The one debit I can think of is the stock pseudo-Nitto seatpost. The spec is for 26.8 but I think this post is 26.7..I haven't pulled it to confirm but the same post on my Appaloosa was. It takes some muscle to get it clamped in there, plus there's a good bit of scratching on the sides from up/down. I'm treating it as a seat-height-dialing-in adjuster, and will replace with a 26.8 S83 when Riv has them back in stock. The seattube will get a little deburring session before I install it. So it's fabulous. I'm almost a little shy about putting the mid-drive on it, but Clem L is so smooth and stable. It's a perfect platform for the distances and speeds I do with ebikes, and the step-through design gives me a liftatube to heft it up stairs. It's gonna be fun! https://goo.gl/photos/AocvMvSFvs4DqjV58 Joe Bernard Vallejo CA. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
