Another interesting combination of elements in the East Bay. After a summer of cold fog, today we have a morning of warm fog. Whatever it is, this fog in the East Bay hills coated everything with a thin layer of wet. No problem there, at least it's warm.
I've been loving my Nitto-Mini + Platrack option so much that I'm putting a Nitto Mini or a Mark's rack on every bike so that any of them can take the Platrack. Anyhow, I just put the Nitto Mini on the Bombadil. With Pacenti Knobbies, the clearance looked pretty tight, right on top and at the front tab. I went out this morning on my first dirt ride since putting it on. Sure enough, the thin layer of wet on top of the east bay dust rolled onto the tire like a paintroller. The knobby was a dirtslick in under a minute. Then any time I rolled over any gravel or pine needles or similar sized soil, I'd get another half inch thick of stuff stuck to the tires and the Nitto mini rack began plowing it back off. My front wheel spewed this roostertail kind of stream of dirt all over the lower parts of bike and rider. The drag on the bike was impressive. It was like seven layer dip where the trails were dry under the trees and wet everywhere else, so you could pick up a layer of wet that sticks to the tires, then a layer of dry that sticks to the wet, with another layer of wet on top of that. Anyhow, I've learned that I should not run the Nitto Mini front with fat knobbies unless I know for sure things are totally dry. If I had run Fatty Rumpkins or similar, I probably would have had the clearance to not be hindered by the rack. Still a fun ride. I'll still keep the Nitto Mini on-hand for the right tire combinations, but will make a mental note to make sure I have enough clearance everywhere for dirt riding. Grant's recent tire tips did say to run narrow tires in mud for exactly this reason. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bu...@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch?hl=en.
