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A. Homer Hilsen 7-year Review

04 Monday Jan 2016

Tags

a. homer hilsen, ahh, bike, commute, cycling, harlequin wrap, nitto, porteur, randonneur, rivendell, Seattle


My first real thoughtful bike purchase was the Rivendell A. Homer Hilsen.  Color – metallic copper – one of the web frame specials in 2009 shortly after I moved back to Seattle from a brief 18-month foray to my childhood home of Minnesota.  I had been commuting on a ’96 Kona AA that I was pretty much done with.  The aluminum frame never felt right – too stiff. I was ready for a real road bike after spending much of the prior 20 years on a mountain bike.

Hilsen-1

2nd Build – still a favorite

I did a lot of research, but after I found the Rivendell site, started reading Sheldon Brown and Grant Petersen’s opinions, and did some test rides on a local friend’s vast collection of Riv bikes, I was smitten.  I recall going to the Seattle Bike Show in 2008 and walking around forlorn, seeing nothing attractive.  At all.

At that point, I knew a couple things about myself:

  1. Steel felt right.  I grew up riding this material.  My Raleigh Reliant, and Stumpjumper Pro (’91) were my benchmark rides.
  2. I wasn’t planning to pick up racing.  I am a recreational and practical cyclist.
  3. Damn those lugged frames were pretty!  They really hit a “homer” in terms of where my aesthetic sensibilities were concerned.
  4. I wanted to build this bike myself from the frame up.

I started watching the Riv site and decided the copper Hilsen was the one.  It was a 59cm frame, and although I would probably fit up to a 61cm, this was as big as I wanted to commit to.

After a few months of collecting the parts and tools needed to put this together, I took it for the first ride and was amazed at the effortless speed compared to my mountain bikes. At about the same time, I had also stumbled on the  RBW owners bunch online community, which helped me navigate a first bike build, as well as sharing lots of good technical advice.

Here was a large community of like-minded folks generally oohing and aahing all the builds folks were doing.  This tight-knit community is one known for being a polite and caring group, and I’m happy to count many of the folks there as friends.

Untitled

Favorite Bike in Current Config

The Hilsen took me on my first 100k brevet, and then my 200k.  Then my 300k.  It helped me learn that I like the Selle Anatomica Titanico saddle best on anything over 100 miles.  It showed me that clipless pedals were not necessary anymore.

I briefly became caught up in the low-trail Jan Heine camp, and picked up another rando bike (the Toussaint), but after all these years, the one bike I still enjoy the most is the A. Homer Hilsen.  It is still as lovely as ever, and gaining beausage every year.  It still gets more comments on my daily commute, rain or shine.  After riding other bikes for several months, and then coming back to this one, it still feels “just right”.  The ride is smooth, predictable, natural.  I never feel like it has quirks, defects, or limitations that I’ve noticed on lesser bikes.

It has done brevets, snowy singletrack(!), loaded commutes, and just riding trips.  Handled ’em all with aplomb.  ’nuff said…

Posted by Stonehog | Filed under Cycling, Northwest, Randonneuring

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Bike Work

12 Sunday Jan 2014

Posted by Stonehog in Cycling

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Tags

a. homer hilsen, bosco, Grand Randonneur, Miyata, porteur, rivendell, Shimano, Soma GR


I needed some “dad alone time” tonight, so I did a little work on the Miyata RidgeRunner Team.  I like the Rivendell Bosco bars, and have used them for over a year, but it was time for a change.  They are huge, and allow an amazing amount of variety, but they started to feel a bit clownish – perhaps it’s the tape job…

Ready to go

I put a VO Porteur setup back on this bike.  This was a cockpit I had originally on the Hunqapillar, and liked it quite a bit.  I also started out with porteurs on my Hilsen after a bad experience with some of the larger (46cm) Noodles.  I rode that configuration for quite a while until I got a bit of hand numbness on a 100k in 2012.

January Populaire-1

The porteurs are narrow, and have enough reach back towards me that they offer a bit more upright position than drops.  They also look cool 🙂

In doing this, I had to replace all the cables due to the length differences.  I also went to bar end shifters (indexed Shimano 8-speed).  They work fine on the 7-speed cassette, BTW.  The bike feels smaller and narrower now.  I don’t have the bolt upright feel that I had with the Boscos, but I’m saving them for someday when I need to relax a bit.  With more randonneuring coming this year, I need to get used to the more aero position of the drops, and the porteurs aren’t too off.

I’ve thought about selling the Miyata with the forthcoming Soma GR I am planning to build up, but I’m not sure I can do it.  I like the bike a lot, and have put a lot of time and effort into reviving it from the ’80’s MTB form I found it in.  I will post some pics of the new config in the next week, but for now, here’s the old version.

B&M Lumos B

Drop Some Wisdom

17 Sunday Mar 2013

Posted by Stonehog in Cycling

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Tags

200k, cork tape, cotton bar tape, drop bars, hand comfort, nitto, Nitto B-115, nitto noodles, noodles, Olympiade, populaire, porteur, randonneur, ride comfort, rivendell, VO


When I started riding road bikes again around 2009, I read a lot of opinion on the “internets”, and a few things were spoken of as gospel.  One of these was:

  • Drop bars, in particular Noodle bars are great for long term comfort (Discussion Thread from ’09)

I’m a dedicated experimenter/tweaker when it comes to building and riding bikes.  I had been on road bikes with drop bars for a short period of my life from about 1983-1991, but mainly as a part-time commuter.  I never raced, and only did one 2-day 150 mile ride in high school.

My old road bike – Raleigh Reliant

When I moved to Seattle in 1991, I rode a friend’s mountain bike down some fire  trails in Whistler, BC, and was totally smitten.  From then until 2009, I had various mountain bikes with flat bars.  When I bought my first Rivendell, I tried 46cm Noodles, but found them uncomfortable.  Specifically, when I was in the drops, they felt really deep/extreme, and my forearms hit the tops disconcertingly.  There was something off.

Cupcake and Homer with 46cm Noodles

I found VO Porteur bars to be a better fit for me initially, as they had a nice stretched-out thin position on the flat fronts, and I could also get very upright on the swept back part of the bars.  I went through a few iterations with these bars until I started riding in longer Randonneur events.  On one Populaire, I developed a bit of numbness in one hand at the 50-mile mark, even with soft cork tape.  I was definitely the only rider using upright bars of any kind, and most of  the folks were using drop bars of some sort.

Porteur with Cork and Cotton

I decided that I would have to try some drops for the longer 200k ride I had planned.  I had an older pair of Nitto B-115 Olympiade bars from the 80s, and the width was a tiny 39cm (compared to the 46cm).  I set these guys up, and found them comfortable on my commute (7-12 miles each way). I also found that my forearms didn’t hit the tops of the bars when I was in the drops.  The next test was the Bellingham 200k.

Olympiades

At the end of the event, I had no hand discomfort, and felt that the bars were close to ideal.  They just needed more width, and a bit of curve back like the old noodles had on the tops.  This led me back to the beginning (almost) and the Noodle style I started out with.  I went with the next bigger size of Noodles and have not gone back to uprights.

Sometimes it is best to listen to the wisdom/opinion of experienced riders in the first place.  At least cheaper…

Faves! Nitto Noodle 42cm with SRAM S500 Levers

The Beer Truck

18 Tuesday Sep 2012

Posted by Stonehog in Cycling

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Tags

beer, beer bike, bike, hauling beer, porteur



The Truck, a set on Flickr.

This is about 20 pounds of beer. Not for everyone (I know), but there is an annoyingly great beer store near the end of my commute home, and with this kind of utility carrying capacity, I have to occasionally work it.

Hunqapillar Porteur

18 Tuesday Sep 2012

Posted by Stonehog in Cycling

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Tags

cycling, Hunqapillar, porteur, rivendell, shopsack, wald basket


ProfileShopSack and BasketCockpitSaddleSack SmallTektro CantisRear Drivetrain
Forward DrivetrainSykes Fender and DynoFull WiringRear ViewRearBar Wrap
Skunk?Pup wants to playBar WrapHarlequin WrapWho needs brake gums?There's a bell hidden in there
HeadbadgeSuperbe Pro
Hunqapillar Porteur, a set on Flickr.

I am going back to an old favorite cockpit on the camp bike. The Mustache bars felt a bit stretched after a while, and I didn’t want to push them up too much higher. The Porteur bars give me a nice narrow forward position on the brake hoods, while providing a nice relaxing upright spot that drops and ‘staches don’t. Since I was going Porteur, I figured I had to go “full Porteur” with the large front basket and bag. This thing can carry a ton as my next post will show.

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