[Dos_Ruedas]

If you haven’t already put those magnifiers on your glasses, take it from someone who’s tried them. Put them on a cheap pair of glasses. If they don’t work and you have to take them off, it won’t ruin your good glasses. And when putting them on, make sure you get the surface the lens very clean and have a fan (at low speed) blowing across them when you apply the magnifiers. It’s extremely annoying to have a bubble with a spec of dirt/dust to look at constantly.

These should be removable (static cling type). I’m really just giving a shot to see what i think. I’ve always gone without and done fine, but I’m a few years older now.
In another life, i worked optical. I know sport Rx lenses aren’t cheap. This will help me decide if it’s worth the money to go that route.

Thanks for the tips about the bubbles and dirt.

 

[Dos_Ruedas]

That drone sounds really cool!!
I bet you’ll get some sweet video with that follow me feature. I can’t wait to see some.

One of my boys has an pretty nice drone. It needs some parts after my last flight though, so it’s been grounded for the past six months.

Happy flying.

 

[Merlincustom]

Some relatively recent purchases for cycling:

View attachment 52325

Then, so that ^ will work with my trainer,
View attachment 52326


Then these, so i can decide if it’s worthwhile to drop the dime on Rx cycling lenses.
View attachment 52327

With those lenses you can now see to clean that hub

 

[Merlincustom]

Got this drone, been holding off getting one for many, many years as I know I'll spend too much time messing with it since it encompasses a number of my interests - the outdoors, airplanes and flight, electronics, and photography/videography.

Anyway, this runs about 20 minutes per battery (I have two batteries) and has a follow me option and an automatic orbiting action as well as the ability to follow waypoints. All of which I think will be useful for videos of some of my favorite mountain biking sections. It will also autoland back at the location where it took off when on low power.

Follow me option I am still working on learning how to set - the ability of something that small to do pattern recognition is pretty amazing but it's hard to get a lock, think I am not doing it quite right.

The automatic orbiting works perfectly - as it does its loop it turns to keep the main camera always pointed at the center point of the orbit.

Have not tried the waypoint marking yet.

Some good candidates for footage are a trail section that goes along high cliffs along the edge of Lake Ontario and at another trail a section where a trail goes directly through the ruins of an old mill along the shoreline of the Black River and then right past the ruins it takes a sharp left-hand turn left at the edge of a cliff (which is on the edge of the Black River at a very turbulent section with lots of rapids - going over the edge means drowning in the rapids and/or death from being rammed against the stones under the rapids).

Secondarily I will probably do some aerial footage of various trailheads and such to add to my local trails website, and interesting trail features taken from altitude (waterfalls, ruins, viewing areas, etc).

Unfortunately, the camera isn't quite as good as I thought it would be but it is adequate, it is on a gimbal.

Small enough to fit in a small backpack or pack. Pic below shows it with the protectors at the end of the rotors, I have since taken those off. It flies beautifully, and I even flew it (stupidly) in winds with 18 MPH gusts and it fought well against them to come back. It also has a fixed belly-mount camera that is mostly used for terrain-following but can also take photos. There is also a VR mode for using it with VR glassess.

View attachment 52328 View attachment 52329

dcrainmaker has some pretty cool drone reviews with footage.

 

[i12ride]

crossbars for buy krakz for the bykbox.....

 

[lectrichead]

Picked up a GoPro Hero5 Session to replace my larger, heavier Garmin Virb action camera. It is so small but the video quality is crazy good, 4k (not needed, probably knock down to 760 for better battery life). It even has voice recognition but I turned that off and a few other things to squeeze more battery power out, and I can still plug an auxiliary battery in if I need to, hidden under the handlebars.

A company sent me a rechargeable battery power air pump for critiquing, suggestions, and review. It has a little light on it and recharges from any USB, can also top off car tires and other stuff, and has different modes that can be preset for pressure, with a shutoff at that point for each mode. One mode specifically for biking, I used the bike setting for my road bike and the motorcycle setting for my mountain bike pressure preset. I have been checking the digital age and the auto-shutoff against the known good readings on two hand pumps and a standalone gauge - amazingly it is precise down to what looks like a half-pound. So far so good. The sucker pumps fast.

One critique I am going to have for the company is that the little screw-on Presta valve converter should be replaced with a nozzle that is convertible for the two valve types or has a double for each, maybe longer hose.

I think I have checked the tire pressure in every bike my wife and I own now and double-checked the gauge on each, and topped off and checked all tires on my Primary Bike Transport Vehicle as well as the large truck/SUV tires on our Secondary Bike Transport Vehicle, the tractor, wagon, two hand trucks, rototiller, two snowblower, kayak cart, and blown out dust from the CPU heat sink on a dirty computer.

Also bought rear cassette removal tools and new rear cassette for the mountain bike - missing cog on one of the rings so decided to replace it myself as the bike shops are crazy-busy. I haven't done this since I was an early teen (early 80's), and I happen to remember having to make my own tools to do it so am going to have to refresh myself a bit with Youtube vids. I know the general method but a bit nervous about doing it myself, despite being pretty handy with da tools.

.

 

[i12ride]

New skins after 10yrs for the actual road bike................

 

[Nigal]

A 90dB bike horn. Has three different sounds. “On your left...on your left! WOOPWOOP!” (Shits pants).

 

[i12ride]

OK, bought $275 worth of fork upgrade parts....oh about 3yrs ago for the cwtch special aka Stache 7. Finally got tired (pun coming) enough of that box glaring at me from the workbench every time in garage AND the WTB Ranger 29×3.0s scored sorta recently takin up space so I finally took bike to LBS to have fork service and tires,rim tape, new sealant installed. Got it back today. Tires look amazing and fork feels super smooth and plush. Gonna go back by shop and go thru dialing in fork setup a bit. Probably just needs more air than it used to run. Also have a fresh new PC1130 chain going on. Brake bleed with fresh new dot 5.1 coming soon...maybe new pads and rotors while I'm at it.

 

[Nigal]

Never said this to a grown man but, that’s frickin’ HUGE! Do they have much rolling resistance?

 

[i12ride]

The 21.5" frame or the 3.0s?.....nothing resists being rolled over by this thing. It is not exactly a sprinter or light airy flyer, more of an unstoppable tank or steamroller. Amazingly nimble on singletrack as long as you pay attention. It's like a wild horse that will stray if you don't keep it reigned in but so much fun. Plenty of gears for every occasion. Takes about 22 lbs of air pressure to minimize rolling resistance.

 

[maelochs]

I like the warning ... "If you don't depressurize from the bottom, the print on this cap will get much larger, very quickly .... "

 

[i12ride]

Fresh PC-1130 chain for the Stache. Bleeding brakes will conclude all service needs and upgrades.....for the time being.

 

[i12ride]

OK, I lied..........Hardheaded Ram Aggro/Downhill material brake pads for the Stache brake bleed project. Since I am 205, ride aggressively and it's a big heavy 50mm 3.0 tire bike. Might as well do new pads and really be done..........as long as I don't find some new rotors, lol................

 

[i12ride]

Like these CLX ones, in 6 bolt.............ooo, tasty

 

[i12ride]

Maybe these, I think I like them better...................

edit - went with theezes.................

 

[Merlincustom]

I joined REI last year and didn’t buy much; I think just a Wahoo mat for the trainer. I forgot about the member discount and then got a reminder email from them. I put these Pearl gloves in the cart along with an Extra 20 discount and got them for next to nothing. They replace some Assos Early Winter gloves that gave it up after 9 seasons.

 

[i12ride]

Nice....wore my warm Izumi's yesterday morning................

 

[i12ride]

Black ABS+ adjuster for the Manitou fork on the Stache.....

 

[Nigal]

Got a $100 from work for getting my vaccine so figured I’d get something else to protect me...