GriddleCakes

Didn't say you were a hipster, just said that you ride a hipster bike. Sorry, but the lack of a front brake is nothing more than a fashion statement, a placement of form before function. In other words: silly.

Doane

This is all pretty amazing... it reminds me of when I was in High School back in the 60's (ya... I'm that old) Back then, cars were custom-izable. With a bit of mechanical intuition you could work on a car, change it, soop it up, etc. Today, you need an engineering degree, just to get into a dash panel is a puzzle. Maybe bicycle modification is the modern answer for what we used to do with cars? Back then I had a 55 Chevy, a 56, a 57 Bellair.. I did all sorts of mods to them. Installed a Hurst shifter on the floor instead of the column mount, put lifters and different shocks on them, changed the wheels to chromed wide ones with slicks in the rear, replaced the carburetor on the V8 with a 4-barrel, added dual exhaust headers with glass pack mufflers, etc., etc. And, it was all done on not that much expense, unlike car modifications today. The only limitation I can see today is taking a new girlfriend out on a date? But, then again, there are no drive in movies to go to anyway, so maybe that isn't so important...

Dean7

I would personally install a front brake ('cause chain braking = you're gonna have a scar otherwise). Doesn't mean it's not sexy.

I think he complimented you. Wear your hipster badge with pride.

Still lookin' good. For what it's worth: I've personally had slightly better luck with these than their more popular conty counterparts:

https://bontrager.com/model/00443

I ride on roads with a TON of glass and these have done me right. Anyway, something to try if you care to (conty's have done me right as well... just not quite as right in my experience... haha).

I see plenty of people riding around every day with no brakes and they somehow survive. Main issue with it as far as I can see is: you get in a crash and you're screwed as far as the law is concerned ('cause you have no brakes). It might be silly to you but it also might make sense to some.

GriddleCakes

I see people driving around everyday, stuffing their fat faces full of Taco Bell and the like and surviving, but that doesn't make it a good idea. I know a few (very stupid) folk who still drink and drive, and they use the same argument: "It hasn't hurt me or anyone else." Yet. Riding a brakeless fixie is nowhere near as reckless as drunk driving, but that doesn't mean that it's a good idea.

You can stop a bicycle faster with a fixed gear drivetrain and a front brake than you can with just a fixed gear drivetrain. Removing the brake just reduces the function of the bicycle, which is to be a vehicle that can efficiently and safely transport the user from point A to B (among other things: exciting, exercising, etc...). It needs to go when you need it to, and it needs to stop when you need it to.

Alien abduction, polytheism, healing crystals, demonic possession, and Reaganomics makes sense to some. How does removing the brakes from a bike make sense? I mean, it certainly makes fashion sense (bike looks cleaner, all the hipsters are doing it, blah blah blah...), but I don't recognize fashion as a reason to reduce function.

The only issue you see is legal liability in the case of a collision? Gee, if only there was some way to provide a safety cushion against collisions...

Deshi

Doane, This bike does not have any brakes. It is a fixed gear so also no coasting. I have been riding fixed gear for about 5 years now and for whatever reason, really enjoy it. The simplicity of the bike is the best part. I will continue to ride fixed gear as long as my legs will allow me to.


I understand where you are coming from. I have thought about brakes and the such but this frame being a true track frame, there is no drilling for brakes front or rear. I really dont want to change the fork either just to fit a front brake. The geometry of this frame and fork combo is really nice as it sits. The fork has a very low axle to crown height. Changing the fork to one that is capable of using a front brake will have a taller axle to crown resulting in changing the overall geometry of the bike and that results in a completely different riding bike. I dont want that. I will accept the possible dangers in riding this style bike on the road and just enjoy it.

As for the tires, I didnt really just buy them. I bought these tires to replace and older set that did me very well and ended up selling the bike I was gonna put them on so the tires were in the top of my closet for a little bit. I will try these out in AZ when I head down and if they do not meet my expectations, I might look into the Bontragers.

Thanks for the kind words on the bike.

Deshi

So every track bike is a hipster bike? The lack of a front bike on this bicycle is due to the fact the fork does not allow for one. I posted in another reply as to why I dont want to change the fork.

I did not post my bike here for your approval. You dont like it, great. Dont tell me I am doing for fashion though because that is not the reason.

BarracksSi

Unfortunately, yes. Too bad that hipsters annoy you as much as they do me.

M_S

Plenty of people riding around on bikes with just a coaster brake and nothing in front. Fixed gears offer a lot more modulation and control than a coaster brake.

xB_Nutt

Maiden voyage into work today on this: (the only reason I didn't mind coming in on a Saturday)

irclean

Very nice! I'm contemplating a similar build using the same Soma frameset. How are you liking it so far?

GriddleCakes

Fine, you're not running brakeless for fashion. Every other fixter might be, but not you.

Let me guess, you were also into fixies before they became cool, yes?

xB_Nutt

Well, since it was my first time riding it today, I don't have much perspective. So far, so good. Built up very nicely with no problems. They redid the rear disc brake mount so no issues getting the rack and fenders to fit. Did have to do a little bending on the front fender stays to clear the front disc brake. One thing that bugs me is the unused top tube cable stops for the rear canti brakes. I think they should have left them and the rest of the rear canti braze-ons off for a cleaner look. I mean they have a canti version of the frame if you want to run cantis. Also it looks very purple in person, so if that is going to bother you, I would try something else.

Deshi

If you bothered to read my earlier post, you would know that there is no where to put a brake on this bike. Even if I wanted to, I could not.

I have my reasons for riding this bike. There is no reason in trying to explain this to you because you are so narrow minded in thinking every person that rides a track bike is a hipster wannabe fashionista.

Take your sour attitude elsewhere.

GriddleCakes

On slow bikes, cruisers and uprights. The gearing and body positioning on Deshi's bike wanna go fast, can easily go faster than any cruiser or dutch granny bike.

Yet, despite it's incompatibility with a brake, you still choose this bike as your commuter, to ride it on the road, assumedly in traffic. Couldn't find a brake-compatible fixie in your town?

Actually, I assume that some people ride track bikes because they race them, like they're designed and built to be, in a velodrome. Others, I assume, simply enjoy riding a fast bike with a fixed gear drivetrain, regardless of whether they're currently "hip". I only assume that people who ride brakeless in traffic are trend-chasing hipsters.

Fixed gear = simple, practical, enjoyable cycling style that happens to be trendy right now. Brakeless = closed-course specific race cycling style that happens to be trendy right now.

Beyond its trendiness, the only explanations I've ever heard for running brakeless are that it "looks cleaner" (form over function, fashion above sense), or that it "heightens awareness", presumably through increased risk (and just think what levels of awareness are achievable by high speed sidewalk cyclists riding counterflow to traffic, what Zen masters of cycling they must be).

Oh, and "this bike won't take a brake." Which is just silly, since you could simply choose a different bike to ride in traffic, instead of marrying yourself to one ill-designed for it.

Deshi

I really dont feel like arguing with you. I dont feel the need to explain myself any further. Thank you for your opinion. Have a nice day.

Sixty Fiver

The stopping power and modulation are actually about equal for either... and you need some really decent skills to ride brake-less.

With that being said, coaster equipped bikes do not stop nearly as quickly as bikes that have front brakes and neither do people who ride fixed with no brakes.

BarracksSi

+1.

And skidding isn't stopping.

Doane

Hipster is a slang term that first appeared in the 1940s, and was revived in the 1990s and 2000s to describe types of young, recently settled urban middle class adults and older teenagers with interests in non-mainstream fashion and culture, particularly indie rock, independent film, magazines such as Vice and Clash, and websites like Pitchfork Media.[1] In some contexts, hipsters are also referred to as scenesters.[2]

"Hipster" has been used in sometimes contradictory ways, making it difficult to precisely define "hipster culture" because it is a "mutating, trans-Atlantic melting pot of styles, tastes and behavior[s]."[1] One commentator argues that "hipsterism fetishizes the authentic" elements of all of the "fringe movements of the postwar era—beat, hippie, punk, even grunge," and draws on the "cultural stores of every unmelted ethnicity", and "regurgitates it with a winking inauthenticity."[3] Others, like Arsel and Thompson, argue that hipster is a cultural mythology, crystallization of a mass mediated stereotype generated to understand, categorize and marketize the indie consumer culture rather than an objectified group of people.[4]

BarracksSi

^^^^ What I like is that a noncomformist counterculture has a uniform.

/end my thread hijack

Dcv

my commuters...
one w brakes, one without





i'm w/ deshi on the brakes

monsterpile

Dcv those are some sweet bikes.

Dcv

thanks - check out my latest conversion still in progress (much to many roadies' chagrin)


...waiting on a new rear rim

monsterpile

Nice, I like that blue and yellow scheme. What Lemond frame is that? This makes me wonder what I will end up doing with my Victoire when the Ultegra shifters wear out.

Dcv

2001 Zurich, mine's was built up w/ cheaper tiagara components and the rear shifter recently broke, perfect excuse to convert.

https://www.bikeforums.net/showthread...on-in-progress

91MF

this.


******

people need to get over the brakeless = fashion thing. i mean, we get it, you dont like the trendy, ignorant youth that frequent YOUR coffeeshop. how dare they ride a bicycle like you do... would you rather they park their lime green civics out front and play loud bass-heavy music and rev their cars too 8000rpm? thats what kids did ten years ago when i was younger. im fine with them riding bikes now...

besides, 'hipsters' ride fully rigid SS 29ers now anyway. dont you know?