Which must the Motown view ... On Saturday, December 11, 2010, hobie <moho1...@yahoo.com> wrote: > Shimmy,shimmy,cocoa pop !!!! > > On Dec 10, 1:03 pm, William <tapebu...@gmail.com> wrote: >> I am a recent subscriber of Bicycle Quarterly. I had thought about >> subscribing for a while, and two things about the newest issue made me >> pull the trigger. One was the write up about the Bilenky 650B tandem >> (dude, I want one). The other was the article about shimmy. I know >> Jan Heine has a reputation under some sections of the big tent of >> cycling, and I was interested to hear what he had to say. I expected >> by now somebody would have started a thread about the shimmy article, >> but it is towards the back. My Samuel Hillborne is the first bike >> I've owned that has a pronounced tendency to shimmy when riding no- >> handed. I'm not the most experienced rider. I've only had 30 or 40 >> different bikes in my lifetime, so I don't have nearly the experience >> Jan does. I hoped to gain a greater understanding of the problem and >> maybe do something about it on my Sam. >> >> Unfortunately, I found the article almost entirely unsatisfying. The >> Cliff-notes synopsis is: "I don't know what causes shimmy, nor does >> anyone else. Here's what several oldschool guys said about shimmy. >> They were wrong. I can't take a bike that doesn't shimmy and change >> it into a bike that does shimmy. Even though I don't have any ideas >> about the causes or the solutions, you should absolutely swap your >> headset to needle bearings if your bike shimmies and hope for the >> best, even though I don't know if it will help, and maybe will make it >> worse" >> >> Now don't get me wrong. I don't understand shimmy, but I came to the >> article with the attitude of student. The only other articles I've >> read on the topic are Sheldon Brown's (RIP) very brief glossary >> discussion and the Jobst Brandt article. For Jan to put the single >> word "Shimmy" on the cover, and to title his article "What Causes >> Shimmy?" suggests that he knows something. The article content itself >> suggests to me that Jan might not know any more about shimmy than any >> of us. That's not necessarily a bad thing: I'm convinced it's a >> complex problem. But I'd almost rather see a person in a pedagogical >> position of leadership to say "Hey, I know a lot, but I don't >> understand shimmy. Here's some anecdotal observations I've made. >> Here's some anecdotes I've heard, but haven't verified." and just end >> it there. >> >> Since I'm growing convinced that there might not be anyone who really >> understands shimmy, I'm going to run some experiments of my own on my >> Hillborne to attempt to understand it more. Since that bike, in it's >> current state, shimmies willingly when riding no-handed at 15mph on a >> smooth flat road, I think I have a decent baseline and reasonably >> reproducable test environment. I'm going to try several (numerous?) >> things, and I'll at least try to take better than normal notes, and >> see if I can learn anything. > > -- > 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. > >
-- Ken Freeman Ann Arbor, MI USA -- 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.
