Quote from: JimInPT on October 05, 2023, 07:59:10 AM

No range; it just says "Inflate to 30 psi" and I keep them there because I mostly ride on dry packed dirt and dry pavement, so the lower rolling resistance is great, they grip fine with good handling and are very quiet.  If I regularly rode soft surfaces I might drop it a few psi, but I'm sure there are others here with more experience to judge that.

The DOT requires maximum pressure on the sidewall to prevent injuries and damage from excess inflation. I've read that they pump a tire up until something gives, and half that pressure is the rated max.

Bias tires would often have a pressure range on the sidewall. I don't remember seeing it on a radial. I think I'm catching on. Radials can operate on less pressure than bias-ply tires, but low pressure could make a car or truck handle poorly. I think tire manufacturers decided to leave recommendations up to vehicle manufacturers.

Schwalbe publishes the maximum weight, maximum pressure, and minimum pressure for each model and size tire they sell. They have tires enough like the CST tires on my Radmission that I can guess I should run 50 in the rear and 40 in the front. I'll have to try it.

I haven't seen the maximum weight or minimum pressure for the OEM Kendra or the Big Boat. Underinflating a fat tire on the front of a bike could cause squirrelly steering. I think lawyers told Kendra, CST, and Radpower to state only the maximum pressure so somebody with a broken helmet can't sue.

Quote from: SemperVee on October 05, 2023, 09:57:34 AM

Unreal..  Tires wear out Dude! Be proactive to change sooner not later.  3000 miles and you are complaining?

I'd sure have something to complain about if I had to buy another 3.3 inch Kendra!

I'm glad I've worn the tire down on one side from cornering because it's an excuse to get something better, and I want to find the best option.

In the middle if the tread, where I normally ride, the knobs are plenty thick, and the blunt stick went through the casing between knobs, where there is no wear. It happened because it was a low-quality tire the day I bought the bike.

I was lucky to go 3,000 miles before it happened. It could just as well have happened in my first 10 miles.

Can you suggest a better tire?

My parents bought a Saab 96 in 1967 and another in 1968. The radial tires on the 68 held on ice better than the bias-ply tires on the 67.

I think it was for the same reason that radials had less rolling resistance and longer tread life. When the bias-ply tires pressed down on ice, the stiff sidewalls would make the tread squirm, turning static friction into kinetic friction, which is less. The more pliant sidewalls of the radials meant less squirming against the ice.

Depending on the tire construction, I think lower pressure could also reduce squirm. I don't know what tire you have, but Schwalbe has three 24-inch cargo-bike tires. They recommend 2 to 4 bars for the 2.6 inch,  2 to 4.5 for the 2.35 inch, and 2.5 to 4.5 for the 2.15 inch. Whatever pressures are recommended for your tire, the minimum might provide the best traction on ice.

At 4 bar, my English bike was better on ice than my shoes. At 2 bar, my two BMW motorcycles were much better on ice than the bicycle. The composition of the rubber was probably another factor.

The CST tires on my Radmission state maximum and minimum pressures. Do your sidewalls show that?

(Schwalbe has a 4" tire that good down to 5 psi. I'd get a kick out of that, but I'd need a tubeless 26" rim.)

CST has a 4" tire that seems to be the same kind as the Big Boat. The 4" version is easier to find. I believe my 55mm rims will do fine with a 4" tire. Think I should try one?

Quote from: JimInPT on October 04, 2023, 01:13:16 PM

About 15 years ago, a raccoon probably saved my life in a similar fashion.  I was leaving my restaurant around midnight, following my standard route home, which was at the same pace every time because there's essentially zero traffic in our rural town at that hour and only six traffic lights in our entire county with none on my route, so it was always the same.  A mile or so on the journey, I had to come to a full stop in the road to let a very fat and lazy looking raccoon amble across.  A mile or so after that, a large pickup truck blew right through a cross-street intersection stop sign at a very high speed in my headlights - right where I'd have been if I hadn't stopped for the raccoon, with no stop sign in my direction to prevent it.  I might have spotted him, because in our rural area we're always watching for deer and other critters especially at night, but this was a fairly blind intersection so I wouldn't have been able to stop in time.  Probably would have been t-boned right in my door if I wasn't running just a few seconds late.  After that, I called a truce with raccoons, no matter how much they pissed me off at times.

A couple of years earlier, 200 yards east on that same road, I was driving an F-150 when a premonition caused me to slow to 25. The hood flew up. I don't know how bad it would have been at 55, but I pulled over and slammed it down. Ford had a treacherous hood latch.

The road came to a stop sign a quarter of a mile or so west of where the guy came over the line. Statistics showed it was dangerous. It didn't look dangerous, but a vehicle approaching from the left could be invisible past the crest of a rise, although the road looked clear.

A couple of years after the guy came over the line, a community watch sign went up beside the road, looking right from the stop sign. It didn't look big, but I noticed immediately that it blocked the view in that direction until an oncoming vehicle was a second away. If I backed up to see past it, brush blocked my view. If I pulled forward to see past it, I could be hit by a vehicle that had come over the rise. I really needed to watch both ways as I pulled out, but you can't do that if your eyes aren't on the sides of your head.

I figured that a sign so obviously unsafe would be moved the next day. It wasn't. I asked other motorists who used that intersection what they thought of it. They said it was fine. Drivers often ignore visual obstructions. If they don't see anything, they assume nothing is coming.

One morning after a year, a truck came to a stop at the sign across the road a couple of seconds before I came to a stop. I looked twice each way and saw nothing. Because the truck didn't move, I suspected that the driver saw something coming from his left, my right. I watched, and a shockingly close vehicle emerged from behind the sign.

I wrote a "To Whom it may Concern" letter. I took measurements at the intersection. I measured the position of a driver's head in a compact car, a large car, and a pickup. I diagramed how in none of those vehicles could a driver see past the sign until his front was dangerously out in the intersection. I asked if it could be moved. I didn't know where to mail it. My mother gave it to a colleague whose husband was a highway patrol officer. She reported to my mother the next day that he was thrilled. He'd reported that sign the day it went up, and his supervisor told him to forget it. Now he had a letter from a citizen.

The sign was gone the next day. I had asked only that it be moved. It could have been put on a higher post, five feet farther from the pavement, or 100 feet farther from the intersection. I guess the supervisor didn't consider the sign important.

There are lots of serious visual obstructions around here. The public is blind to them, and those responsible for public safety don't care.

Quote from: John Rose on October 03, 2023, 10:14:04 PM
My manual says

Quote. . . as close to 12 hours as possible (but not longer than 12 hours).

For those 12-hour charging sessions, does it have to be continuous?
Say I don't have a timer, could I plug it in and charge for 6 hours, unplug it, go to bed, and finish it the next day with 6 more hours of charging?

That's kinda how I do it, but I use meter, a timer, and a watt meter that reads in tenths. I check the voltage with the meter to see how long to set the timer. Probably the green light will come on in that time, but sometimes if the charger is turned on after a rest, there will be two red lights. So when I come along after the timer has finished, I turn on the charger to be sure there's a green light. If there is, I see how many watts the charger is using. if it's more than 2 watts, I figure it's not finished balancing. I leave it alone.

I calculate a vertical speed of .1469 m/s. 

I guess your minimum was between -16 and -16.5, and your maximum was between 103 and 103.5, and the sum was between 119.5 and 120.0.

Vertical distance would be all your up distances added to all your down distances.

I never liked my Radrunner tires. Now that the tread on the right is wearing from cornering, I've got an excuse to put on something better.

I like my Radmission 1.95 x 27.5 tires. They're marked CST CTC-06-1. CTC-06 is a series that includes Big Boat. They have a TPI of 60, which Schwalbe says is much better for puncture resistance and low rolling resistance than the OEM 30 TPI tires.

It's readily available in 4 x 20.
https://www.tradeinn.com/bikeinn/en/cst-ctc-06-rigid-urban-tyre/140040771/p

Would it fit my 55mm rim? I downloaded a chart from a distributor showing what width rims fit what width tires. It says these rims are good for 3.00 to 5.00 inch tires.

If I rerouted the rear brake cable and rear light wire, it looks as if my Radrunner would have plenty of room. I never thought Radpower should have routed those lines between the chainstay and the tire, anyway.

Does it sound like a good idea?

I haven't seen missing segments, but I've seen fogging in the aftermarket displays of both my bikes although they haven't been exposed to rain. It happens in the morning. Maybe the garage can be cooler than the dew point outdoors, so when I go for a ride, air flowing through the displays leaves condensation. Sunlight clears it up.

I hadn't thought of desiccants. I have dozens in a bottle. I've done the opposite with my string trimmer to keep the nylon line from being dry and brittle. I put a wet sponge in a ziplock bag and pull it tight around the trimmer head.

I've seen that in calipers and thermometers. If you took the display apart, the "screen" part would have a row of too many copper contacts to count. Voltage on a contact will cause a certain segment on the display to be black. Moisture can let enough electricity leak away that a contact doesn't have enough voltage to turn its segment black.

If that's the cause, drying can fix it. I believe Radpower says not to leave displays in the sun, but heat from the sun can drive moisture out.

Quote from: santacruzpaul on October 03, 2023, 11:25:32 AM
I thought the lower the TPI the more puncture resistant, And that wire bead was better than the folding tires, Please educate me,
Thanks, Paul

I don't know about folding tires. Some of my info on TPI came from Schwalbe. It was a paper on their site. I read it more than a year ago, so it may not even be up any longer.

I did find this: https://www.schwalbetires.com/technology-faq/

Under Tire Construction, you can scroll down to "What does EPi mean?" EPI seems to be TPI. They say that years ago they quit producing anything less than 50 because the coarser stuff has poor puncture resistance and high rolling resistance. They say 67 is best all around, but sometimes a manufacturer will add up the counts of layers so they might have 3 layers of 67 TPI and call it 200 TPI. Schwalbe says a single layer of 200 would have threads too small to resist punctures.

The last time I  looked into it, nobody mentioned less than 60, and that was too coarse in terms of rolling resistance and puncture resistance. Maybe 60 was 2 layers of 30 or 3 layers of 20.

At 3,000 miles I've had my second puncture of my rear Radrunner tire. The first took me months to find because it was a whisker-thin wire.

This was also strange. A quarter inch of wood less than 1mm in diameter, like 20 gauge copper wire. I thought maybe it was the tip of a thorn, which can be very hard and sharp. No this was blunt, and it felt soft, like broom straw. How in the world could it penetrate the tread of a tire?

I find it ironic that the sidewall of the OEM Kendra tire says "puncture resistant casing." The 30 TPI count means low puncture resistance, and the rubber must be especially easy to penetrate.

The green is showing through on the right of the tread. I guess I corner harder on right turns. I've read here about CST Big Boats. Are they the only other option? How are they for puncture resistance?

Is it the wheel with the sprocket or the wheel on the fork?

On my Radmission and my Radrunner, the front screws pass through a tab on the fork and screw into the caliper. They are 6 x 1 x 15mm long.

On both bikes, the back screws pass through the caliper and screw into the frame. They are 6 x 1 x 35mm long.

i imagine a Rhino takes the same screws, depending on which way a caliper is mounted.

Quote from: mrgold35 on September 29, 2023, 05:31:05 AM

I quickly found out the standard brakes are good for weekend trails; but, not up to par for emergency stops at 20 mph when a car runs a stop sign.  The pads glazed over pretty quick over time and I had much longer braking distances in emergency situations.  Narrowed down the issues to brake pad materials, stretching of brake cables, brake cables strands breaking, and realizing the current brakes were at their limits at max speed at my max cargo capacity.

Solve my issues with upgrading to TRP Spyre Mechanical brakes, TRP replacement brake pads, and jagwire MTB brake cables (cable only, reused the housing).

With the OEM mechanical front brake alone, I can stop my Radmission in 20 feet from 20 mph. That's 0.7 g, the same as a modern car. If I hadn't repositioned the bars and seat, a stop like that would send me over the bars or end over end. The back brake would be useless in a stop like that because the bike nearly stands on its front wheel.

I used to think my pads would glaze, but I decided it was a sort of polishing from light dragging caused by cable stretch, which really isn't stretch. The cure was to adjust the affected brake so that there was no drag, then on a hill repeatedly use that brake fairly hard to slow from 25 to 10. Each time, it heats the pad surface enough to transfer a little material to the disk for improved friction.

The Jagwire product that interests me is the linear housing. Because it's not made of a coil spring, it doesn't stretch. I largely correct stretch of the rear housing by lashing the lever to the handlebar to keep the housing under compression overnight. With a linear housing, I guess I wouldn't have to worry about that.

Thirty years ago on a narrow country road, premonition suddenly slowed me down. A hundred yards ahead, where I would have been, an oncoming pickup veered over the centerline and I veered onto the shoulder. In my mirror I saw an arm come out the window and wave. I guess that was an apology. I guess he was momentarily distracted.

Five years ago I started to cross a street three blocks from here. A van was coming, but by the time it stopped at the stop sign, I'd be across. I'd just stepped off the curb when I realized it wasn't slowing. As it sped by, the driver was talking on a cell phone. She never saw me. She must have used that intersection every day because she was coming from a road that didn't lead to other towns.

Twenty years ago, the best driving simulator test to date was conducted with funding from a long list of prestigious government and nongovernment organizations. With 40 drivers of both sexes and a wide range of ages, it compared talking on a cell phone to driving drunk. A revelation was that at 0.08 BAC, everybody drove better than sober. Before that, when I'd see headlights behind me, I'd hope the driver hadn't been drinking. After that, I'd hope a driver had been drinking because sober drivers are less attentive.

The study found that talking on a hands-free phone was as bad as using a handheld. Conversation itself is the problem. You have to process what you hear as you process your reply, and that simultaneous demand doesn't leave enough brain to process what you see.

Teachers ask surprise questions to scare students into paying attention. In fact, this trains us not to pay attention. Constantly processing the last few words heard and how you could respond is like talking on a cell phone. You don't comprehend or retain because you aren't paying attention to the subject matter. This produces a population who see nothing wrong with texting while driving because they don't know what paying attention means.

There have been times on the road when I  have responded instantly and correctly to the unexpected. I attribute that to 1600 hours of close-order drill in the military. When you hear the preparatory order, there's no time to think, so you have to map what to do in advance, and you have to keep one part of your brain vigilant. Actually, it's not inconvenient because when you learn to do it, the rest of your brain is free to relax or think about anything you wish. It's also a discipline. As a driver, I would keep conversation short and simple. I wouldn't touch a radio with a car in motion if it required more than turning a knob.

So, cancel all lectures and make kids spend 12 years at close-order drill to get a diploma. They'll be better drivers, and if they can pay attention, they'll recognize lies in the news.