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  1. Mr. Coffee

    Hydraulic Disc Brakes - Anyone Change 'Mineral Oil' With Brake Pads?

    Note that what kind of brake fluid you need will depend on the brakes. https://www.bikeradar.com/advice/buyers-guides/brake-fluid-mineral-oil-vs-dot Having said all that, some mountain bikers have used baby oil as brake fluid and relatively few of them have died in horrible crashes caused by...
  2. Mr. Coffee

    US health insurance and mtb

    So tell me how exactly you would make a house less expensive than a TV?
  3. Mr. Coffee

    Salsa e-Bikes - Bikepacking Options

    If you aren't picking up your bike every now and then you aren't on a real gravel ride.
  4. Mr. Coffee

    Lighting kits

    https://forums.electricbikereview.com/threads/hardwiring-lights-on-a-como-2-0.41876/ I'd say that unless you are riding a lot (and I mean a lot) at night there are many great rechargeable LED lights at reasonable prices these days. And no matter how great the lights mounted on your bike even...
  5. Mr. Coffee

    automatic self-adjusting wire strippers

    The Knipex Mini-Pliers are great but have some pretty specific narrow situations where you really need them. In particular on my Rohloff-equipped R&M Charger they are indispensable. I have a couple of other cases where they are helpful but not strictly necessary (one is a couple of very...
  6. Mr. Coffee

    Hydraulic brake upgrade or calliper upgrade?

    Even without considering the motor cutoff switch upgrading to hydraulic brakes is going to be quite a project. Especially if you haven't worked with hydraulic brakes on a bike before. Expect to make a mess and mess some stuff up. If it were me I'd start by upgrading the rotors, and probably...
  7. Mr. Coffee

    Battery recharge with dynamos?

    The rim-drive dynamos are very inefficient and in practice are barely enough to charge small lights. Hub dynamos are more efficient, but are draggy, heavy, and often very expensive. I have a quite nice hub dynamo on my touring bike that keeps a front light going and has a USB jack on the stem...
  8. Mr. Coffee

    What should I get? New to ebike world?

    This is probably heresy, but for the distances you are proposing to ride I'd argue that a decent non-electric city commuter bike is probably the thing to buy. I'd only really want an e-bike for this application if I knew all of the riding was going to be quite hilly. There are a whole universe...
  9. Mr. Coffee

    US health insurance and mtb

    It turns up more often with life insurance or disability than health insurance. Probably they think the risks of being physically active in a possibly risky activity are less than the risks of being inactive. And they are probably right. A lot of life insurance (really death insurance) has...
  10. Mr. Coffee

    The Future of eBikes: How Fast is Too Fast?

    That also kind of depends on context. Most of the "group" rides I've ever participated in are carefully routed onto very quiet roads. When I say "very quiet" I mean it isn't super likely that we will encounter more than one or two motorized vehicles over the whole route. And much of the rides...
  11. Mr. Coffee

    Lightweight all around bike

    Yeah, this. Also, most e-bikes are not only heavier but have an awkward weight distribution as well. This combined with the longer wheelbase and (usually) longer chainstays that they have compared to meat-powered bikes makes them handle like a barge. If you haven't ridden a regular bike very...
  12. Mr. Coffee

    The Future of eBikes: How Fast is Too Fast?

    Who exactly is restricting your speed? In Europe you can basically go as fast as you want as long as you have a license and insurance. What we're talking about here are vehicles that require neither of those.
  13. Mr. Coffee

    The Future of eBikes: How Fast is Too Fast?

    One of the things a lot of people miss about the non-street-legal electric bikes is the liability issue. On one side, if somebody hits you with a motor vehicle and injures you, chances are you are SOL on getting any compensation from them or their insurance because you were operating an illegal...
  14. Mr. Coffee

    carrying extra battery(s)

    One thing to watch out for with velcro straps is that they often fail to hold if they get wet or dirty. If you use a dry bag or a salty roll you could easily wrap your battery in a rag or a sweater if you think you need padding. On the top of the rear rack you really don't need padding.
  15. Mr. Coffee

    carrying extra battery(s)

    Voile Straps are strong and reliable.
  16. Mr. Coffee

    carrying extra battery(s)

    Simplest secure approach would be to find dry bag with a daisy chain and two or three voile straps. This bag is designed to be strapped to the handlebars but will work fine on a rear rack: https://www.rei.com/product/186003/revelate-designs-saltyroll-handlebar-bag Voile straps, probably 20...
  17. Mr. Coffee

    Small low pressure pump?; I

    You didn't specify shrader or presta valves, though. This is probably the pump to purchase, though it is heavy and expensive: https://ride.lezyne.com/products/1-mp-mfdr-xl-v104 You can get it with either an analog or digital gauge on the filler hose. I know a lot of folks (and myself) swear...
  18. Mr. Coffee

    Riding Shoes; In Search of Something Better *Update!

    No. Five Ten made rock climbing shoes and slippers starting in the mid 80's. You didn't walk very much in rock climbing shoes. For one thing, they were wicked uncomfortable and not at all designed to be walked in. For another, the soft sticky rubber they were famous for would quickly become...
  19. Mr. Coffee

    Riding Towards Quality: A Call to End Low-Cost Compromises in the Bike Industry

    I think a hard and fast rule these days should be to never buy a bike if you haven't been able to test ride that exact same model of bike or at least a bike from the same manufacturer first. The way I look at it, a bike is not so much ridden as worn. No sane person would spend $400, much less...
  20. Mr. Coffee

    Another ebike description of thieving Surron riders

    Actually the rot has been driven by a certain brand of journalism that became entrenched in the Untied States in the 1970s and that's pretty much how journalists work now. They structured the stories they told where there were always two opposing sides, and journalists behaved as dispassionate...
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