dynamic
Well-Known Member
- Region
- USA
Great ride today! High 50’s and sunny is just warm enough to ditch jackets! First ride with the kinekt (will get to that). And the first one using RWGPS + MC + HRM. Rungap is fantastic. I now have my data in garmin connect and strava. With rungap, if I get a forerunner, I will likely use garmin as the source and have rungap sync data everywhere else.
Because of the HRM strap, I don’t get recovery heart rate data because I take the strap off immediately and end the ride. Another interesting thing is RWGPS only gets its own data. I would have to tell it to discard the ride data and then add it to the sync list from rungap (currently coming from MC). That would work if I want matching data in RWGPS (not sure I care).
Garmin did collect battery info. This does exist in ride. And ride also tracks microtune in a useful way. I ended with 60% battery left and that was because I spent 43% of the 14.2 mile ride at 100% microtune pushing the motor power to its limit. Pegging motor power at 729w for periods of time is not good for battery. In other news, I set all kinds of rider power records. (And I think the seat post contributed to that).
I deliberately chose the end of the rough ride to miss the typical mad sprinting up to my house at the end. Instead I came down from the north which means the last 5-10 minutes of the ride is relaxing instead of crazy. I love this difference. Especially in this weather where the cold breeze takes care of sweat.
Ok, on to the kinekt. It’s……. Glorious! Spectacular! Amazing! Ok, but why? So, I swapped springs based on e-bike weight guidance. It said use red and purple, but none of the springs were marked as red. I just assumed it was the unmarked one since I did have yellow black and purple (I think those are the colors). I did have to watch a video as I didn’t know what they meant by removing the link plate. It was easy to do. Just not super clear instructions. It took me a bit to get the saddle back into place. And, I think it is further back (more on this in a minute). I set it to just above 1 on softness (recommended by kinekt). And then I picked the toughest route I could think of by combining the roughest dirt back roads I have experienced into a single route.
And it was like a fluffy cloud. Obviously, giant potholes are felt significantly, but these are the ones I dodge anyway. The float was a bit soft on subtle ground changes. A bit too cloudy. I plan to tighten that up some.
But here is the big surprise: very little handnumbness. There was a subtle tingle, but not anything I need to deal with. And the way I was sitting on the seat felt very relaxed. No two lumps feeling, no sliding, very few adjustments on ride. I found myself much more able and comfortable to “sit back”. And it was pretty natural to do so. It also felt pretty powerful as a riding position.
I did have a thudbuster on the current. But, the current never made it to this kind of backroad riding. So I can’t compare it directly. I will say, the thudbuster didn’t feel very “active”. The kinekt feels very active. I am very much aware that it is smoothing out the road. This is not a bad thing at all. You can feel the seat respond. The thing is my body immediately trusted it. And I think that took weight off my hands.
I was also really hitting the hills hard. I pushed myself harder on this ride than any previous one. But it also felt comfortable and smooth.
I did not check tire pressure before the ride and it is possible I am low contributing to the softness. Just ran down to check, it was 31 psi. Pumped it up to 40 and will see what that does tomorrow.
The kinekt is completely worth it to me. It’s crazy good compared to the suspension seat post included on the vado.
Sql lab is next. Won’t arrive for a bit.
Because of the HRM strap, I don’t get recovery heart rate data because I take the strap off immediately and end the ride. Another interesting thing is RWGPS only gets its own data. I would have to tell it to discard the ride data and then add it to the sync list from rungap (currently coming from MC). That would work if I want matching data in RWGPS (not sure I care).
Garmin did collect battery info. This does exist in ride. And ride also tracks microtune in a useful way. I ended with 60% battery left and that was because I spent 43% of the 14.2 mile ride at 100% microtune pushing the motor power to its limit. Pegging motor power at 729w for periods of time is not good for battery. In other news, I set all kinds of rider power records. (And I think the seat post contributed to that).
I deliberately chose the end of the rough ride to miss the typical mad sprinting up to my house at the end. Instead I came down from the north which means the last 5-10 minutes of the ride is relaxing instead of crazy. I love this difference. Especially in this weather where the cold breeze takes care of sweat.
Ok, on to the kinekt. It’s……. Glorious! Spectacular! Amazing! Ok, but why? So, I swapped springs based on e-bike weight guidance. It said use red and purple, but none of the springs were marked as red. I just assumed it was the unmarked one since I did have yellow black and purple (I think those are the colors). I did have to watch a video as I didn’t know what they meant by removing the link plate. It was easy to do. Just not super clear instructions. It took me a bit to get the saddle back into place. And, I think it is further back (more on this in a minute). I set it to just above 1 on softness (recommended by kinekt). And then I picked the toughest route I could think of by combining the roughest dirt back roads I have experienced into a single route.
And it was like a fluffy cloud. Obviously, giant potholes are felt significantly, but these are the ones I dodge anyway. The float was a bit soft on subtle ground changes. A bit too cloudy. I plan to tighten that up some.
But here is the big surprise: very little handnumbness. There was a subtle tingle, but not anything I need to deal with. And the way I was sitting on the seat felt very relaxed. No two lumps feeling, no sliding, very few adjustments on ride. I found myself much more able and comfortable to “sit back”. And it was pretty natural to do so. It also felt pretty powerful as a riding position.
I did have a thudbuster on the current. But, the current never made it to this kind of backroad riding. So I can’t compare it directly. I will say, the thudbuster didn’t feel very “active”. The kinekt feels very active. I am very much aware that it is smoothing out the road. This is not a bad thing at all. You can feel the seat respond. The thing is my body immediately trusted it. And I think that took weight off my hands.
I was also really hitting the hills hard. I pushed myself harder on this ride than any previous one. But it also felt comfortable and smooth.
I did not check tire pressure before the ride and it is possible I am low contributing to the softness. Just ran down to check, it was 31 psi. Pumped it up to 40 and will see what that does tomorrow.
The kinekt is completely worth it to me. It’s crazy good compared to the suspension seat post included on the vado.
Sql lab is next. Won’t arrive for a bit.
