Ten Years Later

The Spiritbox Studio blog. At 10 years!

Happy Anniversary!

I started this blog with my first post on May 3, 2009.

You can find it in the links at right, or you can find it right here:
http://spiritboxstudio.blogspot.com/2009/05/new-blog-new-shooz.html

Mostly, it was just talking about some new cycling shoes I got.

Well, ten years later, I still got em!

They're definitely a little more worn and dirty, but still in good shape. The laces are getting ratty, need to replace those soon. But as 4 of my 5 bikes have SPD pedals, they get used pretty regularly.

Speaking of bikes, I posted recently on the Orange Chopper project bike I built. And mentioned in the Christmas post about the 5th bike I had finally gotten - a real road bike. Since this seems to be mostly a bike stuff post, how about just a little more with a current photo of my road bike - The Fred Sled.

It's a very good bike - a Specialized S-Works bike. Which is their top end bike even today. This particular example dates to 2004. So about 15 years old. Its a very nicely finished aluminum frame with carbon fiber fork, seat post and handlebar. Current higher end bikes are usually entirely carbon fiber. Over the years, the prior owner changed a bunch of the components from what it came with. It was kind of grungy, some time with automotive polishing compound cleaned up a whole lot of seemingly permanent grime. Did some tuning and adjusting, touched up a number of paint scratches and chips. It's got new tires and tubes, pedals, bottle cages, seat bag and a cyclocomputer. Otherwise it's just as I bought it. For its age and a lot of use, it looks really, really good. 

In the future, I'm thinking of stripping it down of all the miscellaneous components, and put on matching current generation Shimano 105 parts. And a new set of matching wheels. Plus a few other minor changes like a different saddle and handlebar. Which is just about everything!

But its all functional as is. Certainly feels different from my other bikes as its about half the weight of any thing else I have. Fastest I was able to pedal up to, on flat ground with a bit of tailwind, was 33.7 mph. Briefly. Can't maintain that speed at all. 

Time to wrap up this anniversary celebration. Open the champagne!

Sneak Peek - Coming soon - Something else with wheels. Considerably larger...