2006 CAAD8

The latest adoptee in my stable of Frankenbikes is a truly fantastic project. In its current incarnation probably one of the nicest bikes bikes I've ever owned. Built for racing, it's not a great city bike and it's too light for touring but it's a dream to ride. 

The 2006 CAAD8 frame is stiff and responsive with aggressive race geometry and enough damping from the Ritchey carbon fork to keep the ride responsive but not jarring. The gruppo is a bit of a taboo myth buster with a Campagnolo Chorus drive train utilizing a Shimano ten speed cassette on Dura Ace 1380 wheels. "They" will say it can't be done but I assure you with the ten speeds it can. The Belgian compact crank up front is also amenable to eleven speed mixing with Shimano but I'm sticking with my ten. For the record I tried a Shimano wheel with a Dura Ace Cassette in an otherwise Campy Chorus drive train and it works as well as the American Classic wheel with Campy Cassette I have, better in terms of the ride.

It mostly took some fussy adjusting and measuring to figure out if it could be done and then a lot of head scratching and wrenching in Italian. I visited all of my usual bike guys and a few more to get help yanking the very stuck Campy Record seatpost out and learn a few critical details about drive trains. For the most part it needed cable adjustments that it would have needed regardless of the cassette. The bike had been sitting a long time and I suspect was formerly fitted with ZIPP wheels and a Campy cassette. It was dusty, dried out and neglected but came right back with a small amount of TLC. The end result is well worth the effort. 

Street sweeper bristles (pt2)

All the files you need

So once you have some raw materials and some files, you can make a few basic tools. An initial set doesn't need to be at all complicated. Just a hook and a tension wrench are all you need to get started. That noted, I have had great success with saw tooth rakes and they're not terribly hard to make. You can also start with a hook and leave the other end of your tool ready to shape once you figure out what you want to do with it. I make most of my tools double ended.

Double ended tools ready for final shaping

A basic pair of one tension wrench that has a hook on the end opposite the wrench and a double ended tool with a hook on one end and a rake on the other makes a good basic set. The hook on the wrench can be used as a feeler to test locks for condition and to count the number of pins. The rake allows for rapid picking that can then be finished with the hook on it's other end as is often the case. Set most of the pins with quick raking and SPP(single pin pick) the last one or two. This also leaves SPP as a first option. This should open most Master, Ace and random Chinese locks with reasonable practice. With more practice and time, most any lock can be SPP'd. This set is not as easy for the untrained to use as the popular Bogota rakes but has far more potential in the long run and allows a student to better understand what they are doing.

The basic process is to cut half circles out of the bristles at the ends and then shape them into hooks as shown side by side in the third image. This should be easy enough to logic out. Use the round files for making round cuts and flat files to shape the hooks

Basic hook

or rakes as shown in the fourth image. You could be very precise making these but you'll be close even if you aren't and the locks aren't that precise anyway. Just make sure to stack your peaks and valleys so that the peaks are points when you make a saw tooth and then round the end so it moves easily inside the lock.

Noteworthy points might be that my best hooks are almost all cut at about forty five degrees if you draw a line from the base of the arch to the end of the hook. You will almost certainly want to cut the inside of the arch before shaping the outside and then remove a lot of material from the shaft leading up to your tool end. The bristles are stiff and you want as little in your way inside the keyway as possible. Polishing is optional but if your raw material is particularly rusted or corroded but it doesn't take much and the tools do clean up a bit with use.

Different stages of completion of a saw tooth rake

There are innumerable YouTube videos showing basic attack methods. Fewer deal with tool fabrication. My thought is that tool manufacture is at least as important as the skills one needs for using them. Given the ease of acquisition of bristles and the quality of the metal I focus on making my tools as shown.

Other materials commonly available are windshield wiper blade springs, good but too soft for my liking. That means easy to shape but they wear out much faster and bend easier when you don't wan them to. So, I have and do use these springs but they aren't my preferred stock. A similar common material with potential is bra under wire strips. There are certainly plenty of bras but not so many sitting around waiting to be robbed of the wires. These are also somewhat softer metal and not to my liking.

I'll leave it at that. A couple very basic tools you can get about anywhere and street sweeper bristles you can also get about anywhere and keep a few on hand for later or just find when you need one.

So go out and make a hook and I'll get to work on the next installment, how to make a tension wrench.

Street sweeper bristles (pt1)

What? Right, it does say street sweeper bristles. What they are you might guess, why they are useful you would have to know. So, here is a post to get you in the know for what may be the most popular secondary use of street sweeper bristles.

While I'm sure there are other uses the two main things broken street sweeper bristles get used for are lock picks and clay sculpting tools. The relatively thin, durable, spring steel bristles are just shy of purpose made for both, especially lock picks. While they sharpen into ok little blades, make nice fish spears and random other things, my main use is lock sport tools. 

They seem to snap off where street sweepers, the big mechanized ones, turn corners or encounter rough pavement. Find them most often at cross walks. While even experienced lock sport folks won't usually need more than half a dozen tools at a time, they do break, get lost or more often are given away, perhaps even discarded for various reasons. Keeping a few bristles on hand is useful and leaving them as found advantageous. My personal preference for styles of lock sport tools has certainly changed over time. Between making my own new tools and sharing materials or making tools for others I often keep an eye to the curb for stray bristles. 

One major advantage of doing this and why it warrants a post introducing the topic is related to something I learned when I acquired some of my skills. 

The tools you start with will likely be your go to tools as your skills progress. Those who start with commercial tools usually prefer commercial tools and those who make their own tend to continue that practice. The utility in knowing how to make your own tools with materials that are literally laying around should be obvious. 

Next up, fast tracking some basics. 

Yucca packs and packboards

A question was recently posed about taking a yucca pack off of a packboard with regard to how you re-attach its straps. Short answer, you don't. After looking at both of my yucca packs, checking out packboards, sleuthing every style of bag I could find photos or examples of and finally looking at my copy of the 1948 and 1967 handbooks as well as the 1965 field book, I figured out a few things.

There are about three styles of scout packs that have been in common use as well as a deluxe version of yucca(1329) that is better suited to a packboard or frame, than the most common scout pack, the 574 yucca pack. The official frame was the Cruiser. Two other packs are the ultra basic haversack and the camper or three pocket model. Those four models are all Diamond brand packs and all have permanently attached straps that are stitched and riveted with a reinforced leather patch. If any of those models lack straps, they have been removed or its a different model. 

There are two other less common packs the 1307 D by Diamond and an early one called the Trapper Nelson, both are designed to remain on their frames. The Trapper Nelson is much more rare and looks different from the 1307 which at first glance looks like a yucca. Most 1307 models have a zippered outer pocket and a red Scout seal rather than the black one found on most Diamond brand packs and a handful of others have model numbers you aren't likely to see. As these models are designed to stay on their frames they have no straps or only have straps for attaching to a frame. 

Being canvas, any of the old Diamond brand packs are easily modified and maintained as long as the cloth isnt rotten. If you have a bag needing repairs or something modifed any luggage repair shop should be able to help. 

Glass knapping

I have a lot of old projects, things that have been set aside for one reason or another but not abandoned. I'm a big believer in know when to push projects and when to let them breath and happen in their own time. My glass(flint) knapping project, and I suppose knapping skills in general, are on that back burner stack.

I did a lot of shaping stone when I was a kid. In scouts, my decade of involvement with Historic Fort Wayne and outdoor adventures in general, flint knapping was something that everyone seemed to be doing. Whether art, hobby, demonstration or any number of other reasons from dressing musket flints to making stone tools, it was just present. When I got to college it was another thing that archaeologists do, though with a more experimental intent. College was also where I started focusing on glass. Partially because it about the best easily obtainable material and partially because it's hard to create false sites or contaminate existing sites with glass. 

I've had a nice piece of glass sitting on my nightstand for months waiting for a time and inspiration. It's kind of a zen thing, shaping a piece of glass with a stone is something everyone should do once or twice. So when I found a scrap of bone last weekend that seemed like "the" haft, I got to work. 

The blade is still rough but shaping nice and I've always wanted to make a knapped knife to carry as a pocket knife just to see how functional it can be. We know countless cultures used stone blades as functional tools at one time and they certainly show up as art now but for tool use seem to have become a novelty item. 

As an archaeologist, artist and post apocalyptic fiction fan I think I'm over due to answer that question. I'll post an update once my slab of window glass and bone turns into a useable tool and maybe after it lives in my pocket for a while. 

  

....and damn it. Meh, I'll find another hunk of glass. 

Another Globe in the mix!

There's this constant quest for "the" bike, the perfect bike for all applications that more than likely doesn't exist. The more probable solution is accepting the limits of our machines and becoming better riders. Working as a bike messenger in San Francisco provides an opportunity to test bikes and riders on some of the most challenging terrain in the world.

Even on our "insane" hills my Globe Roll 1 has been a favorite. I don't ride it fixed and I do have brakes but even geared high in track bike range, once I got used to it, riding single speed is efficient and fast. Granted, I had a lot more adapting to do than the bike did and on my tired days I grab one of my geared bikes but I've even been able to manage a couple of 100 mile trips with my one lonely gear.

I was predictably excited recently when I added an early model Globe Daily 1 to the mix. Visually different from the Globe Roll series it offers similar ride quality and geometry in a full fender dressed up package complete with front rack, mustache style bars and stem mounted bell. So far it has tackled courier shifts and the back roads of Santa Cruz county earning the moniker "Daily" as it has become a true workhorse and go to utility bike pedaling to and from school, on weekend trips and hops across the Golden Gate for Coast Guard duty. With ample eyelets and lugs on it's sturdy aluminum frame, the Daily stands ready for all manor of racks and accessories begging the question, how feasible is touring on a single speed bike? While 100 mile days would be a chore, the daily would certainly go anywhere a vintage three speed could go. Back in the "good ol days" that was just about everywhere.

There are a handful of things needing upgrading. The brakes work but aren't stellar, the pedals look OK but leave a lot of room for improvement and the rear fender needs regular attention to keep it from rattling loose but those things stack up as minor in the big picture. Overall it's a damn classy bike and like it's Roll counterparts, outperforms nearly every other bike I've encountered in it's style and price range.

Update: About a week and 100 miles after writing this one of the pedals came apart. I replaced the stock pedals with a set of Specialized platform pedals with power straps. They work well but don't quite look right and will be getting another upgrade soon. I have a set of All-City pedals that would look a lot better and maintain the Daily as the one bike in my stable with non-SPDs

Martial skills for EMS

Tonight as I sit here admittedly whining about the vaccinations I got today making my arms ache, I'm contemplating gentle submission techniques to present to EMT students tomorrow. Our lead instructor has police and SWAT experience with a lot of very "real world" stress testing. That noted, I'm coming up with a small number of value added items to augment the standards. I'll be digging deep on this one to come up with things both simple and effective that are less likely to cause harm.

It's been a while since I gave my Oni Kai Aikido blog any attention but this may provide material and an interesting direction for a few posts. While I maintain that Aikido is about the longest path to field applicable combat skills a person could choose, it is effective none the less. 

I miss my days of nearly living in dojos and being immersed in this stuff. Maybe a new evolution for Oni Kai is in order. I can certainly think of less noble applications for martial systems.