Lock It, Light It, & Carry It Wheelgirl Sale Save 10% on Locks, Lights, Messenger Bags, Bike Caps, Wheelgirl Apparel This Week

Yes, we are having a bike-back-to-school sale from Saturday Aug.  29th through Sunday Sept. 7th. Anyone with a student ID of any sort gets 10 percent off of locks, lights, messenger bags, backpacks, bike caps, and Wheelgirl-branded apparel. We do have some great bags from Reload, Soma, Knog, Jaand, Basil, and Chrome. We have Cateye and Knog lights, and we have a ton of U locks from Kryptonite and OnGuard. Also, included in the sale are Campagnolo, MKS, Sugino, Nitto, and a ton of the cool world championship colors and retro bike team caps, like 7-11 and Panasonic. And of course, you can save 10 percent on any Wheelgirl American Apparel zipped hoody, t-shirt, or track jacket.

The gear is great. And ten-percent savings adds up on a pricey-but-well-worth-it bike bag. Also, in the case of Chrome bags, if you don't see the exact Chrome bag you want, we can order it for you, and you will still receive the discount. However, as much as I like the great gear, I really like the bike-back-to-school ad campaign talented Dalton, Wheelgirl bike shop employee and graphic design student at Expression College, designed and created with his friends Santiago, Vaughn, and Erika. Here are some of the "Need a lock?" ads Dalton and his friends made one evening. If you ride a bike, and you are caught without your lock, you know the feeling.  Stop by the shop this weekend. It should be a happy circus.  Thanks Dalton, Santiago, Vaughn, and Erika for truly making me feel your lockless pain and for making me grin.

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Photographs by Santiago Portilla. Graphic Design by Dalton. Starring Erika and Vaughn.

Anodized Dia-Compe Threadless Headset Spacers, Assorted Colors for Your Road, Fixed Gear, Mountain Bikes

Well, Chris King makes very pretty and accurately cut anodized headset spacers. But if you can't come up with the coin for King spacers, you can start changing the look of your bike by grabbing a few of the color anodized Dia-Compe spacers. They come in pink, blue, green, gold, and purple. (Because I watch you carefully construct the visual style of your individual bikes: The pink is like a dark magenta. Purple has a lot of red in it. The green is dark and classic. The gold is an orange gold, not a yellow gold. The blue is electric not navy.)

Spacers are an easy and inexpensive way to spice up your bike. You can mix them of course, or you can add a dash of brightness to the traditional silver or black spacer stack. They come in 5mm and 10mm thicknesses for both 1-inch and 1-1/8th-inch threadless steerer tubes. The spacers will fit most track and fixed gear, road, and mountain forks. We just received a bunch of them. (I can already predict that they are also going to be very nice candidates for those creative mockingbird riders who like all things shiny and make jewelry, messenger bag do-dads, and key rings.)

Photos by Wheelgirl

1959 Murray Meteor Flite, Kristin & Olympic Cervelo Win Gold, and a Lucky Deep V

You can be a little bit country or a little bit rock 'n' roll, and you will still find a bicycle story that appeals.  Sunday at the bike shop, we got a visit from Ray and his group of riding pals. Ray added some touches to a red 1959 Murray Meteor Flite, and he assured me that both lights still actually work, and each wheel has 144 shiny spokes.

Neil from Rohloff stopped by, and we admired the tubing shapes on his bomb proof new city ride from Brooklyn Machine Works. Neil tells me I might want to stop by his booth at Interbike in
Vegas, since there will be a nice new shiny bit of gear in his booth, and I might
want to try on my fixie. We talk about bikes, and Neil sends me a link to the clean and very cool Cervelo S3 limited edition Olympic paint scheme road bike.  Kristin Armstrong (USA) won gold in the Beijing Olympics in the Women's Individual Time Trial on her Cervelo Olympic paint scheme TT bike. (Mike Day won a silver in Men's BMX. Jill Kintner won a bronze in Women's BMX. Donny Robinson won a bronze in Men's BMX. Levi Leipheimer won a bronze in the Men's Individual Time Trial. Well done.)

Monday morning, customer Eric calls. He is completely fine, but could we take a look at his track frame. He assured me that he didn't even fall off, but on his morning commute to work, a car spanked his fixie Eric figures that the rear Velocity Deep V took most of the impact from the car moving into the bike wheel at approximately 15 miles per hour. The rider and frame were fine. The rim stopped the music. (Yes, Eric got the license number of the vehicle and two witness' phone numbers.) It looks like Phil is doing fine and will take up residence on another Deep V. Ah, bikes, never a boring moment. (Jump for more photos.)

Photo by Wheelgirl are of Ray and his 1959 Murray Meteor Flite. The Cervelo S3 limited edition Olympic road bike is lifted from the Cervelo site. Eric took the cameraphone photo of his bike with the tired Deep V.

More photos:

• Ray's 1959 Murray Meteor Flite is a trip. The lights look like a robot's face. According to Ray he received the bike in very good condition. It is easy to see he has thoughtfully restored and enhanced this most excellent looking machine.  The bike sports 288 spokes total glimmering in the August sunshine.

• Quiet, now. Eric's Deep V is tired and sleeping. (I know bike wheels typically buckle from lateral forces, but it is a curiosity to see that thick extrusion folded.)

 

Photos taken by Wheelgirl. (Actually, when you think of it, it was a pretty great Monday morning for unscathed Eric. When things like this happen, it is time to buy a lottery ticket, since you are undoubtedly lucky.)

Hip Wheelchair Rolls By On Phil Wood Hubs and Mountain Bike Tires

I was sitting on a bench slurping down my coffee before work one late morning about a month ago, and I couldn't help but notice a very hip powder-coated green wheelchair rolling by me on Phil Wood hubs.  Theodore was kind enough to let me take some photos of his ride that he designed. He told me that he really likes the Phils, and he uses regular mountain bike tires on his chair. He explained that dedicated tires for wheelchairs are really pricey (up to $300 for hard rubber specialty wheelchair tires), and these expensive tires are not half as available or comfortable as mountain bike tires. Theodore also told me that he figured out he could use standard plastic electrical connectors, which are available in giant bags for pennies each, instead of more expensive fittings to connect the hand wheel to the main chair wheels. (Jump for more photos.)

Photos by Wheelgirl of Theodore and His Ride He Designed

Dia Compe BRS 100 Dual Pivot Road Brakes in Anodized Blue and Gold

If you are converting an old road bike or building up a single-speed commuter, these Dia Compe BRS 100 anodized dual-pivot brake calipers bring a splash of color to the usual silver scene. The blue is a non-organic shiny, electric blue, and the gold is less orange and more yellow. (You cats matching golds on your fixies know what I am talking about.) The arms are standard road bike length. If you are riding with old and maybe truly frightening brakes right now, add a pop of color and upgrade your ride for a reasonable price. We have a set of the blue and a set of the gold in the case.

Photos by Wheelgirl

Leather Handle Bar Grips by Click For a Mountain, Flat Bar Road and Single-Speed, Fixed Gear Bike

If you are making over your mountain hardtail from the early 1990s or converting an older road bike to a more upright single-speed commuter or fixie with riser or flat bars, stop by the shop and check out the new Clicks spiral leather handle bar grips. They come in four color ways, and they can add a touch of class to your commuter ride. I don't know how they wear on the trails, but for street riding, they look to be of good quality. The ends are protected, so the bars are less likely to break through them. Thus, you are less apt to core sample your own thigh in the event of a stack.

The green goes oh so  nicely with the special edition Brooks green B-17 saddle we have in the case. If you end up riding with a set of these on your city bike, or any other bike for that matter, post a comment. The packaging with the grips states they are "100% PVC-free". (Um...yes, that would make sense.) I did go to the URL on the package (www.clickgear.com), but I got an under construction page, which took me nowhere. If you find the real site, post the URL for the rest of us.

Photos by Wheelgirl

Campagnolo Faux Track Cranks for Fixed Gear Riding

OK, what happens when you have a ton of square-taper alloy Campagnolo Record double road cranks, and everyone has switched to the "modern" outboard bearing style cups and the carbon Campagnolo Ultra Torque Record road racing crank sets? The answer just got delivered to the bike shop.

Campy and a huge bike component distributor took the high-quality alloy Record square tapers and bolted them to some alloy 1/8th inch chain rings with holes drilled to fit cranks requiring 144 BCD (Campy and most true track bolt circle diameter) and 135 BCD (Campy road and Miche track BCD) rings. Yes, there are a ton of holes, but voila! You now have what I am calling "Campy Record faux track crank sets" that you can use to run 1/8th-inch single-speed and fixed gear drive trains. (You can also change out the ring and run a 135 BCD 3/32nds Campy road ring if you run a 3/32nds drive train on your fixie.)  These faux track cranks cost much less than the super pretty and crazy pricey real Campagnolo or Dura Ace track crank sets. (Jump for more and extra photos.)

Photos taken by Wheelgirl

Right now we have silver 170mm Campy Record faux track cranks ($150) in the bike shop and some other Campy faux track cranks that are made of Xenon old cranks ($50). The chain ring isn't made by Campy. But the Record crank sets look great.  Of course, if you turn it over, you can see the double-ring tabs, but they are going to be there on any other road crank set you convert to put on your fixie.

A few months ago, I ordered a Record 10-speed square-taper crank set on closeout, since I figured that the worst case scenario, we could use it for parts in the shop, and I always liked that crank. We did, in fact, use the rings for a customer's tune up. Then I ordered a Campy faux track crank set just to see what they were about. Guess what? The same exact numbers, marking, measurements. Both arrived in official (but differently printed) Campagnolo Record packaging and boxes.  A bunch of crazy amazing road cyclists used this crank set in the pro peleton. You can surely spin it down to the pizza parlor or on your daily commute and feel good about your value-shopping self.

Suggestion: Those new to building fixies, make sure whenever you are putting on a new crank, you are mounting it on a bottom bracket that has the correct taper (the shaped flats on the spindle that match up with the inside of the square taper of the crank). Also, make sure you have the correct spindle length. Crank sets, based on the year the brand and the year they were manufactured usually require certain bottom brackets shapes, and your frame and drive train will require a certain spindle length for the chain line to be within an acceptable range.

Photos taken by Wheelgirl

Greg From Brooklyn, New York Wins The Wheelgirl 2008 T-Shirt Design Contest and Brings Home the Phils

Greg from Brooklyn, NY USA wins the first Wheelgirl 2008 T-Shirt Design Contest and receives the prize of a set of Phil Wood high-flange track hubs in the color of his choice plus more. Greg's Wheelgirl design will be available on t-shirts in the Wheelgirl Bike Shop as well as online. Make sure to check out all of the wonderful designs that artists from all over the world created and entered in the contest.

If you live in the continental USA and want to order Greg's Wheelgirl design printed on an  American Apparel t-shirt, send $22.00. If you live outside of the continental USA (Europe, Asia, Hawaii, Alaska, etc.) send $30.00. The prices include all shipping and handling. Make sure you tell us if
you want a men's or women's t-shirt and if you want size small, medium,
large, or extra large. Send your payments via PayPal to service@wheelgirl.com.  Greg's Wheelgirl t-shirt should arrive by mail to your home and be available for purchase in the Wheelgirl Bike Shop in 4-6 weeks.I haven't picked the color ways yet. But rest assured, there will be one color way for crazy hip fashion cats and one color way for calmer cats who prefer to make subtle fashion statements. (Jump to read more.)

First photo by Wheelgirl of the Wheelgirl  apparel room in the bike shop. Next photos of Greg's winning graphic design for the front and back of the new Wheelgirl bike shop t-shirt. Congratulations, Greg!

We reviewed many cool contest designs, and with the permission of the artists, we might actually
print up t-shirts with some of the designs that didn't win the contest
but would still make styling t-shirt for those who love bikes. 

(Artists
who have their designs printed on a t-shirt get $1.00 USD commission for as long as the shop decides to manufacture, retail, and distribute the
design in the brick and mortar store and on line at Wheelgirl.com.)