Author: DennisTheCyclist

Photography and Cycling.

on by 4 Comments

Some time ago I went through all the dusted old stuff that I once put into the attic, because it was to good to be thrown away … you know what I’m talking about, right? It’s like a huge flea market, just with your own stuff.

This time I rediscovered two boxes filled to the top with … LEGO bricks!

Two boxes with single stones and plates of every color and size. I knew one thing right away … I needed to build something.

At that time, I’ve been awaiting spare parts for the Viny Solo singlespeed conversion I was writing about some time ago (read the blogpost right here). The weather was bad and I had some spare time, so I decided to empty out the content of the two boxes right down on the floor and started looking through tons of LEGO bricks.

Some people might not understand this, but when there’s only cycling related topics inside of your head, there’s just one thing that I had to find out: Is it possible to mount LEGO stones to a bicycle frame?

Well, the answer is … Yes, it is possible!

And before the day ended, I found myself looking at the prototype of my new bicycle bottle holder, complete build with LEGO stones. In case you might want to know more about it, here’s a short video about the prototype of my bicycle bottle holder:

The process of building something that only exists as a picture in your head, is tougher than it sounds. What you’re looking at right here, is probably the third or fourth version of the bicycle bottle holder, but the first one, that I thought was okay.

After hours of work inside of my private bicycle laboratory, it was about time for the first official test under real conditions. An empty parking lot on a sunday morning was the best location I could possibly find for this purpose.

I mounted the bottle holder to the frame and the test started. A few laps around the parking lot proved, that the bottle holder worked just fine at average speed and without hitting huge bumps and potholes. The bottle seemed a bit loose and moved around quite a lot inside of the holder, but as long as everything stayed where it was supposed to be, I was okay with that.

Then it was time for the ultimate test : Will the bicycle bottle holder survive a ride over potholes at average speed?

Well, the answer was NO …

Right at the second pothole, the bottom plate of the bottle holder broke and the holder itself slipped down the frame to get stuck between the frame and the big chain ring. However, it still hold on to the bottle and prevented it from falling to the ground. That counts as a success, right?

Of course I’m just joking around. The test was a failure. The bicycle bottle holder could not live up to its purpose, though it didn’t went as bad as I imagined. Before the test, I imagined dozens of tiny LEGO bricks flying through the air, spreading all around the parking lot, the water bottle smashing on the ground and my bicycle slipping out on the wet surface, resulting in a huge crash for me.

Luckily, that didn’t happen. One single LEGO brick broke of the bottom plate and landed on the ground, the rest of the prototype got stuck between the frame and didn’t touch the ground at all.

So, after all, what’s the result of the first test?

I think, the prototype of the bicycle bottle holder ain’t as bad as I thought it might be. It’s able to hold a filled water bottle on a road without potholes. That’s a good result, I think.

However, the test proved that the bottom plate is too weak to survive big hits like potholes or curbs. That’s something I have to work on for the next prototype.

Yes, you heard right … I’m not done yet, I will be back with a second prototype and it will be awesome …

If you’d like to find out more about the first test of the bicycle bottle holder, here’s the full video about it:

Feel free to share your thoughts with me in the comments below. I appreciate every feedback and / or reply to my posts.

Thanks for reading, watching and replying!

-Dennis

on by

Whenever I’m looking for ideas, that would be great as a next YouTube video, that’s when I’m most creative.

The Highway Loop is my latest invention, if you want to call it like that.

What’s the Highway Loop? – It’s a cycling route, that I created while I was scrolling through the streets of Dortmund on google maps, while checking out nice routes for my next YouTube video.

The Loop actually is a cycle path right next to the B54, one of the smaller highways in Dortmund. It starts at the Phoenix West highway entry, follows the highway for 3 km out of town, turns left to cross the highway under a bridge and then follows the highway for 3km in the opposite direction back to Dortmund. While the first part of the loop is challenging your endurance with a light ascent of round about 2%, the way back to town is making up for it, with a light descent of round about 2%. Basically, this just means, you can’t go as fast as you want to on the way out of town, but always as fast as you like on the way back. You should always keep in mind though, that the cycle path is crossing several highway exits, so you better make sure to keep an eye out for cars. Beside of this, the loop’s your classic average cycle path. Tons of potholes, bumps, highway debris and garbage are going to test your reaction and handling skills.

However, the great thing about the highway loop is the fact that you can usually ride without interrruptions like traffic lights or pedestrians. Of course, you might have to stop for cars at the exits, but most of the time you can avoid that with good anticipation.

I did the highway loop on a sunday and I think, that might be the best day of the week to ride it. There’s no rush hour on the highway and most of the weekend cyclists are choosing much nicer routes around town, so there’s a good chance, that you got the cycle path all for yourself.

As I mentioned before, I did a whole video about cycling on the Highway Loop, that I’d like to share with you so, here it is:

Thanks for reading, replying, sharing and liking…

-Dennis

on by 2 Comments

Yes, it’s true. The pizza saddle is history. It’s gone, spending its days chilling on top of the desk inside of the garage until there’s a new purpose for it.

It was a necessary change, although it really had a chance, a good chance, maybe even more than one chance, because I’ve always been a die-hard fan of it. I first saw it somewhere on the internet, five years ago maybe, and instantly decided I had to own it. I mean, it’s a pizza saddle, how much cooler can a saddle possibly look? Yeah, it’s not possible…

I felt confirmed, when I saw the saddle in real life mounted on the old bmx of mine. That really was a classy combination, style for miles … unfortunately contrary to my bmx skills …

The pizza saddle went into its first retirement, when I realised, that I didn’t had what it takes to be anything near good on a bmx. I bought my first roadbike and the pizza saddle spent its days covered in dust leaning against the wall inside of the garage.

A few months ago the saddle was reactivated, dusted off, cleaned and brought back to life, when I started to customize my everyday roadbike ( if you “missed” the story, there’s a chance for you to catch up with it right here and here ).

The saddle still looked classy, upgraded the roadbike from the first moment on and I instantly knew why I decided to buy it a few years ago.

Then I rode more than 25 km on the customized roadbike. That was the exact moment I learned the reason, why you shouldn’t ride a saddle, even a pizza saddle, that is mounted with one huge screw right down through the middle of the saddle into the seat post on a roadbike. It was a painful lesson, but I learned from this mistake …

This blogpost is dedicated to the one and only pizza saddle. Its freshness and style will always be remembered. I’m sure there will be a next purpose for the classiest saddle in the game soon…

-Dennis

on by 4 Comments

Maybe you heard it (and watched it already!), maybe it’s breaking news for you: I started my own YouTube channel.

YouTube is a great platform to share my “everday” bicycle life with everyone around the world and thus, reach even more people than I do already through my blog. I’ve always been interested in making videos about cycling, but I only did short clips for social media and stuff like this.

Most of the videos so far are short three or four minute videos, about my favorite roadbike spots in Dortmund. I’m spending a lot of time everyday working on new ideas for upcoming videos and at the same time, I’m learning a lot of new things with every published video, for example I would’ve never thought I’d catch myself talking in front of a camera.

Right now though, my channel is as small as it could possibly be and I’m struggling to reach barely anyone at all. I know there’s small progress already, I can see it in the data – which is ablsoutely awesome in YouTube Studios by the way – but just like starting up this blog three years ago, starting something new always take time. Trust me when I say, that this was a tough lesson … again …

But I don’t let small numbers discourage me from sharing my bicycle life. After all, this is a free time activity, it’s my hobby, it’s part of my recreation, if you want to call it like this. I don’t necessarily need to be successful in order to have fun. But of course, I do like to get a bit of approval from time to time, you know…

So, what I’m trying to say is: If you’re into watching videos about cycling and you’ve got a spare minute or two or three left to spend, I would appreciate it a lot, if you would check out my YouTube channel:

Hope you enjoy watching this video!

-Dennis

on by 1 Comment

The singlespeed conversion of my Creme Cycles Vinyl bicycle took weeks until everything looked like how I wanted it to be. Of course, my excitement level to take the bike out for a first ride went straight through the rooftop…

I decided to go on an easy spin through the neighborhood to see, if everything works as it should. I was especially worried about pretty much the whole brake system and the positions of the brake levers on the handlebar in detail. Everything used to work on the bike stand, but that doesn’t mean anything for on-road use. So, the first few times I hit the brakes were very exciting moments to say the least.

Somehow though, the brakes were working just fine and I’m happy about that.

On top of that, the way the bike looks made me even happier. The chrome-like brake levers on the black handlebar, the velcro on the toptube holding the brake cable and of course … the pizza saddle! Everything looked exactly the way I imagined.

However, looking at the bike as a whole, I think I would maybe go with two rims of the same color next time. The new rim at the rear looks great for itself…but the rest of the bike is black, so the silver of the rear rim looks a bit weird…

I don’t know, next time I would probably try to get a black rim or two silver rims. But in times like these I’m happy that I got a single new rim at all. Ordering and waiting for the new parts took way longer than I thought. The local bike shop almost ran out of spare parts and looking for parts online proved to be a nightmare too. This rim was basically the only singlespeed hub – rim combination available, so I’m pleased with what I got right now…

Besides of this, the customized version of the bike is running so smooth, I sometimes have to look twice to see that this is the same frame as before. Of course, the 47 – 17 gearing has its pros and cons. My first impression is, that it’s perfect for riding on city roads. I’ve got a nice acceleration, so that I can easily flow with the traffic.

Unfortunately, this city ain’t too big… As soon as I hit the suburbs, I find myself fighting on every climb. I just hope to get some nice training effects out of this…

After all though, I’m pretty satisfied with the result of my work. The bike is far more fun to ride than it used to be and I learned a whole lot of new things about the mechanics on a bicycle.

Plus, I’m already thinking about a next project…

-Dennis

In case you’d like to see a bit more of the customized bicycle, here’s my YouTube video about it:

Thanks for reading, watching, liking and visiting!