What are your cycling gear pet peeves?

[zircon]

Pet peeve - lack of possessive adjectives in thread titles.

the 'r' must have got deleted while rewording. Now can't unsee. Is that something a mod can fix? (please please please)

Also, my dura-ace hubs (I swear I don't go out of my way to buy Shimano things... the wheels came from the bike's previous owner) are surprisingly silent.

 

[cantunamunch]

My Shimano hubs are quiet too, but then I remember the age of the ears.

The Chris King running 20somethings are probably just trying to drown us unwitting oldsters out.

 

[zircon]

Looking at photos side by side, it appears I have ruined my own life through vanity and if I'd gone with the metal railed version that's on my other bikes I could have all the setback I want. That's what I get for trying to weight weenie 100g on a bike that's already 6.9kg with pedals.

 

[scott43]

My Shimano hubs are quiet too, but then I remember the age of the ears.

The Chris King running 20somethings are probably just trying to drown us unwitting oldsters out.

Can't hear ya..can you speak up???

 

[Carl Kuck]

According to Endomondo (tracking program on my phone), I regularly ride a couple of hundred feet below sea level. Say what ??? (Actually, having worked as a QA person for Nokia for a number of years I know all too well that the vertical axis is far and away the least accurate for GPS - you need to see at least 4 satellites to get an accurate vertical fix and 5 sats are even better...)

 

[cantunamunch]

(Actually, having worked as a QA person for Nokia for a number of years I know all too well that the vertical axis is far and away the least accurate for GPS - you need to see at least 4 satellites to get an accurate vertical fix and 5 sats are even better...)

This bothers me too - imagine loop rides where you regularly descend 200 feet more than you climbed - even though you wind up at the same point?

 

[Tricia]

Pet peeve - lack of possessive adjectives in thread titles.

I have no idea what your talking about.
(See what I did...... ^^^^ there?)

 

[Erik Timmerman]

So...how many of you actually splashed out for an Onyx hub?

I've ridden them. I wouldn't want to own them, too quiet, I'd hear everything else all the time! Sometimes I wish I had loud hubs on my gravel bike, I'd love to have them announce me when riding multi-ire trails.

 

[cantunamunch]

^ Any truthiness to the "so much directness" crank feel claims?

 

[Tom K.]

Onyx is a cool story. A bunch of mechanical engineers at a Minnesota agricultural products company that wanted better hubs for their kids' bmx bikes IIRC.

 

[scott43]

I'd love to have one...but I bought my whole group for $400.... I can live with the slop in the pawl engagement...

 

[Erik Timmerman]

^ Any truthiness to the "so much directness" crank feel claims?

It's direct, but has a soft clutch feel, not a bang like pawls engaging.

 

[Delicious]

According to Endomondo (tracking program on my phone), I regularly ride a couple of hundred feet below sea level. Say what ??? (Actually, having worked as a QA person for Nokia for a number of years I know all too well that the vertical axis is far and away the least accurate for GPS - you need to see at least 4 satellites to get an accurate vertical fix and 5 sats are even better...)

Wow. I totally just learned something here. I never imagined that there was "vertical axis" data being created from triangulation. I had always ASSUMED that there was software referencing "known elevations" from the grid. It doesn't even seem possible..?

 

[cantunamunch]

I had always ASSUMED that there was software referencing "known elevations" from the grid.

Ever wondered how those "known elevations" on (even remotely fine enough for cycling) map grids were established?

It certainly wasn't through land-based survey.

According to Endomondo (tracking program on my phone), I regularly ride a couple of hundred feet below sea level. Say what ???

There is, however, software that references a grid to determine where your actual sea level is. The grid is based on the EGM96 model.

EGM96: The NASA GSFC and NIMA Joint Geopotential Model

cddis.nasa.gov

 

[Delicious]

Ever wondered how those "known elevations" on (even remotely fine enough for cycling) map grids were established?

It certainly wasn't through land-based survey.

Often wondered, but never really thought about it. I have some research to do.

 

[scott43]

Yeah the gps sats are a long way up and the resultant strength of figures is poor for z-axis calcs.

 

[Delicious]

At the risk of completely hijacking this thread...
Maps are created using these methods:

Digital elevation model - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

The whole "real time" triangulation method using multiple satellites seems a bit ambitious to me, and the results speak for themselves. +/- 30-40m!! Yikes. It's been a while, but I do seem to remember my Garmin PC software giving me the option to turn-on "elevation correction", or something like that to reference known data based on my route.
If I seem like I'm "crawling out of a hole" here with regard to cycling GPS stuff, I am. I actually tossed my Garmin off of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge 10 years ago, and quite frankly hadn't thought about it again until... well, today. Maybe riding with a computer was my REAL cycling gear pet peeve?

 

[cantunamunch]

I actually tossed my Garmin off of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge 10 years ago,

Did it notice?

 

[zircon]

I actually tossed my Garmin off of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge 10 years ago

This is probably only rational response I can think of for the shrill chirp-y tone my Edge 800 emits whenever it does anything.

New annoyance: tiny tools that vanish into thin air the moment you’re not looking. I think my only recourse is to buy a new BBT 10 at this point.

 

[Delicious]

New annoyance: tiny tools that vanish into thin air the moment you’re not looking.

They're in the "she-shed", in my case!