Two Wheeling West

Shakedown success, new kickstand mount!

Posted by Andrew on June 6th, 2009 -   

I spent last weekend, May 30-31 on a two-day shakedown ride to test out the bike, gear, and my body.  Success!  I forgot a pair of shorts and flip-flops, but otherwise, everything worked out very well.  I’ve got the shorts packed, I bought a pair of flip-flops, so I’m all set.

I was happy with my saddle, but not thrilled.  The Specialized Avatar saddle I used has been on my mountain bike for 2 years and I’ve been very happy with it.  Of course, riding a mountain bike off-road is very different than having my ass parked in the saddle all day long.  I would venture a guess that I spent less than 50% of a mountain bike ride actually sitting in the saddle (I ride a hardtail with cheap/lousy front suspension).

Back to the Internets for some research…  The tourers say Brooks, but I really don’t want to baby a leather saddle all the time.   I would much rather set it up and forget about maintenance and keeping it dry, not to mention the break-in period for stretched leather.  More to come on the saddle front…

In other news, I have a new and much improved mount for my Pletscher two-leg kickstand.  I noticed that the Pletscher web site had a picture of a different mount than I have, so I emailed them about it.  A few days later I got a response from the CEO cc-ing their US distributor, KHS Bicycle Parts (note: not KHS Bicycles).

Thorsten at KHS Parts helped me out - I spoke to him on the phone and he spent some time rummaging around the warehouse that afternoon.  I had the new top plate and bolt in 2 days, just in time to head out for my weekend ride.  The old top plate was a simple piece of angled metal with a bolt down the middle.  In order to get the kickstand stable, several people reported having to tighten the bolt until the kickstand deformed the chainstays.  Obviously not a great idea, and the new mount will stay put with much less force.

New Pletscher kickstand mount
view on flickr»

(click “view on flickr” to view more photos)