all tubulars all the time

This is my fixed-gear commuter bike (a Surly Cross-Check frame/Reynolds Ouzo pro fork) And when I say commuter I mean everything from riding to the office, to shopping, going to Boulder for meetings or throwing it on a plane for a trip to the East Coast. I've done everything from the Black Hills around Mt. Rushmore, to muddy Vermont single track on this bike. One of the best investments I ever made.

The one thing I want to point out is the Mavic Reflex tubular rims. Tubulars for commuting? I hear you scoff. Yes, in this particular case, Veloflex Roubaix, which are wide, durable and incredibly comfortable. I can't remember the last time I flatted on these. I.e., more than a year ago with daily commuting on normal roads.

the flatbed scanner as a cheap digital microscope

Just got a new HP Photosmart all-in-one (scanner/printer/copier) etc. Kudos to HP for producing the powerful open-source tools that let Linux users get the most out of their hardware (HPLIP). For years I have used flatbed scanners for all sorts of microscopy and measurement applications in my lab; applications that have lots of folks scratching their heads when they see the results that a few hundred bucks of hardware can produce if you let it.

Consider this. At 4800 dpi (what xsane lets me do with the new scanner), that works out to 189 dots per mm. Or a pixel size of 1/189 mm, which is 5 microns! To measure something small, just scan it and count the number of pixels. The 'n' pictured is from from e pluribus unum on a US dime. The image is 159 pixels across, so at 4800 dpi, that is .84 mm wide. Not bad for something you can pick up at the corner big-box for a lot less than $200.

the three laws of inference

If I hadn't believed it, I wouldn't have seen it --- Anon

The problem of making inferences in the presence of uncertainty is ubiquitous both in science and in society. Just look at the controversy over the trends in Earth temperature and how such data influence public policy. What most people don't realize is how uncertainty permeates even the simplest measurements (which are almost never direct) and hence the whole chain of measurements that goes into even the simplest problem. Here are some simple ideas to keep in mind when interpreting claims in the news

the problem is not too little energy

Jared Diamond, January 2, 2008 New York Times: "Much American consumption is wasteful and contributes little or nothing to quality of life. For example, per capita oil consumption in Western Europe is about half of ours, yet Western Europe’s standard of living is higher by any reasonable criterion, including life expectancy, health, infant mortality, access to medical care, financial security after retirement, vacation time, quality of public schools and support for the arts. Ask yourself whether Americans’ wasteful use of gasoline contributes positively to any of those measures."

Diamond also does a great job explaining why the problem is not too little energy but too much consumption. He points out that if the developing world were brought up to the standards of consumption and waste of the developed world, it would be as if the Earth's population were 72 billion people!

7.5 kg custom single-speed cyclocross

When you remove all the mud, this bike weighs 7.5 kg. Some nontraditional features. Single speed. Campy Record crankset (42 chainring), hs, bb, brake levers, etc. Custom Zipp 32h tubular rear wheel with a DT 240 s hub. Training rear wheel is a Mavic Reflex tubular with a Phil Wood ss hub. I worked with Scott Mares of Sibex Sports to design the geometry. He sends the Cad file to Russia where the thing is CNC'd from titanium and presto you have a frameset. It was fun putting together. TRP says not to use road levers with their brakes, but it works fine. The Zipps are really stiff and light. Excel got the custom drilled 303 cyclocross rim from Zipp and built the wheel. The front wheel is a standard road 303. One thing I discovered the hard way: don't use a 3/32 road chain for single speed cross. They break. So I use thick 3/32 cogs like the Surly or a White Industries freewheel. These are much stouter than road cogs and they work with a 1/8 track chain. This chain works fine with the Record chainring.




There is so much clearance, it has been suggested that I could run it with 29er MTB wheels. May try that over the summer.