tales from the "it's life Jim, but not..." dept.

)Once again, mad bike props, this time to my North Shore Extreme Bitch, a bike that I use mostly for posing, just like my old StreetLegal though this time I actually take it out into the parks and urbanity that is Arnhem. (like I did yesterday btw. that was sweet. more about it later!

I built this frame up with a much more non-urban flavour in mind. Therefor it has big knobby tyres, gears, a chain device, and a massive 160mm fork on the front end to save me for ifwhen I screw up. Surprisingly for such a big bike, it rides very well and it doesn’t feel heavy as long as you keep it moving heh. Yesterday I had it out on dry mud/sand and it just skitters across the surface and flies off jumps like it’s 5kg lighter than it really is. Very nice indeed :-) This bike, I can see myself getting serious with!

The actual build was a sheer pain in the arse: amongst other things, I have every hayes brake adapter there is, except the one I needed! The rear brake has new pads, and for the life of me, I can’t get the caliper to fit the rotor properly: it drags. It’s not an alignment question, there is no room to align the caliper because the pads are too thick! (it’s starting to work now btw.) The only thing I could come up with is that the 160mm Hayes disk is thinner than the 200mm disk, and that’s why it doesn’t fit, even though the pads are original Hayes parts! Bah! Most irritatingly, to fit the SRS I need two spacers on the drive-side bottom bracket bearings to get the chain to clear most of the chaindevice. Now, if I do that, the non-driveside crank has play in in because it’s not fitting fully onto the available length of axle showing. So to fix this, I have hand filed the steel (@%@#%) spacer down to about half it’s thickness so there’s about 1.5mm more axle available which should just be enough. Now, it fits and there is no play if I tighten the crankbolts really really tight, but on top of all the other problems, the Truvative Holzfeller crankbolts keep coming loose even though I glue them into the axle with an epoxy agent! RAAR! Even so, now that there is no play the bolts will stand up to an hour of rough fooling around before they start to come loose (which it seems is a known problem with Holzfellers according to the internet), whereas before I’d filed the spacer down they were coming loose withing minutes of me starting biking. So, I’m getting there.

(right-click, view image, to see larger pics)

TdC frame rating: 9/10 points
TdC build rating: 7.5/10 points (note I deduct one whole point due to the cranks)

• NorthShore Extreme Bitch ‘07 frame Black finish, gold decals mmmm
• NSX Moto 50mm stem
• NSX Xup bars (I really should cut a couple of cm’s off these cos they’re wiiiide)
• Odi yeti hardcore grips
• RockShox Domain 302 fork ‘07 model 160/115mm U-Turn
• Truvative Holzfeller crankset with a howitzer BB. 36t Truvative chainring. (not pleased with these cranks tbh, sorry Truvative)
• e13 SRS with bash
• NSX “leg eater” pedals (yes, they are aptly named)
• front wheel: PlanetX LMF rim on PX 20mm hub
• rear wheel atomlab GI rim on atomlab GI hub
• Shimano LX rear mech and LX 9spd cassette
• YabanMK9S2 Chain (I have to mention this because it’s hot, and nobody ever talks about their chains heh)
• Maxxis Minion 26” 2.5”width
• Hayes 9 disk brakes, 200mm rotor front and rear
• Thomson elite seatpost
• Deity saddle