I still ride my 2004 Specialized Enduro S-WORKS, which despite being many generations behind in bike years, is still really good.The XTR brakes and drivetrain are working as smoothly as they ever have, so no complaints.

Well, except for the Fox Brain rear shock which has been slowly leaking oil for years now. More recently it has started leaking air pressure as well, slowly collapsing during a ride. Specialized and Fox haven’t been servicing these for ages now and I have not been able to find any replacement shock that fits into this frame.

For a while I was adding air pressure before each ride but it’s leaking too fast now, not really usable anymore.

So what to do…

Found these rod ends in McMaster-Carr which are a good fit so I have a hardtail mountain bike now!

Of course, the width and the bolt hole diameter were not a match, but here is where having a 3d printer comes in handy!

After measuring and drawing the suitably sized spacers, ready to print:

And here is the printed version ready for mounting:

I was thinking one benefit of converting to a hardtail would be to save some weight on the bike. And while it is a little lighter now, I was surprised how light the Brain shock actually was!

The whole Brain shock assembly with the hose and remote reservoir only weights 1.26lbs!

My rod end based replacement weights 0.84lb, so only really saved less than half a pound.

But the bike is rideable again! Went for a test ride with my son and it felt fine and no issues observed. I’ll see over time if the 3d printed spacers hold up or wear out, but in any case it’ll be easy to print more.

As I was searching details to write this, I now found a place in Oregon which seems like they can service the Brain shock. I’ll look into that and perhaps later I can convert back to full squish, but at least for now I can ride the mountain bike again!

As my son grows, so do his bikes!

First bike: Strider

The strider balance bike was the first one, at a year and a half old. No pedals, no brakes. Very light at 6.48 lbs. It was a great first bike to learn how to coast and balance without any pedals getting in the way. Even after he started riding the next bike, he kept using the balance bike for the local pump track. He rode this one almost until five years old!

Second bike: 12″ Specialized HotRock

When it was time to learn pedaling, we moved up to the 12″ HotRock when he was a bit over 3.5 years old. A big jump in weight to 15.6 lbs. And pedals! This bike comes with training wheels but we never used them since he already knew how to balance from the previous bike.

It only has a coaster brake (pedal backwards) unfortunately. I got some parts online and added a hand brake for the front wheel. It didn’t have much braking power but it served its purpose of getting him used to regular brakes (when he test rode the next bike which has only hand brakes, he was immediately familiar with using them).

Third bike: Cleary Hedgehog 16″

This is one nice bike, a huge step up in quality from the previous ones. This is a kids bike in size only. I’d love to ride it myself if I could fit! He’d been asking for big boy brakes (hand brakes) for a while and the Cleary delivers, for his fifth birthday.

(In comparison, the 16″ Specialized HotRock inexplicably still has a coaster brake and training wheels.. Specialized completely lost the plot in this age segment!)

The Hedgehog is also fairly light, which is very nice as he is starting to ride some of the hilly mountain bike trails nearby. Even though it is a much larger bike than the 12″ one, it is barely over one pound heavier, at 16.8 lbs.

Gear Ratios

Linking these here for my future reference…

Roubaix

50-39-30 chainring, 12-30 Ultegra cassette (10 speed)

Speed @90 rpm

    |    12    13    14    15    17    19    21    24    27    30
----+------------------------------------------------------------
 50 |  29.3  27.0  25.1  23.4  20.6  18.5  16.7  14.6  13.0  11.7
 39 |  22.8  21.1  19.6  18.3  16.1  14.4  13.0  11.4  10.1   9.1
 30 |  17.6  16.2  15.0  14.0  12.4  11.1  10.0   8.8   7.8   7.0

Enduro MTB

32 chainring, 12-36 cassette (9 speed)

Speed @90 rpm

     |    12    14    16    18    21    24    28    32    36
 ----+------------------------------------------------------
  32 |  18.6  15.9  13.9  12.4  10.6   9.3   8.0   7.0   6.2

XX1/30

Speed @90 rpm

    |    10    12    14    16    18    21    24    28    32    36    42
----+------------------------------------------------------------------
 30 |  21.8  18.2  15.6  13.6  12.1  10.4   9.1   7.8   6.8   6.1   5.2

I meant to post this last month…

For years I’ve meant to participate in Bike to Work day. That distance for me isnt’ that long (about 35 miles one way) but there is the small matter of having to cross the Santa Cruz Mountains to get from the Santa Cruz area over to Silicon Valley. And of course, doing it again at night to get back home!

This year I decided to go for it (I’m signed up for the Levi’s GranFondo in September, so need to start getting some training mileage in!). Going to work wasn’t bad at all, I’m used to climbing Mt. Charlie and from the summit the rest of the way was all down hill or flat! Easy ride. I could do this often!

Coming back home was a lot tougher. When I got to Lexington Reservoir I had already done about 50 miles that day and was starting to get tired but all the climbing was still ahead of me! By the time I got to the summit I was beat and it was completely dark. Fortunately I had borrowed some powerful bike lights from my neighbor so I had plenty of illumination.

All in all it was fun, I should do this more often. Here is the data from my bike stats and also on strava.