Topstone 105 – Wheels, Tires, Fenders

Table of Contents

Clinchers; Tubes and Tubeless

In the early 21st century, the most common bicycle tires are pneumatic clincher or bead clincher tires. The tire has a bead, formerly made of metal wire. Modern tires are manufactured with material that can rebound into a circle after being folded for packaging and shipment. The tire contains an inner tube, which is soft and vulnerable to punctures and tears. Clincher wheels curve into a bead hook at the rim to catch and hold the bead. In tubeless wheel, the rim has

  • a central groove which can be described as a valley or well;
  • a rim strip to seal the spoke holes
  • bead channels – the spaces between
    • a shelf, between the rim wall and the well, and
    • a bead hook.

Tubeless tires are clincher tires sealed and inflated directly – no inner tube. Tubeless systems generally require sealants installed in the tire; tubeless tires are supposed to self seal to mitigate small punctures. Riders may carry inner tubes to install a tube in a tubeless tire to mitigate a larger puncture. A tubeless tire bead is designed and manufactured to fit into tubeless wheel rims. A tubeless or tubeless ready wheel has a machined bead channel. The beads and the rim channels are supposed to fit tightly enough to be air tight when the tire is inflated. The seal is normally obtained by applying tire sealant to the edge of the side walls along the bead.

The wheels on my 2019 Topstone are “tubeless ready” WTB i23, a metal alloy with a 23 mm rim; the 23-622 model. (WTB has versions of i23 including a “26 inch” mountain bike rim, and i23 (23-622) for 700c tires from 700c x 32 to 700c x 46). The 23 mm measurement is taken between the rims in the bead channelat bead seat. The tires were “tubeless ready” WTB Nano 700c x 40. Some manufacturers (e.g. Mavic) manufacture rims and tire beads to the Uniform System Tubeless (UST) standard. The bead seat is designed to accept and hold the beads of UST tires without tape. WTB’s tubeless metal rims are sealed with plastic rib tape (liner) which adheres to the rim. The rim channel and wheel beads are beadlock – which is WTB’s way of saying manufactured to the UST standard. WTB, like other manufacturers, calls tubeless tires a modern improvement or feature and calls its beadlock system a feature. It is hard to unmount a tubeless tire from a rim to replace a tire or to fix a flat. It requires a skill that has to be learned. It can be a problem with some wheels and tires as noted in this YouTube review of the Topstone (at the end of the 3 minute video). I

Tire sizes are normally described by height. Height is the diameter across the wheel on the outside of the tire, measured on the mounted and inflated tire. The height is the nominal exterior diameter of the tire, which was used by manufacturers of tires and other components. 700c was the term used in a French system. The height, assuming the tire is a perfectly round torus, should be the diameter of the rim plus the 2 x the diameter of the tire. For 700c x 28, this works out to 678 mm which is almost 28 inches (700 mm. = 27.559 inches) . The tire, inflated, has an irregular oval cross section, sort of egg or pear shaped. Diagram below. A tire is always marked with a tire size in a nominal diameter system, and a size in the International Standards Organization ISO or ETRTO system. The most common tires on gravel and all-road bikes are 700c tires – considerably fatter than 700c road bike tires. 700c is a standard for tires with a nominal outside diameter around 700 mm (28 inches). There are skinny 700c x 25 (ISO 25-622) tires and fatter 700c x 36 (ISO 36-622) tires. The 622 in the ISO descriptions of 700c tires refer to the 622 mm diameter of the wheel.

700c (ISO 622) is also the standard for describing larger “niner” and “niner +” (29 inch x 2+ inch) wheels. 650b is a standard for tires with a nominal diameter around 650 mm (27.5 inches). The ISO descriptions of 650b tires refer to the 584 mm diameter of the wheel and the tire.

The other number in the nominal diameter or ISO description is the bead seat diameter (“bsd”) – the width measured across the tire or the rim at at the inner bead seat where the tire bead fits into the bead seat of a wheel. The width is usually the same in the nominal diameter and ISO systems. There are some outliers. A tire may be 700c x 38 and 622-40.

A higher bsd means a fatter tire, mounted and inflated, with a larger diameter and circumference than a narrow tire. The actual thickness (width from sidewall to sidewall, from the outside)≥ bsd. Actual thickness varies, depending on pressure and load. For higher bsd numbers, the thickness starts to push out. Height (outer diameter) and thickness can vary slightly depending on the construction and inflation of the tire. The height and thickness of some tires:

Tire SizeISOCircumference ≅Diameter (C/π )ThicknessSource
700c x 1818-622Generic/Standard2070 mm658 mm
700c x 2525-622Generic/Standard2111 mm672 mm
700c x 2828-622Generic/Standard2130 mm678 mm≅ 28 mm
650b x 5050-584Generic/Standard2149 mm684 mm
700c x 3838-622Generic/Standard2180 mm.694 mm

Clearance

The rear tire has to fit between the chain stays behind the bottom bracket and between the seat stays below a bridge below the seat. The bottom bracket shell accomodates a bb and a crank with a suitable Q factor. On the Topstone, the chain stays are straight and parallel to each other for a few cm behind the bottom bracket. The distance between the chain stays is about 56 mm in the parallel section where a 700c tire would have to fit. The The seat stays are straight and bend out to fit around the rear axle assembly (cassette and disc brake rotor). The distance between the seat stays is 66 mm where the tire runs. The front tire has to fit between the fork blades under the fork crown. The distance between the fork blades where a tire runs is 61 mm or more. (The measurements were made with a caliper with the wheels on the bike). The side clearances allow 700c x 40 mm tires. The clearances at the tops of the tires under the seat stay bridge and the front fork crown were tighter. The WTB Nano 700c x 40 tires were too big to allow for fenders. For subsequent model years, Cannondale shipped the Topstone with 700c x 37 WTB Riddlers, a slightly smaller and narrower tire (with small knobs).

The WTB Nano tires had a mountain bike type tread. The tread on the center line of the tire was made up of chevron shaped groups of cleats or knobs. There were alternating gaps in the chevron. I thought the tread caused vibration, noticeable at low speeds; experienced gravel riders reviewing it thought it made for a smooth ride. I agreed it was smooth unless speed dropped to under 12 km/h. I did not need cleat or knobs e for my riding on asphalt and packed gravel. I downsized the tires to 700c x 38 Panaracer GravelKing SK tires.The dense small knobs were smooth to ride, although I expect some drawbacks.

Some all-road and gravel bikes can be adapted to use 650b wheels and tires. The 650b standard is based on a 584 mm. diameter wheel. A 650b x 48c (ISO 48-584) wheel is as tall as a 700 x 28c. It has more rubber, and is wider and heavier. 650b x 48 is not as tall as a 700c x 38; it will fit into the fork under the fork crown and the seat stay bridge. René Herse states that its 650b x 42 tire is 41-43 mm wide, and its 650b x 48 is 49-50 mm wide. These tires will fit within the clearances in the Topstone, but fitting a 60 mm diameter fender for 48 mm tires would be awkward.

Fenders

Fenders were normal part of the design of all-purpose bikes used by commuters and city riders, and installed by manufacturers for most of the 20th century. Road bikes, imitating racing bicycles, were built without fenders or even mounting points for fenders. While fenders were useful for some uses of mountain bikes, fenders were hard to design. manufacture and install. Fenders for road bikes, hybrids, and mountain bikes became accessories. Fenders were more popular on touring bikes and endurance/randoneusse bikes.

To fit fenders, the rider needs to know the thickness of the tires, and the clearances in the bike frame. The front fender has to attach to the fork at or near the fork crown. The rear fender needs to attach to the frame behind the bottom bracket between the chain stays, and at a bridge between the seat tubes. The attachments at those points support the front parts of the fender in the proper position. Fenders stays hold the back parts of the fenders in position. Fender stays normally attach to the frame and the fork near the axles.

A fender should fit around an inflated tire, with horizontal and vertical clearance. The exterior diameter of the fender, measured across the base of the arc of the fender indicate that the fender needs that horizonal distance to fit between the seat stays or fork blades without cutting or bending the fender Velo Orange, a manufacturer of aluminum fenders, suggests an 8 mm. horizonal difference between the exterior diameter of the fender and the bead seat diameter of the tire. This suggests a 700 x 40c tire needs a 48 mm exterior fender. A fender should clear the tire vertically (along the radius of the circle) by about 20 mm where the fender covers the tire. There has to be a vertical gap of more than 20 mm from the inside of the fork crown or the seat stay bridge and the outside of the tire.

My first fenders for the Topstone were SKS P50 Chromoplastic Longboard Fenders, a popular model sold in many shops and online stores in the USA and Canada including Modern Bikes and Universal Cycles. SKS marketed these fenders as wide enough to cover 700c tires in the range from 700c x 38 to 700c x 45. The P50 fenders had an exterior diameter of 50 mm. Plastic is light but it is prone to twisting and vibration. The rear ender mounted easily to the eyelet between the chain stays behind the bottom bracket. SKS, like other fender manufacturers provides a fender bridge that has to be bent around the outside of the fender and crimped around the edges. This bridge has to be centered on the fender to align to the frame mounting fitting on a bridge between the seat stays, slid into position and crimped onto the fender. If this is not done successfully, the fender will be twisted out of true. There is very little margin for error . SKS chromoplastic fenders use V shaped stay ; each stay has 2 arms. These stays are designed to attached to eyelets at the ends of the chain stays. The stays did not quite line up to eyelet . I had to adapt some left over parts from a rack mount kit to fabricate little fins. I had to bend the stays out to balance the tension to keep the fender from rubbing, but it worked.

The front fender fit under the fork crown and appeared to have adequate clearrance over the tire, but did not clear the original 700c x 40 knobby/cleated WTB Nano tire. I downsized the tires. The next problem with those fenders was the lack of eyelets for fender stays at the ends of the fork blades. The only eyelets stays are on the inside of the fork, 15 cm above the end of the fork. This was not a good place for the SKS breakaway tab or for a V shaped stay. I was able to improvise an attachment for the SKS break-away fender stay mount, and bend the V arms of the stays to slide into the attachments on the fender. This worked for my rides in the winter of 2020-21. I began to get a rubbing noise at higher speeds on chipseal. The V stays did not support the plastic fender under those conditions.

Riders reported installing SKS plastic fenders on Cannondale road bikes in forums, Reddits and YouTube, but these riders referred to bikes with eyelets at the end of the fork blades. One English rider reported, in a YouTube video, using the Bontrager NCS plastic fenders on a Topstone with carbon forks. That fender has a single straight (adjustable) stay, which normally attaches to an eyelet at the end of fork blade, but can be attached to the eyelets on the Toptone. I installed aluminum Velo Orange fenders. These are light but rigid, and attach with a single stay on each side of the fender. This is how the stays fit, using the pre-drilled holes for the stay:

Carbon Fiber Fork

Carbon fiber forks are offered on many production road and gravel bikes with steel or aluminum alloy frames. A carbon fiber fork is light and stiff, which is supposed to improve steering, although this can be debated. A carbon fork on bike with disc brakes has to be stiff. A stiff fork does not dampen vibration. Many carbon forks lacks eyelets for racks and other devices, which limits some uses of the bike. The carbon composite must be laid over a metal component tapped to receive a bolt and act as an eyelet. This is tricky and expensive.

Crankarms and Cassette

I changed the stock 172.5 mm crankarms to 165 mm – a shorter radius and less stress on knees. I replaced the Shimano 105 11-32 cassette for an SRAM PG-1170 11 cog 11-36 for a couple more low, climbing gears. With the 30 tooth front ring, this change gives me 30×36 as the lowest gear.

(Instant Pot) Dry Beans

Table of Contents

Endless

This post was published in 2021, with some later editing and further thoughts after more experience.

Cooked or Canned

Cooked dry beans are a staple ingredient. Some recipes provide directions for cooking dry beans as a step in a recipe, or by reference to another recipe for cooked beans in the recipe source/collection. Some recipes call for canned beans, rinsed. This is common in slow cooker recipes. Canned bean are dry beans cooked in the canning process. Dry beans may take twice the cooking time as other ingredients, or may not cook properly. Canned beans have cooking fluid in the can. This may contain sodium and other residual ingredients. It may be unpalatable. The extra fluid may affect the recipe. Most recipes recommend rinsing the beans and discarding the fluid.

Cooked beans can be substituted for canned beans in any recipe. The benefits are not paying for factory cooking and other supplier and seller costs built into in the price of canned goods, and avoidance of salt and additives. The cooking fluid can be used in the recipe or set aside and used as a vegetarian stock – it depends on how it tastes.

1/2 cup of dry beans makes 1 1/2 cups of cooked beans, the amount in one 14 fluid ounce can of canned cooked beans. Precision is generally not necessary:

For recipes requiring precise proportions, you should always cook … the dried beans before you measure them, using the average equivalents as a rough guide to estimate the amount of dried beans you need to prepare. Many bean recipes are fairly forgiving and adjustable.

The Spruce Eats – How to Measure and Use Dried Beans

Also, the Reluctant Gourmet – Bean Conversions

Soaking

Soaking before cooking starts hydration. It reduces the cooking time and improves the result. This is true for every cooking method except the extremely slow simmering e.g. in a ceramic olla as Rick Bayliss describes in some of his books on Central American and Mexican cooking. Soaking for at least a few hours prepares dry beans. The common advice is to soak overnight. This may mean 12 hours but can mean over 20 hours. Cook’s Illustrated/American’s Test Kitchen explained its tests on soaking at pp. 256-258 of The Science of Good Cooking (2012).

Some phaseolus vulgaris (Central American beans) varietals take up more water than others. For instance cannellini (white kidney beans) absorb more than pinto peas or black turtle bean.

Cook’s Illustrated/American’s Test Kitchen discusses variations on soaking: soaking in water at ambient (room) temperature, quick-soaking cook dry beans for a short time in boiling water or in a pressure cooker. The “quick-soak” or parcooking methods use any appliance and vessel that can hold dry beans in boiling water. Anupy Singla’s slow cooker recipe (The Indian Slow Cooker) for red kidney beans says quick soak in boiling water, and 5 hours on high in an electric crock pot type slow cooker. Laura Pazzaglia discusses soaking methods and times in her article/lesson Long-soaking and Quick-soaking beans in the Pressure Cooker and soaking for pressure cookers (including Instant Pots) in her article/lesson Pressure Cooking DRY versus SOAKED Beans.

Cook’s Illustrated/American’s Test Kitchen also explains soaking in brine, and/or adding baking soda to the cooking water. These use sodium to some degree. I have not tried them, as I avoid sodium. Those publishing brands tend to aim at an audience of home cooks striving to cook like restaurants, most of which use salt heavily for the taste buds of modern consumers, sensitized to highly salted foods.

The claim that soaking dry beans removes “indigestable sugars” and helps to avoid intestinal gas is common but unverified. Beans contain sugars: stachyose, verbascose and raffinose which ferment in the digestive tract, producing gas. There is support for the claim that soaking removes some sugars in some medical and scientific literature. For instance see this Michigan State University extension publication. However, soaking cannot remove sugars without removing other nutrients and flavour ingredients, and probably does not remove much sugar.

Instant Pot options

The pressure cooker program can cook unsoaked dry beans. It can be used to “quick soak” dry beans.

The pressure cooker program or the slow cooker program can be used, of cousse to cook soaked beans.

Medium and Large Phaseolus & Chickpeas

Rick Bayless’s slow cooker recipes for black (turtle) beans and pinto beans in Mexican Everyday (2006) start with unsoaked dry beans, to emulate cooking in an olla, discussed in his Authentic Mexican (1987), and Mexico, One Plate at a Time (2000). In Mexico, One Plate at a Time (at p. 192) he reported cooking in an olla heated the beans and water to 205-210 degrees (F), with little evaporation. He says 6 hours on the high setting in a slow cooker. In an Instant Pot with the slow cooker program this is 6 hours on the high slow cooker using the the sealing lid, with the pressure valve set to vent. Other traditional slow cooker recipe propose 8-10 hours slow cooker low for unsoaked black, pinto, cranberry (i.e. medium Phaseolus). I cooked small recipes in a small round traditional slow cooker on low in lower times.

Chickpeas and the large dry beans such as red kidney, Borlotti, cannellini, cranberry can be slow cooked in an Instant Pot by a three stage process:

  1. a few hours by the natural method of soaking in water at room temperature – the beans will take up some water and swell;
  2. in the Instant Pot, with enough water to cover the beans by a centimeter, a pressure cooker program “quick soak” (two minutes at high pressure, and a manual release); and
  3. top up the water to cover the beans, and 2-4 hours at slow cooker program, high. If I have time, I keep the beans simmering at slow cooker program medium (which is equivalent to traditional crock pot low) for 3-6 hours. The beans can be kept warm as slow cooker program low, or the warming program.

This works in a six quart Instant Pot with one or two cups of dry beans in the bottom of the Instant Pot in less than a quart of water.

The larger phaseolus varieties are not necessarily the hardest. This method worked with seda beans, with extra time, but the beans were old.

Recipe error – Chickpeas

The book is Madhur Jaffrerey’s Instantly Indian Cookbook, was published in 2019 by the Borzoi imprint of Knopf and as an ebook in the Amazon Kindle store.

The error in the recipes for Plain Chickpeas at p. 20, Everyday Chickpeas at p. 22, and Chickpeas in Gingery Tomato Sauce at p. 24 is saying soaked (white) chickpeas can be done in an Instant Pot (or any electric pressure cooker/multicooker) in the pressure cooker program at three minutes on high pressure with a 3 minute natural cool down. In these recipes, the Instant Pot is used to sauté onions and make a sauce; uncooked soaked chickpeas are added. I was suspicious about 3 minutes. I set 6 minutes, but the result was crunchy and barely cooked. I put the lid on and cooked at high for another 8 minutes. This produced chickpeas with some texture, barely cooked.

The recipes are fine if the user has cooked chickpeas – either canned or cooked at home. Madhur Jaffrey used cooked chickpeas in several recipes in At Home with Madhur Jaffrey (2010) (in the UK, Easy Curry). She regarded canned chickpeas as acceptable but cautioned that the sauce or canning fluid was not good and should be rinsed off the chickpeas. except for some organic brands.

Dry chickpeas, even soaked, take more time. In an electric pressure cooker, Laura Pazzaglia’s Hip Pressure Cooking suggests

  • 40 minutes on high for dry chickpeas and
  • 20 minutes on high for chickpeas that have been soaked.

Madhur Jaffrey has a note at p. 20 of Madhur Jaffrerey’s Instantly Indian Cookbook that unsoaked chickpeas can be cooked in an Instant Pot set for 50 minutes of high pressure in the pressure cooking program.

In an Instant Pot, I would cook the legumes first, set them aside, wipe the pot, do the recipe as written and add the cooked chickpeas and give them the three minutes on high to cook some of the flavour into the cooked chickpeas.

Recipe error – Tamale Pie in a Skillet

The book is Cast Iron Skillet Cookbook (2003, republished 2014), Sasquatch Books, Seattle. The authors are Sharon Kramis and Julie Kramis Hearne.

The error is in the recipe for Tamale Pie, at p. 113 in the 2014 edition, saying this is a recipe that can be done in a 10 inch cast iron skillet. While there are recipes that work in a 10 inch skillet, this needs a 5 quart or larger casserole dish or Dutch oven. It is not a mistake that exposes the cook or the diners to harm.

The error is exposed by adding up the ingredients. It uses three cans of canned ingredients, an onion, a bell pepper and a pound of ground beef. The cornbread topping is a cornbread that can be baked in a skillet – the cornbread will fill the skillet by itself. This recipe is bigger and takes longer than one might expect. I use a skillet to brown the meat and soften the onions and fresh vegetables. I use an enamelled 7 quart Dutch oven as a baking dish.

Perhaps this recipe belongs with stew and chili recipes in a Dutch Oven cookbook, like Kramis and Hearn’s Dutch Oven Cookbook (2006, revised ed. 2014).

Tamale Pie, like shepherd’s pie, is a stew with a topping, finished by baking. A shepherd’s pie is topped with mashed potatoes. A tamale pie is topped with cornbread batter. No corn husks, banana leaves or other wrappers are used to make a tamale pie – it is not a tamale. It is an American chili con carne, a stew that may involve meat, beans, bell peppers, chili peppers, and vegetables. Mexican and Central American versions of chili feature the flavour of chili peppers, and use beans. American versions often stress meat and minimize beans, but there are bean free and meatless recipes. The food processing companies have been making canned chili since canning became a technology in the food industry. Canned chili may emphasize meat, or spice or meat-free. (Bean free canned chili looks like dogfood).

The Kramis & Hearne recipe is a a family recipe. It uses ingredients found in family pantries or supermarkets including ground beef, canned tomatoes, canned chili (for the beans, I hope), frozen corn, a bell pepper, an onion, and garlic. It uses “chili powder” (this normally means a concoction that uses some dried ground chilies, and other spices for bulk). The Kramis & Heane recipe adds cumin, oregano, paprika and crushed pepper flakes; also, optionally roasted poblanos or diced fresh chilis (I use serrano or jalepeno). It is a good recipe. There is enough meat and flavour. I am going to substitute canned or cooked black and pinto beans for canned chili.

Cookbook Errors

Lists of mistakes in the kitchen for home cooks:

Such lists usually don’t mention problems with recipes, writers and publishers:

  • Recipes
    • with philosphical or ideological agendas. I am not a fan of the “Small Planet” recipes and other nutrition centered recipes;
    • promoting demand for devices or ingredients. Some require obscure ingredients or follow culinary trends into blind alleys;
  • Poor recipes – dubious ingredient ideas or planning by the recipe writer;
  • Inadequate instruction;
  • Serious errors – There a references to such errors in printed and broadcast stories. Some address a famous restaurant recipe that does not replicate – the famous Chocolate Nemesis is cited in a 2019 piece by Felicity Cloake in the Guardian, Cookbook errors: recipes for disaster.

More on serious errors. Quotes from Marion Burros’s 1997 NY Times classic column:

The prevalence of errors in cookbooks is the publishing world’s dirty little secret. The problem is likely to get worse as an industry mired in economic doldrums resorts to cost-cutting, practically guaranteeing less editing and testing before publication.

….

”Book publishing contracts are very specific,” said Sydny Miner, the cookbook editor for Simon & Schuster. ”Publishers don’t have any way to amortize testing of recipes, so the responsibility falls on the author. We take it on faith that the recipes have been tested.”

….

Generally, mistakes in cookbooks come to light when they are so egregious that someone following them might be injured. Or if a book riddled with errors was written by a particularly well-known author. Julee Rosso’s ”Great Good Food” (Crown, 1993) was lambasted from coast to coast for its errors.

What book publishers don’t tell you is that they view errors as almost routine. ”Every line in a recipe is an opportunity for a mistake,” Ms. Miner said. ”They can be made by the author, the editor, the copy editor, the typesetter. I don’t think you can expect perfection.”

….

Writing recipes is a skill. Accuracy is obviously essential, but there is an equally important need to write directions clearly. Not everyone has the knack. ”Cookbook writing is very tough,” Ms. Jones said. ”You have to write for beginners and advanced cooks.” And there is an additional problem. ”There are a lot more dummy cooks than there used to be.”

Marion Burros, Cookbook Follies: Recipes that Fail, NY Times 1997-09-17

Cycling out of James Bay

History

This is a historical summary.

James Bay

James Bay is at the south end of the City of Victoria, in the urban part of Greater Victoria between the Strait of Juan de Fuca and the Inner Harbour.

Routes

Many routes out of James Bay have vehicle traffic.  Douglas Street and Blanshard Streets are heavily travelled.  Douglas Street becomes a highway (the Trans-Canada) west to Colwood and Langford, over the Malahat and north up-island.  It has a paved shoulder and bike lane, but the traffic on the entrance and exit ramps is significant.  Blanshard Street runs up to Saanich and the BC Ferry terminal at Swartz Bay.  It is a highway, called Highway 17 or the Pat Bay Highway.  It has bike lanes, but significant traffic. Other streets go north: Quadra, Cook, Gorge Road, Cedar Hill, Richmond, Shelbourne.  They have drawbacks including traffic, lack of bike lanes, limited visibility, curb lanes occupied by parked cars, elevation changes. One option is to go downtown along Government, Douglas, Blanshard or Quadra as far as Fort Street and east and north on Fort Street whch has a bike lane (as of 2019)  The bike lane was redeveloped as a separated lane out past Cook Street as of 2017-18.  Fort Street crosses Oak Bay Avenue which runs east out to Beach. Fort becomes the Cadboro Bay Road.There is 5 k. loop around James Bay on Belleville along the Harbour on the north, the streets at the west end, Dallas on the south, and Douglas on the east. There is longer loop around Beacon Hill Park by Cook Street, and some loops in the park.  The is a new paved bike lane beside Dallas from Beacon Hill park to Ogden Point as of 2020 after Dallas Road was torn up 2018-20 for sewer reconstruction. These are usually safe in the evening but the traffic on Sundays is heavy between tourists, families with children, people walking dogs, and people taking elderly parents out.

 

In the first few years, many times , I went east on Dallas past Beacon Hill Park and the Ross Bay Cemetery and followed a nearly coastal route. Dallas continues until it runs into Hollywood Crescent and Crescent Drive, which also follow the coast.  These streets connect to to Beach Drive in Oak Bay.  The traffic along Dallas is steady.  There are intermittent micro-congestions behind tour buses and the ubiquitous horse drawn carriage rides.  There are sections where cars park at an angle facing the Strait. The drivers have little vision and can back into oncoming traffic. These conditions were mitigated by the new bike paths that opened in 2020.

In 2016 I began to take the Beacon Hill-Oak Bay-Uplands-UVic-San Juan option.

  1. going southeast along Niagara, through Beacon Hill Park exiting on Park Avenue;
  2. crossing Cook Street at May, turning north at Moss Street, crossing crossing Fairfield at the traffic light;
  3. turning right on Thurlow and follow Thurlow to Kipling and Brooke to St. Charles. Then another block along Chandler to Richmond, and a short block to Richardson. This avoid climbs of streets approaching the heights on Richardson at the south end of the Government House area. I used this as a route to Richmond at Richardson.
  4. From there, I often crossed Foul Bay Road and proceeded on Richardson (which becomes McNeill in Oak Bay) to Victoria, turned left and then turned right onto Windsor.
  5. I turned left (north) at Monterey, to cross Oak Bay Avenue with traffic lights. I go north on Monterey and St. Ann to Bowker, turn left and then right to continue northbound to the edge of Uplands of Oak Bay on Musgrave.
  6. I ride north and cross Lansdowne on Midland, continue on Upper Terrace until to ends at Cadboro Bay Road, opposite the end of Cedar Hill Cross Road.
  7. I cross Cadboro Bay Road and ride west on Cedar Hill Cross Road to University Drive and turn there and cross the Univesity of Victoria. Sometimes I pass the University and turn north on Gordon Head.
  8. I emerge at Gordon Head and McKenzie, at the NW corner of the campus, and on go up Gordon Head to Feltham. A left turn and an immediate right onto Longview brings me to San Juan, which runs west as road and trail as far west as Cedar Hill Road.

My main cycling-friendly route out of James Bay was north along Menzies or Government to the Legislature, and along Government and Wharf along the Inner Harbour to the east end of the Johnson Street Bridge. There is a cycling lane, as of 2019, along Government from Belleville to Humbolt and along Wharf to Johnson Steet.

The Victoria Canoe & Kayak Club is on Gorge Road just past Tillicum. My best route from James Bay to the club was over the Johnson Street Bridge, along the Galloping Goose to the park at the West Victoria Y, near the Selkirk Trestle. At that point it’s off the trail through the park to Craigflower and then on Selkirk, a side street t parallel to Craigflower, all the way to Tillicum. At that point a right turn onto Tillicum, across the bridge, a left turn onto Gorge Road and that’s it. It was 6.8 k one way, mainly off the main roads.

100% Whole Wheat Machine bread

100% whole wheat loaves may be made with a bread machine in the whole wheat program. High WW flour formulas that aim for sandwich loaves with an moderately open crumb use a dough with enhanced visco-elastic properties; the dough is enhanced with vital wheat gluten or bread flour and enriched with fats – oil or butter – and sugar in the form of molasses, honey, milk, brown sugar or refined sugar.

Much “whole wheat” bread multigrain bread. Multigrain covers many blends made with 50-90% flour being high protein white flour and some whole wheat flour. Loaves with high white flour content may use, and carmelized sugar products (e.g. molasses) for sweet flavour and brown colour. These loaves deliver the energy part of nutrition – starch – like sandwich bread and other processed carbohydrates. A multigrain loaf high in white flour can be baked in a bread machine with the basic bake program.

Bread machine recipes have to be customized; each machine needs a different amount of yeast to ferment to produce enough carbon dioxide to inflate the dough and make the dough rise within the time limits of the program. The best way to find the right amount of yeast for a bread machine recipe is to understand the manufacturer’s recipe for basic bread. The amount of yeast depends on the type of yeast and amount of salt in the recipe. I use instant yeast, and I write recipes in tables.

The manufacturer’s recipe for the whole wheat program is a suggestion of how produce a goof loaf with whole wheat flour, water, salt, added gluten, sugar, fats, and dry yeast in 4 hour program. Zojirushi’s recipe for 100% Whole Wheat Bread provides medium (1.5 lb.) and large (2 lb.) loaf formulas for the Zojirushi machines with large pans such as the BB-PAC20. I used those recipes to find out how to leaven 100% whole wheat for that device, a precaution to avoid overflowing or collapsing loaves.

The Zojirushi medium (1.5 lb.) recipe says to use 3.5 cups/420 g. of whole wheat flour recipe. The manual recommends measuring by scooping flour into a measuring cup – i.e. lightly scooped and less dense. This is a 3 cup recipe by weight. The manual says 4.2 g. [1.5 tsp] active dry yeast. 3 cups of whole wheat flour can be leavened with 3.6 g. of any instant yeast [a little more than 1 ¼ teaspoons]. It used a teaspoon of salt which is much healthier than many whole wheat recipes, but can be reduced using the usual calculations. Because I try to use 33% or 50% of the sodium (salt), than a recipe prescribes, I have to make a corresponding adjustment to yeast. The rule of reducing salt and yeast in the same proportion by weight works with whole wheat.

The dough made with the Z. recipe is enhanced with vital wheat gluten at a ratio of 1 tbsp. to 1 cup flour (8 g. to 139 g.). This exceeds the often generous prescriptions of Beth Hensperger for a 100% whole wheat loaf in the Bread Lovers Bread Machine Cookbook. The Z. dough is enriched with sugar, >43 g. for 417 g. of flour in a medium loaf (35 g. refined sugar, 7.5 g sugar in 10 g. molasses, lactose in milk powder) i.e. about 9% of dry ingredient weight. The recipe bakes into a denser bread than I like, which is fixed by reducing the water by a few teaspoons to get a loaf that rises, crowns and holds a loaf shape. Bakers hydrate whole wheat flour more intensely that bread flour to get suitable dough. Some of the water comes out in the baking. Whole wheat loaves have to be left to cool and dry out a bit. I find that in a machine, I can just leave out a little water. I can happily bake and eat this bread. I haven’t tried to toast it.

I have baked Beth Henspergers “Tecate Ranch Whole Wheat”, BLBMC (p. 126), a 100% whole wheat flour loaf enriched with canola oil, honey, and molasses a few times. It gets sugar from honey, molasses and milk powder (lactose is milk and dry milk is a sugar) . It may have as much or more sugar than the Zojirushi formula. BLBMC named it for a spa in Baja California that served “Zarathustra” bread; the spa used Zoroastrianism as one its themes. Exotic naming was a staple of marketing several times, in different decades of the 19th and 20th centuries. For an SF reading of the name, consider watching 2001: a Space Odessey, listening to the fanfare of Thus Spake Zarathustra. This could inspire a vision of black monolith. With gluten and adequate yeast the loaf rises and crowns nicely. I adapted the BLBMC source – it uses too much yeast (and is not low sodium). I get a loaf that rises, crowns and holds a loaf shape with just a little less water.

Adding gluten offsets the tendency of whole wheat to produce dense loaves by providing enough additional elasticity to use the CO2 produced by fermentation to provide some crumb and lift. The sugar weakens the gluten slightly, which enhances pan flow.

Organic stone ground flour doesn’t require changes to recipes. It seems to lead to slightly more open and rustic crumb. I am not able to find a flavour difference.

I have a Flax seed multigrain loaf recipe with 2 cups of bread flour and 1 cup of whole wheat flour for a medium loaf. I am adapting my sister’s Flax Seed Whole Wheat bread with 2.5 cups of whole wheat flour, 1 cup of white flour, oatmeal, sunflower seeds, flax seeds, poppy seeds, flax meal, and 1.75 cups milk.  It works in her machine, producing a loaf with an open crumb. I have adapted it for the Zojirushi BB-PAC20 for low sodium – this is a work in progress.

Cycling computers & GPS

Table of Contents

Classic

Original or classic cyclometers measure and display distance, time and speed. The devices could be powered by button cell batteries. These units had (or if in use, have) a magnet that clips onto a spoke which rotates the magnet past a sensor. They count rotations and process data to display speed, distance and time. The original models had a wired sensor; more modern models have wireless sensors. These devices need to be programmed with the circumference of the wheel to calculate how far the bike moves forward each time the wheel goes through a full revolution. The tire will flex under load; the distance travelled is a little less than the circumference of the inflated tire measured unloaded. Cateye had a chart in its manuals, listing the circumferences for dozens of tires, including several 700c tires from 700c x 18 to 700c x 40. Similar charts are online in support articles by Sheldon Brown and by volunteers in the public knowledge base at newwheel.net. I had a Bontrager (Trek) computer on my Trek hybrid – it gave the user choices of tire size in a menu rather picking a circumference in the menu. These systems assume uniform tire sizes, inflated to the rated/marked maximum. The circumference of a tire on a wheel is affected by the tire pressure. It is small inaccuracy, only a centimer in 200 (½ of one percent).

Most units could be calibrated to one bike; a few could be programmed to two bikes. They may pause and appear to “sleep” if the rider stops for longer than a couple of minutes. It depend on the device, default settings and user choices. Setting them up is time consuming and balky.

The monochrome displays were visible even in bright sunlight and under low light conditions.

GPS

GPS was not available to cyclists until the US goverment allowed non military users, after the year 2000, to receive satellite signals from Global Positioning Satellites and calculate position on the ground to within 5 meters. This provided enough accuracy for navigation and tracking distance and speed. A cycling GPS head unit will measure distance accurately and “save” the ride in memory. It may lose a few meters as the device may need a few seconds to recognize when the rider has started to move after halting. The device may lose satellites in tree cover, and falter in calculating velocity or elevation changes. The rider usually has to power the device on, and the device then usually starts to record the session as a new ride or a lap. There are some nuances to setting up a device. Setting up and learning the unit requires time and attention, as changing anything during a ride takes time and reference to manuals and resources that may not be available.

Garmin, having produced watch sized GPS units for runners in 2003, began to produce and sell the Edge GPS receiver for cycling in 2005. Garmin added functions including rear radar, lights, power meters, electronic shifter controls, touch screens, colour screens, maps, navigation and voice prompts in more evolved and expensive head units combined with peripherals. The units for sale bundle primary functions with functions used occassionally by some users, and with some specialized functions and features. Garmin has added GPS functions using the alternative satellites of the Russian Glonass system and the EU Galileo system. Competitors including Wahoo have entered the market.

Basic models do not display a map or provide navigational prompts. Some can be paired with smartphones which may, if they are using wireless data, be able to display maps. A large screen displaying a map is useful if the rider can stop and check, but can be a distraction. The marriage of the GPS cyclometer to cloud computing, big data and social apps means cyclists are sharing their location data with the device manufacturer network and its partners. If the device network servers are hacked, as Garmin was in July 2020, users can lose access to functions that depend on the servers in the cloud. It may not matter much if the cyclist is only using the head unit to display and record distance and speed.

Smart Phones

It seems to be efficient to use a smart phone app on a phone that you already own, and to not acquire a head unit but there are trade-offs.

Smart phone mapping apps will tell a user where the user is on a map but do not necessarily calculate distance and speed in real time. These apps use the GPS receiver and sensors in the phone, and the location services of the OS ecosystem. The GPS receiver is not as good as a dedicated GPS head set; these apps do not appear to record distance as accurately as GPS headunit or a classic cyclometer. Google had MyTracks, an app that ran in Google Maps, but killed it in 2016. The cycling, running, walking and hiking apps push ads, harvest data and self-promote paid apps with better “features”. I am not happy mounting a phone to handlebars or using battery power and cellular data.

Wheat Flour

The Nafufians, hunter gatherers in Jordan, were making bread with wild cereal 12,500 BCE.  The master formula for ancient bread is to grind dried grain into a paste or flour, add water and yeast, let the stuff ferment, tear it in pieces and cook the pieces on a hot surface. People know how to grind and mill flour, and bake bread before the science was understood. The master formula for a loaf of bread is to make paste of flour and water and handle the paste until to becomes a mass of dough and put pieces of dough on the hot surface and bake it. 

The wild cereal evolved into wheat, which grew in the Fertile Crescent and Egypt (and North Africa) when the climate was wetter. Wheat has been grown in Western Europe, on the Eurasian plains and the North Amercan plains. Most bread is made with wheat flour. The supply chain for a consumer of flour or bread is farmer (land, seed, work, machinery) to mill (machinery to refine wheat to flour) to bakery to retail store to consumer. The interactions between actors along the chain have changed wheat, flour, baking and bread. Wheat can be classified based on millers’ descriptions or botanical taxonomy. Wheat evolved, under the direction of plant breeders into varieties of a short grass that produces high carb seeds. Farmers grow cultivars of annual wheat. Organic agriculture criticizes the wheat monoculture and the use intensive chemical fertilizers. Millers want wheat that they can mill into white flour. Bakers want white flour that can be mixed and baked into white bread.

White bread became a widely available commodity. White flour became a standard miller’s product, a commodity, and staple for consumers after the development of steel roller milling. White flour is highly refined – the bran and germ of the wheat kernel are milled out. White flour does not require refrigerated storage. It is shelf stable. White flour is nearly pure starch. White flour, in the U.S.A, is identified and labelled as being in one of several categories including Bread (or strong), All-Purpose, Pastry and Cake.

Bread flour is milled from high protein “hard” wheat (Canadian All-Purpose is high protein like US bread flour) and has more gliadin and glutenin, the insoluble proteins that bond to form gluten than white cake or pastry flour. Bleaching 1the source is now gated became legal in the US in the 20th century. According to the science cited by the milling and food processing companies, bleaching did not affect nutrition. There was instant reaction by some bakers, consumers and food scientists. European food scientists debated about the effects of industrial mixing methods on the quality of white bread. Consumers accepted the convenience and low price of sliced bread. Through much of the 20th century American bakers concentrated on making sandwich bread. Nutritionists criticized white flour in the 1930s. American regulatory decision makers required the enrichment of white flour with nutrients. Consumers became suspicious that mass-production white bread lacked culinary or nutritional quality. Some independent artisan bakers used baking technique to produce better white bread.

Whole wheat baking was a counterculture idea in the 1960s, rather than a restoration of traditional baking practices, remembered through cookbooks from that era such Edward Espé Brown’s Tassajara cookbook. The pioneer counterculture bakers were vegetarians, enviromentalists and spiritual thinkers, interested in authentic and natural products. Their methods were often trial and error; they were skeptical or unaware of food science and culinary tradition. They had to learn about leavening and other baking methods. Some followed traditional regional styles for flatbreads, which had efficiently used grain, fuel and time. Recipes from vegetarian, vegan and nutritional/health oriented recipes tend to produce brick-like loaves. Peter Reinhart has a chapter in Whole Grain Breads (2007) on how he learned to bake before he started Brother Juniper’s Café/Bakery in Santa Rosa, California in 1986. He describes the 1960s and 1970s as a preamble to an American culinary awakening. Independent artisans or craft bakers used methods including use long or cold fermentation to make very tasty loaves with whole wheat flour. Industrial bakers responded to demand and opportunity with their interpretation of whole grain baking producing brown bread, which is usually a white flour multigrain bread. Artisan baking did not scale to industrial baking.

Millers do not use high protein wheat to mill whole wheat flour. There is an abundance of steel roller milled whole wheat flour available. It is not as shelf stable as white flour, but more stable than traditional whole wheat flour. Stone ground whole wheat and “organic” whole wheat flour is less stable and more expensive. It is usually made with basic market wheat, and seldom made with identified varieties of wheat.

A home baker and an artisan baker can make whole wheat bread with starters, soakers, sponges, barms and sponges. This gives the loaf time for preliminary fermentation which adds flavour. It also allows for more gluten formation which starts when flour and water are mixed. Bakers hydrate whole wheat flour more intensely that bread flour. Sugar it is hygroscopic and weakens (relaxes) gluten. Small amounts relax gluten for flow and rise much. With time and hydration, loave with whole wheat flour, water and sugar will form gluten and shape up and bake into loaves that crown up. A commercial baker working in with pans will not have time or space to let loaves rise slowly and could enhance whole wheat dough with vital wheat gluten and enrich the dough with sugar. These recipes may use about 6 g. (less than a tablespoon) of gluten to 300 g. of whole wheat flour. In bread machine recipes, gluten may run at a tablespoon and sugar(s) to 1 ½ to 2 tbsp. per cup of flour.

“Farm to table” cooks (e.g. Dan Barber, The Third Plate) and plant breeders (e.g. The Bread Lab at Washington State University) try to find good wheat that can be grown sustainably. The Bread Lab is a resource for recipes and techniques to bake with “unsifted” whole wheat flour. It has recipes for an “Approachable” sourdough whole wheat loaf on its Unsifted page and Bread Lab Collective page.