The Great Gatsby Assignment Essay Example

The Great Gatsby Assignment Essay Example The Great Gatsby Assignment Essay The Great Gatsby Assignment Essay Essay Topic: The Great Gatsby ts a new year and after 2 seasons on my last steed I am lucky enough to be able to build up my new ride for the 07 season. While todays off the shelf rigs can offer an amazing value for what you pay, I wanted to build something unique that stands out a bit. What I ended up with is a 36. 3 lbs coil sprung DH bike that you wont see anywhere else. I have to say that coming in a close second to the actual riding, the technical aspect of mountain biking is what really excites me. I am a self admitted tech nerd. I can spend hours reading about the latest gadgets from any sport, be it Fl, MotoGP or ven tennis. If its lighter, faster or uses a new material then I am interested. The great part about our particular sport is that if you have the time, money and knowledge you can build some really neat things. I dont have a great deal of any of those three things but I still try, even though a smart guy once told me it was the first step towards failure. So what I did was try to build up a light and very functional DH bike. Actually what I built is a full on DH race bike. I Just happen to not race all the much, only hitting up a few each year. But what I do like to do is pin it. All-the-time. Weight was a huge concern for me, not because of any delusions of getting my pro number plate, but because this is my only bike. I have had more XC-type bikes in the past and I hated descending on them. It was not worth the uphill gain. I want to ride everything on my DH bike and to make that a little more enjoyable I had to pick my parts real carefull like. I Just happend to end up with a really light DH race bike! Fact: All 3 current Honda factory riders have raced World Cups on Oranges Fact: All 3 current Honda factory riders have raced World Cups on Oranges The biggest decision to make when building up your dream bike is which frame you will decide to hang all your parts on. I had a few on my short list so there was some thinking to be done. The U. S. made Iron Horse Sunday frame is one that Ive always had my eyes on (not that Id ever rail a corner like Sam even if I was on his bike). The Glory from Giant was also hard to say no to, being one of the best deals out there. The DW Link and Giants Maestro designs look similar but work in different ways and are about as far away as you can get from a well thought out single pivot design as seen on the Orange 224 frame. I have spent the last two seasons on an Orange 223 and came to love the light weight and simple bike, so even though the 224 frame is almost more than the Glory and Sunday put together, I still wanted one. After doing my homework on the frames the decision was made for me. The 224 was the only one that had the geometry that I liked. A bikes angles are absolutely the most important factor in its performance. There are a lot of different takes on suspension out there but the truth is that while some work different, they all do work good. But a DH bike with a 67 degree head angle will be ntirely different beast than a 64 degree monster. The 224 has that slack 64 degrees up front and also the low b. b. height and longer wheelbase that I feel at home on. Another consideration of mine was a full length seat tube on the frame. Some of my best rides are xc rides from home with my iPod and the seat on my DH bike Jacked up to the max. Oh, and it is light. The 224 is claimed to be one of the lightest production DH frames which is key when trying to piece together a light bike, might as well start off on the right foot. Suspension is the second most important part of any rig. Again, there are a lot of hings out there that do work great so it is more important to pick something based on your needs instead of Just looking for the trickiest possible set of sliders. But what if I could have a fork that came in at under 6. 51b, had a super low crown to axle length and worked great to boot? Id say that would be a pretty trick fork! So what I built is most likely one of the more unique forks out there. I started with a set of white 07 Boxxer lowers that use the Maxle system. Dropping the pinch bolts helped save a bit of weight but also means I only need a single allen key to get my wheel off. It doesnt hurt that the athena white lowers look dope next to my white 224 frame. I had originally planned on tracking down some of the old gold ti-nitrite stanction tubes, I did find a few but nothing in usable condition. Thankfully Tyler had some of the slippery silver tubes laying about from a buddies wrecked fork. The rest of the fork was garbage but the silver stanctions were mint so a small amount of money was exchanged and I nearly had a complete fork. Instead of dropping in some boring (but good working) World Cup internals, I installed a MOJO Boxxcart in the right leg and the ingle MOJO spring in the left. MOJO decals MOJO decals Now, you may or may not be aware that MOJO does not even produce these nice little units anymore. So why am I telling you about this stuff if its not made anymore? Because it is by far the best suspension I have even ridden. Ill admit, its not for everyone. It feels like ass in the parking lot (but thanks for telling me, everyone! ) but once you open it up on dirt it will blow you away. Stay tuned for pictures and details of the Boxxcart that will be in the (really long) review of the whole bike this summer. So what I ended up with is a 6. 1b coil sprung and MOJO damped Boxxer. The MOJO rebound knob Out back the boing is handled quite well by a Fox DHX 5. 0. Fox obviously know how to produce top end stuff as they have been in the suspension game for a long, long time. The great thing about the 5. 0 is the range of adjustment. If I am on a trail or course that would normally be faster on a smaller travel (read: stiffer) bike I can turn my 224 into that bike without to much hassle. Likewise, she can be a rock and root eating machine and all I need to do it is a single 4mm allen key and a simple shock pump. Another plus is the range of rebound adjustment. Some of the newer shocks on the market seem to have no noticeable difference in return speed until the final turn of the adjuster. All this adjustment is great if you know what is going on back there but one thing I did want was a slightly more active ride out of my 5. 0 shock. After some top secret trickery on a late night at the shop I think I have get her dialed. 5. 0 w/ Ti spring So you may be starting to see a trend here. I am building a very single purpose bike. A bike that is meant to pin it fast down fast trails. I am not the rider who stops to hit p the skinnys a few times or goes to sesh the local gravel pit drop, all I want to do is go. Sometimes the most important part of going is the stopping or Just slowing down a bit. Only a little bit though. I am a huge Avid fan, having spent time on the original Juicy 7s, 5s and Juicy Carbons. You cant really go wrong with any of those setups but I wanted something a little bit special. Last season some of the top SRAM riders were sporting the new Juicy Ultimate levers mated with Code calipers. Since I am nobodies top rider I had to spend my personal booty. Lucky for us peons the Code and Ultimate parts can be bought seperately. Using the Ultimates upper end saved some grams over the 7s master cylinders plus there are no finicky red dials for friends to play with. You still have the ability to fine tune the bite point but youll need an allen key to do it. Code caliper Code caliper The Code calipers bump up the power a bit by using four pistons and more importantly a much larger pad surface area. After a few bleeds the Ultimate/Code combo works great, much to my relief as SRAM does not advise combining the two systems. Two years ago I saw a picture of Fabian Barels bike sporting a 6 rear rotor o I decided to give it a try. It worked great with my old Juicy Carbons, actually saves nearly a 1/4 pound and should perform Just fine with the even more powerful Code calipers. I expect a lot of power but will my hybrid brakes keep the Juicy modulation that I love so much? X. O shifter and Ultimate lever mounted using Avids sweet Matchmaker bar clamp X. O shifter and Ultimate lever mounted using Avids sweet Matchmaker bar clamp It is no different with the wheels I chose but I did decide to avoid the more expensive rims out there. I put a rim thats on a DH bike in the same category as brake pads or a hain: Disposable. I wanted something light but nothing to expensive as I would most likely be going through a few as the season got bigger and badder. I have had nothing but great results with my set of Alex Supra Ds, under 600 grams, easy to build and very reliable (gotta love the anodized gold option! ). But at $90 msrp canadian they are a little expensive to be turning them into squares. The SingleTrack from Sun seemed to be the perfect choice. Closer to 500 grams then 600, a decent width and cheap! The msrp here in Canada is only $40 so it was hard to say no. Hubs re a hard one. There are a lot of amazing hubs out there, some seem to be more art then a bike component. The truth is that they all use wheel bearings that I can buy from local hardware store or distributor so why drop more on a rear hub then most regular people spend on a whole bike? Well.. l cant! As much as I wanted a Hadley or DT I could not Justify it. I would rather put that money into my suspension or brakes. I did manage to find a sweet set of hubs that come in at nearly half as much as some others, are lighter and are easy to service. WTB may not Jump out at you hen you are thinking about hubs for your big bike but you should really look them up. The Super Duty rear hub is an amazing little bit of work. Unlike most hubs, everything is a push fit which makes it super easy to disassemble and clean. The 12/150mm Super Duty rear hub has been stripped of absolutely any extra material that it does not need. You also slide your cassette onto a aluminum freehub body which is where most of the weight savings come from. WTB SuperDuty hub Check the aluminium freehub body Actually, the rear hub weighs 305 grams and the front comes in at only 190. The folks at WTB are also good people which has a lot to do with me picking their hubs over some others. Poor spokes. No one ever thinks about them and they do so much work. I really did want to build these wheels with Sapims super high end CX-Ray spokes but time was not on Sapims side. All my parts were where they needed to be and I had some very nice black DT Champion spokes to hold everything together so that is what I chose, pertinence be damned! The CX-Rays do make a lot of sense though and I hope to use them on my next wheelset. I have not had a spoke break in years but hey are light and the minimal middle section is bladed which makes building and truing alot easier as I can hold the spoke with a special tool to prevent and wind-up (wind-up is when a spoke turns with the nipple when truing, it makes things difficult). Aluminum nipples get such a bad rap but as long as you treat them right they work great. I weigh in at 1701b. which is not huge but I have run al. nipples exclusively for years now with no problems. I am sure I have had no trouble because I look after my wheels though. With A1. ipples you need to keep the tension from getting to low as he constant loading and unloading of spokes can snap the heads off. I also use a four sided spoke wrench to finish the build, tension and true. Holding onto all four sides minimizes the chance of rounding the corners on the softer metal and also dropping a touch of thin lube into the nipple now and then keeps things from seizing up. A light wheelset can be the k ey to a fun and nimble bike so I thought it was important to choose parts carefully to end up with the right package, something I think has been done. Everyone go buy Srams X. O shifters and derailleurs. And if you cant afford them then ell a liver or something because you owe it to yourself to roll with X. O. I like nice stuff (obviously) but my rides dont depend on it. If I am on a test bike with a lower end group set I will have Just as much fun as on some rare super bike. But this X. O stuff is amazing. Basically, you put it on your bike and then 6 months later you scrape the dirt off it and maybe make a small adjustment. The 1:1 cable pull ratio means that stretch and other variables that can cause shifting to go haywire will have half the effect that it would on Shimanos traditional 2:1 pull. I love how I am able to move the lower shift paddle to a more comfortable position for my tiny girls hands. Its a feature that I thought was more gimmick than function but now I Just would not be comfortable with a stock non adjustable shifter. All around quality parts and despite the fragile look they can take a beating. 0k people, stop buying outboard bearing cranksets. They are not better. In the real world they do not last longer and you can not tell me that you can feel a differance in stiffness on your mountain bike with big knobby tires and suspension. k, you can ell me whatever you want but I wont believe you. I will go through two ISIS b. bs in a year of riding. I gave outboards a shot a while back and if I had stuck with it would have gone through four sets of cups. Lame. Take your chain off your external bearing crankset and give it a spin, not to great eh? Even on a broken in external bearing b. b. you will have a ridiculious amount of seal drag, way too much to be accept able for the meager amount of power we put out. Unfortunetly, the amount of companies putting out nice light ISIS cranks is shrinking so hit up e-bay and scoop up what you can get