General Topics

Is it just us, or is the world of advertising cycling products and bikes a bit, well, odd ? If you've been watching the Tour on Eurosport you can't have missed the erm, boring collection of adverts designed to inspire ! More...

We've caught up with this a bit late on but thought its worth posting because we're sure some of you cyclists out there will like this. The team here at wheelhub have been known to like a pint and some music and we've also cycled to pubs which were open last year and closed down this year, which is a shame.

So it was great to find a fellow cyclist, who is also a well known musician (Beautiful South and Housemartins), supporting the good old British Pub by cycling around them and doing gigs. More...

We couldn't believe that rotating spokes could ever be a good thing, but it turns out that in this new technology it is actually a benefit.

Two Dutch Aeronautics engineers who are also keen cyclists have been working on the project, which involves the attachment of a U-shaped rotatable strip to the front of spokes, so that the sides of the U extend around the spoke, while the curved part of the U acts as an aerofoil. The aerofoil is mounted on pivots and rotates automatically depending on air pressure and direction. They say that there are two main benefits to this new technology... More...

If you're old enough, you might remember attaching your Dad's Players cigarette cards to your bike with a clothes peg off the forks, so that the spokes hit it as they went past, making a cool motor sort of noise.

It turns out that a Manchester borough council is planning to trial the use of an updated version of these to help cycle safety. More...

£22,000 for a road bike is what you'd need if you got Formula 1 engineers to custom design one for you. There's only 100 available so you'd better start saving now... More...

So there you are, a nice peace loving Dr Jekyll of the community, picking up kids from school, chatting to all the folks about the weather...

and the next day you get on your bike for a quick whizz around the countryside.

On one straight bit of road you're really enjoying life, despite the puddles. In the distance there's a 4x4 coming which you don't take much notice of until it seems to accelerate towards you, showering you with muddy water as it goes past through a puddle that the driver must have seen; it was big enough.

Suddenly, Mr Hyde makes an appearance. All cars stink. They're noisy, inconsiderate and the owners should be strung up... More...

Its easy to get yourself lit up like one of those cross-channel truckers using all sorts of flashing lights. Plus it doesn't cost you that much either, so increased safety in the dark evenings of winter is within most people's grasp.

At least, in terms of being seen by others. However, if you are riding on your own down a darkish lane, it can be a different matter... More...

Just recently in our area there have been a spate of pedestrian reservations installed by our council to help cross difficult roads and to act as traffic calming measures.

If you haven't come across these, they are a small kerbed area in the middle of busy roads, that's wide enough to take a pushchair.

Some of the reason for these is also that traffic flow can be maintained, whereas another pelican crossing just makes matters worse.

However, they are pretty scary for cyclists, especially if the road was not that wide in the first place. Perhaps a bit of redesign would help.. More...