Snow has been on the ground here in Ames since the end of November, which is now about three months ago. We repeatedly get snowstorms and sub zero Fahrenheit weather resulting in very little snow melting. The roads have been a mess; they will still have a layer of ice and snow several days after the most recent snowstorm.
Finally, last weekend, we had a period of about a day where the sun cleared the roads and the ice and snow was gone. Of course, this didn't last long as another snowstorm arrived Monday with a slushy mix of three inches of snow. The latest snow left another layer of ice covering sidewalks, bike trails, and streets.
During the brief moment without ice on the roads, I took the new road bike out on the road. The bike is a Trek 1600 SLR. It has an aluminum frame, carbon fiber fork and seatpost, and Shimano 105 and Ultegra components with a 30 speed setup. I'm very impressed with its performance and ride. Power is transfered to the ground very efficiently. I was cruising between 22 and 27 mph while on flat or slightly uphill road. I'm excited to see the performance when I'm not sick and we have good weather (it was 15 degrees when I was riding).
The controls are awesome. New road bikes have shifters built into the brake levers requiring a simple sideways movement of one or two fingers for an indexed shift. Shifting is instant and precise. I added a Cateye Cadence cycle computer, which provides basic speedometer, odometer, and timing functions, and it also displays my cadence (pedaling rpm).
The bike weighs around 20 lbs, which is not super light for a race bike but within a few pounds of the lowest weight bikes available. The cost of removing a few more pounds of weight is spending about four times as much on a carbon fiber frame and other lighter components. Aluminum is fine with me. I'm not ready for carbon fiber due to cost and durability issues.
I will add more details once I get more miles on the bike.
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
Thursday, February 21, 2008
Kiteboarding
I haven't posted here for a while again. I've been busy with a lot of work for my research project. I know all about coal gasification, ethanol land use, problems with ethanol, new solar projects, and other good stuff. I should have a paper done mid March.
I've also been going to the gym a lot this semester. I have been there about twice a week riding a stationary bike in a cycling class. I can really tell the difference in my performance. Just this week I noticed I can ride at a very high output for long periods of time. I wish they had power meters on the bikes so I could see my watt output, and how I've improved. This week I also started doing some weight lifting after the hour bike rides. I should be in very good shape by the time spring arrives (will it this year?).
Last fall I purchased a big 4 meter traction kite, which is basically a big powerful kite designed for a large amount of pull on the lines. I bought it for fun and exercise, and it meets my goal of entertainment requiring little or no fossil fuel. It looks like a parachute and is designed similarly. I measured its air speed with a video camera and the kite reaches speeds in excess of 100 mph during 18 mph wind gusts! The kite has the power to lift me off the ground in higher winds, and it easily drags me through grass even with slow 12-15 mph wind conditions. One day I was practicing "kitejumping" and I was lifted about 4 feet off the ground and thrown about 40 feet forward! It is a huge adrenaline rush to be thrown through the air!
I finally decided to take advantage of the constant winter precipitation known as snow and bought a snowboard about two weeks ago. I bought it (or pretty much stole it based on the price) used from a guy here at the University. Most people would go to a ski hill to test it out, but I had different plans.
My new winter sport is kiteboarding. It consists of using my kite to drag me on a snowboard. I start by setting up the traction kite in an open area and then do a test flight to evaluate the wind conditions. Then I land the kite and attach the brake lines to a rope attached to a post or fence. I normally use a 12" steel spike stabbed into the ground, but that doesn't work good this time of year. I then strap into the snowboard and attach the kite killers to my wrists (they provide somewhat of a safety by pulling the brake lines on the kite if I lose control). I unhook the rope from the brake lines, tilt the handles back, and the kite launches into the sky.
This is where it gets interesting. The kite requires a lot of practice to fly. There are four lines and two handles. Each handle has two lines attached. The main lines provide the pull, and the other two are the brake lines. You can do simple maneuvers by changing the relative line length between the left and right side of the kite, but you really need to know how to apply the brakes to partially depower the kite in high winds and to provide power assisted cornering using just one brake line to make the kite turn very sharp. Besides all the control, which requires constant arm movement for steering along with wrist movement to control brakes, you have to be aware of the power window. The kite has to fly downwind of you, and it provides the most power about 10 meters off the ground directly downwind. There are parabolic shapes of wind power, depending on how far to the side you are away from directly downwind and the height above the ground. In simple terms, it will rip your arms out when downwind, and it flies like a little plastic kite with hardly any pull when directly overhead or far to the side.
I've used the kite quite a bit, so I have most of the understanding of the wind and control figured out. Now add a snowboard. I have done some downhill skiing, so I am familiar with sliding on snow. Snowboards are different, and my past experiences have all involved a small kid-sized plastic board I used last year. The kid design was rated for about 50 lbs, and I have only gone down tiny sledding hills with it. Basically, I have no snowboarding experience. I figured being dragged by a kite will be a perfect time to learn.
It's not.
The wind has thrown most of the snow off of the field I fly at. I am left with an inch or two of powder with ice underneath. Snowboards don't grip wind swept ice at all, and I need the snowboard to grip so I can change direction and get going fast. I don't want to travel with the wind, or else I will end up a few hundred feet away from where I started and I won't be able to get back. Speed is also limited going downwind due to a decrease in relative wind speed as I go faster. The best way travel is across the wind, that way you can accelerate to speeds several times the wind speed.
Trying to control a snowboard without falling over while turning and maneuvering with no prior snowboarding experience is a big challenge. Now add in the fact that I am attached to a kite, with both of my hands busy. I am trying to pay attention to where I am going on the snowboard while controlling the kite to be at the right spot in the wind window to give me the amount of power I want pulling me in the correct direction. Throw a gust of wind at me and I accelerate really fast, and suddenly pay attention to the snowboard and lose track of the kite, and then the kite swings back to the center of the power window and tries to drag in a direction I don't want to go and knocks me over in the process. I can't use my hands for balance, and I have to use the snowboard to resist my movements. When the wind is strong or a gust hits the kite, it tries to pull me over forward and knock me down, so I have to lean back. While I'm leaning back, the wind will die and I will fall over backwards.
As you have probably figured out by now, there are a ton of things to pay attention to at a single time. I need more practice, but it is definitely fun. I have gone out three times now. The first time I only went a few hundred feet due to poor wind conditions (either barely blowing or gusts approaching 25 mph lifting me off the ground). The other time the wind was marginal but the snow was good, and I was able to travel at least 1000 meters across the snow. The last time the wind was somewhat gusty, and all the snow had blown off the field. I traveled probably 500 meters before the kite knocked me over knee first onto a patch of ice and I quit for the day.
What may be surprising to those of you reading this from the warmth of indoors is that kiteboarding in 30 below wind chill is not cold at all. I use about every muscle in my body when kiteboarding and I end up overheating and unzipping my coat after a short amount of time. Controlling the kite and snowboard works some weird muscles and I feel it the next day.
Maybe this weekend we will have a good combination of wind and snow and I will try again.
I've also been going to the gym a lot this semester. I have been there about twice a week riding a stationary bike in a cycling class. I can really tell the difference in my performance. Just this week I noticed I can ride at a very high output for long periods of time. I wish they had power meters on the bikes so I could see my watt output, and how I've improved. This week I also started doing some weight lifting after the hour bike rides. I should be in very good shape by the time spring arrives (will it this year?).
Last fall I purchased a big 4 meter traction kite, which is basically a big powerful kite designed for a large amount of pull on the lines. I bought it for fun and exercise, and it meets my goal of entertainment requiring little or no fossil fuel. It looks like a parachute and is designed similarly. I measured its air speed with a video camera and the kite reaches speeds in excess of 100 mph during 18 mph wind gusts! The kite has the power to lift me off the ground in higher winds, and it easily drags me through grass even with slow 12-15 mph wind conditions. One day I was practicing "kitejumping" and I was lifted about 4 feet off the ground and thrown about 40 feet forward! It is a huge adrenaline rush to be thrown through the air!
I finally decided to take advantage of the constant winter precipitation known as snow and bought a snowboard about two weeks ago. I bought it (or pretty much stole it based on the price) used from a guy here at the University. Most people would go to a ski hill to test it out, but I had different plans.
My new winter sport is kiteboarding. It consists of using my kite to drag me on a snowboard. I start by setting up the traction kite in an open area and then do a test flight to evaluate the wind conditions. Then I land the kite and attach the brake lines to a rope attached to a post or fence. I normally use a 12" steel spike stabbed into the ground, but that doesn't work good this time of year. I then strap into the snowboard and attach the kite killers to my wrists (they provide somewhat of a safety by pulling the brake lines on the kite if I lose control). I unhook the rope from the brake lines, tilt the handles back, and the kite launches into the sky.
This is where it gets interesting. The kite requires a lot of practice to fly. There are four lines and two handles. Each handle has two lines attached. The main lines provide the pull, and the other two are the brake lines. You can do simple maneuvers by changing the relative line length between the left and right side of the kite, but you really need to know how to apply the brakes to partially depower the kite in high winds and to provide power assisted cornering using just one brake line to make the kite turn very sharp. Besides all the control, which requires constant arm movement for steering along with wrist movement to control brakes, you have to be aware of the power window. The kite has to fly downwind of you, and it provides the most power about 10 meters off the ground directly downwind. There are parabolic shapes of wind power, depending on how far to the side you are away from directly downwind and the height above the ground. In simple terms, it will rip your arms out when downwind, and it flies like a little plastic kite with hardly any pull when directly overhead or far to the side.
I've used the kite quite a bit, so I have most of the understanding of the wind and control figured out. Now add a snowboard. I have done some downhill skiing, so I am familiar with sliding on snow. Snowboards are different, and my past experiences have all involved a small kid-sized plastic board I used last year. The kid design was rated for about 50 lbs, and I have only gone down tiny sledding hills with it. Basically, I have no snowboarding experience. I figured being dragged by a kite will be a perfect time to learn.
It's not.
The wind has thrown most of the snow off of the field I fly at. I am left with an inch or two of powder with ice underneath. Snowboards don't grip wind swept ice at all, and I need the snowboard to grip so I can change direction and get going fast. I don't want to travel with the wind, or else I will end up a few hundred feet away from where I started and I won't be able to get back. Speed is also limited going downwind due to a decrease in relative wind speed as I go faster. The best way travel is across the wind, that way you can accelerate to speeds several times the wind speed.
Trying to control a snowboard without falling over while turning and maneuvering with no prior snowboarding experience is a big challenge. Now add in the fact that I am attached to a kite, with both of my hands busy. I am trying to pay attention to where I am going on the snowboard while controlling the kite to be at the right spot in the wind window to give me the amount of power I want pulling me in the correct direction. Throw a gust of wind at me and I accelerate really fast, and suddenly pay attention to the snowboard and lose track of the kite, and then the kite swings back to the center of the power window and tries to drag in a direction I don't want to go and knocks me over in the process. I can't use my hands for balance, and I have to use the snowboard to resist my movements. When the wind is strong or a gust hits the kite, it tries to pull me over forward and knock me down, so I have to lean back. While I'm leaning back, the wind will die and I will fall over backwards.
As you have probably figured out by now, there are a ton of things to pay attention to at a single time. I need more practice, but it is definitely fun. I have gone out three times now. The first time I only went a few hundred feet due to poor wind conditions (either barely blowing or gusts approaching 25 mph lifting me off the ground). The other time the wind was marginal but the snow was good, and I was able to travel at least 1000 meters across the snow. The last time the wind was somewhat gusty, and all the snow had blown off the field. I traveled probably 500 meters before the kite knocked me over knee first onto a patch of ice and I quit for the day.
What may be surprising to those of you reading this from the warmth of indoors is that kiteboarding in 30 below wind chill is not cold at all. I use about every muscle in my body when kiteboarding and I end up overheating and unzipping my coat after a short amount of time. Controlling the kite and snowboard works some weird muscles and I feel it the next day.
Maybe this weekend we will have a good combination of wind and snow and I will try again.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
