Since I wrapped up another Tool School session today, I figured on bringing home my repair stands (both of them) and my tools that I took to share so that we would have enough tools for some of the lab sessions. I pulled my Safety First trailer (since it will connect to my Vanguard) to the store in the morning rather than drive my truck.
During the day, Jenn called me, laughing, to report that her front brake on the new bike worked a bit too well. Her new bike has its first bit of road rash--a scrape on the corner of the basket. Sad, but it's over with--it's no longer pristine, so she might as well enjoy using it now!
As I readied for work this morning, I started thinking about whether I could haul my Raleigh home using the trailer. I had an idea that might work, but I was going to have to test it before riding home. It wasn't quite crazy enough to appear on www.thatwillbuffout.com, but it was a bit inventive.
I started by mounting one of my repair stands in the trailer, with its legs spread as far as they would go. I secured them to the back end of the trailer, both to keep the stand down in back and keep the legs spread to support them on the trailer frame. I then tied the stand to the cross bar on the trailer, and put the bike frame in the work stand clamp. I used some of my new inner tube bungee cords (with the IT-clips mentioned in a prior post) to tie the bike's wheels to the front corners of the trailer frame. I turned on every flasher I had, and hit the road.
Since it was dark by the time I left the store, I didn't really get to look at the expressions on folks' faces as they passed me. At one point on my ride home, I was followed by a tow truck for a quarter-mile or more--I can only imagine what the driver was thinking ("Huh! A tow bike!").
Aside from a couple of tense moments, it went just fine. One of the tense moments was when I was looking for a place to get off the road, as a police car was going to overtake me very soon. The motorist going the other way at the time had stopped too close to where I was, and I needed to get up the road a bit before I could reach a driveway. The cop passed me with his engine in full song. Since his was the third cruiser to pass me in a couple minutes, I figure that there was something pretty exiting happening. Not really needing any extra excitement, I opted to go my own way rather than see what they were doing--I of course could not have kept up with them had I wanted to follow them.
The other tense moments had more to do with traffic than the load--there is something about a bike being carried by some nut riding another bike that gets overtaking motorists to give said nut a bit more room in general, but some motorists still don't "get it." One passed me with plenty of room, but took a LONG time to get back in the correct lane, earning him a honk from an oncoming motorist.
Anyway, that it worked as well as it did gives me an idea that might work for getting the new bike home Tuesday evening. I can pull the trailer to the store with the Raleigh, then pull it home carrying the Raleigh with the new bike.
Might as well break in the new bike right, eh?
1 comment:
Interesting way to carry a bike.
I've considered hauling my folding bike on my bike to bring a bike somewhere. I would then drop off the bike I was riding, unfold the other, and ride home.
I haven't done it yet though.
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