Google Maps

It's another weekend where the crappy weather will keep me off the bike. I was able to get out last weekend for a nice 40 mile ride which felt good so I was hoping to get out again this weekend but it is not looking good.

I saw this week that Google added bicycle directions to their maps (http://maps.google.com/). My first impression after trying it was that it kinda sucked since it routed me down Rt 130, one of the major highways in the area, on one of the rides I tried to map out. However after playing with the map for a while I think it can be a useful tool for those who want to map out bike rides.

The first thing that is nice is that you can share the routes You can see my simple route by clicking here. This is just a simple route from Cranbury to Etra Park and back. To start creating a route I went to http://maps.google.com/ selected the Get Directions link on the top left then chose Bicycling from the drop down menu below the list of destinations.

To create a route what you need to do is to first decide where you want to go and then pick a few places along you route as way points. You then add the way points as destinations. For example on my route I first added Bennet Pl in Cranbury, then Disbrow Hill Rd, then Bennet Pl again. Longer routes will have more way points and with most routes you create the first and late destination will be the same.

Once you get the destination all set you will have the basic route. What you need to do now is to edit the route since a number of the roads that it takes you on aren't really roads you would want to ride a bike on. To edit the route what you do is to hover your mouse over the blue lines of route and drag the lines from the roads you don't want to ride on to the ones you do. I recommend starting at the starting point and working you way through the route road by road. This editing is a little twitchy because as you drag the blue lines around it sometimes does some strange things and starts putting some loops in for no apparent reason. With some trial and error and some patience you quickly get better at editing the route and it becomes easier.

After you finish editing the route by dragging all the blue lines around your done and have a complete bike route with a map and directions. There are a few nice things here. First you have a pretty accurate set of directions that you can now copy and paste into any document or spreadsheet so you can edit and take it along on the ride. The mile estimates are pretty good but I think the coolest thing is the pictures along the way.

If you look at the directions you will see a little camera icon to the left of the mileage on some of the directions. If click on this icon you will get a picture of the intersection. This picture is not static but is a panorama that you can zoom and pan to see the whole area. Pretty cool and useful.

Google maps is good but it still doesn't provide me everything I need to research and create a good bike route. First although I can print out the maps they aren't of the quality that I need. There is also no way to add comments to the map. In my mind nothing beats the maps from NJBikeMap. The other thing I would like to see shown in the directions is the total accumulated miles as well as the elevation change. This is why I will still use a mapping program like Topo USA for mapping out my rides. I like a lot of information when I plan rides and am more picky than most.

I still think Google maps is a good tool for planning a ride. The satellite maps and photos along the way are very useful. The roads it puts you on may or may not be ridable roads so you will have to double check and edit the route. This should get better as the product matures and people add comments to improve the map

Bicycle Repair Man!

Although a bike is a relatively simple machine that is very reliable, it does occasionally break down and require some repair. That is way it is a good idea to have a relationship with a bike mechanic at your local shop or know how to do the maintainance by yourself. I am mechanically inclined so I do most of the up keep on the bike my self but there are still a few things I don't know how to do. That's why when I saw a course on bicycle repair at Mercer County College I decided to give it a try.

The course was taught at Bernie's Bikes in Hamiliton by Chris who is one of the bike mechanics there. Chris is a great guy and really knows his stuff. Chris spend 2 hours every Wednesday for 3 weeks going over the different items of the bike to repair. He start out by showing how to fix a flat tire and then moved on to harder tasks like how to adjust the front and rear derailleur. By the end of the last class he was showing us some pretty advanded stuff like how to rebuild the bearings in a wheel.

A lot of what Chris showed the class I already kinda knew and understood from already having done a lot of work on my bike but I still picked up a lot of useful information. There is a lot of details and nuances you need to understand to do some of the repairs on a bike and until you do them yourself or see someone else do them you don't truly understand how to do it.

For example I knew that changing the rear cassette was not a hard job and just involved removing a locking ring. I had actually tried to do this on my old bike a few years ago but couldn't figure out how to do it. Now after seeing Chris do it I was able to go home remove the cassette from my rear wheel in a few minutes.

Part of taking the course was buying Park's "The Big Blue Book of Repair" book which is a decent bicycle repair manual. Bicycle Magazine also has a good book on on bicycle repair "Bicycling Magazine's Complete Guide to Bicycle Maintenance and Repair" Repair manuals are great but nothing beats seeing the different repairs actually done.

I picked up a lot watching Chris do repairs and am glad I took the course. This helped me fill in some knowledge I was missing about bicycle repair and has given me the confidence to try some of the more difficult repair tasks. I now consider myself a Bicycle Repair Man. So whenever bicycles are broken, or menaced by international communism, Bicycle Repair Man is ready! (Monty Python reference)