What happened to those single speed bikes with the reversing hub brake on the rear wheel?
Saw one last week and realised I hadn’t seen one for ages. Used to be all over.
They usually came with “racing” stylee handlebars, and tended to be ridden (dangerously, natch) by Taiwanese males of school age.
Very simple, and a lot more suited to local Tainan (few hills) conditions and attitudes than the junk 15-20 speed mountain bikes that litter the campus here after an oil-less summer. Fitted with a front brake (which I can’t remember having seen) they wouldn’t even have been all that dangerous.
I remember some FOTB foreigners asked me how I could ride a “bike without brakes” and I said it allowed me to feel “at one” with the traffic, but brakes would be a barrier, a separation…a…distraction.
They are around.
You can usually see them by ‘hearing’ them…as they squeak so painfully loud as make you wish for a gun to put it out of its misery.
The locals are not known for their preventative, or needed maintenance skills.
I first became acquainted with my neighbor across the lane due to the daily squalling of the brakes on his bicycle. I became so sick of the noise that I finally just went over to his house when he came screaming in can of oil and lubed his damn rear hub brakes.
He was absolutely amazed at the change it caused. Of course, he then would bring it back over to me every few months so I could do it again…rather than do it his ownself. But small price I think.
TC: I don’t remember them squealing, though its a few years since I had one. The mechanisms inside the greased hub, and looks a bit like the inside of an impact driver, with a ball-bearing in a track-groove. I took one apart once and thought I understood it, but I couldn’t fix it, so “deceptively simple” might apply.
You get band-brakes on back hubs too. Sure you aren’t thinking of them?
See them all the time down in sunny Kaohsiung. The kids all ride a certain model that is purple? They usually customise them too. Some run a brake, some don’t.
I recently tested a modern folding bike that only had a ‘pedal back’ brake and a brilliant two speed hub.
then there’s fixed gear bikes, used mostly on the track but now big on the streets (especially among the ‘cool’). the ‘coolest’ run them without any brakes, but a front brake helps . there’s no freewheel, the chain locks the pedals and the rear wheel together so you slow by resisting the turning of the back wheel. Dangerous in traffic like in Taiwan, but who cares when you’re young, dumb, and full of cum?
Brakeless bikes are still cool in America, Canada, and Europe with jean wearing nerd-rock listening urbanites who wish they were bike messengers in San Fran. You can catch some “alleycats” down by Taipei 101 if you know where to look. Fixed gears generally are going to use fresher steel with an optional set of breaks that don’t make it squeal - TainanCowboy means the classic “beater” you find on every street which has the worst frames and breaks on earth + taiwan weather + never being fixed. Why on earth would you fix that squeak? If you fix it…you need to buy a bell to tell people to get out of your way. Seems like a waste of hard earned money.
Taiwan is actually pretty good at making low cost fixies, generally in a range from companies like Mercier or even Giant. Braking is actually affected by learning forward, slightly lifting the back wheel, locking it up, and then skipping it against the pavement. Youtube has some great videos to same. My guess is that if you can do this correctly, you’re about as good as having one set of crappy breaks.
In the States, they were called “coaster brakes”. What were they call in your boyhood country?
Fearless fixies. In Savannah, there’s a SCAD student or ex-student with a frame welded on top of another frame, with a fixie drive (and no brakes). To mount and dismount he leans against a tree (of which there are plenty in BubbaGumpville) or a streetlight and uses the frame as a ladder.
Heard of them as City of London courier bikes. Far too hardcore/cool for me. The minimalism appeals, but even if I was tempted, my knees are far too knackered.
I’ve ridden fixed for years. Even ridden fixed in central London. It isn’t bad on your knees as long as; you use the appropriate gear size and have a front brake for emergencies. You don’t really ride a bike from your knees, so to speak. Any problems from your knees is usually incorrect position on the bike or some other contributing factor (like using a really big gear).
The simplicity of a single geared bicycle is it’s magic, less is more and not many parts to wear out = cheap transportation. Pretty sure I will get back on one, as I think they’re ideal in Taiwan. As for the fashion thing, it’s just about ownership, like an iPhone or YSL handbag…
[quote=“Steviebike”]See them all the time down in sunny Kaohsiung. The kids all ride a certain model that is purple? They usually customise them too. Some run a brake, some don’t.
I recently tested a modern folding bike that only had a ‘pedal back’ brake and a brilliant two speed hub.[/quote]
I currently have a few abandoned single-speed folders for repair, and am using one of them. I selected them partly because by the time its identifiably and unambiguously abandoned, a derailleur-equipped bike is often completely knackered, though I’ve revived a few in the past.
(I have some conscience, but even with one, it is not necessary to pay for a bicycle in Taiwan. I suppose a knackered 15-speed could be converted to single speed, if I knew where I could get a splittable chain, another useful old technology that seems to have disappeared.)
One of the folders has a Sturmey-Archer geared hub, ANOTHER useful old technology that seems to have disappeared. Once upon a time, (unless you were into racing), If you needed gears, that was the way to go.
Havn’t done anything with it yet though, because, even by the standards of cheapo folders, the bike is incredibly heavy.
Been using another “coaster” braked bike which just stopped working, developing noise, resistance and excessive free pedal movement before any braking action.
There is actually some Internyet info on these, notably
which breaks it down by model, but none of the diagrams look quite like what I remember of the last Taiwan one I took apart.
Anyone know which pattern is used in Taiwan?
My impression is that these are mostly produced by bike shops retrofitting the hubs to scrap frames, so if that is correct its likely they all buy in the same type of hub.
Having taken it apart, looks like a Bendix knock-off, which the previous one didn’t. Thats good because these are documented a bit, so I don’t have to deduce how it works.
Quite nicely made for what I assume is a very cheap component, and nothing obviously worn or broken, which means it was probably just mal-adjusted. This is not necessarily such great news, since
(a) I don’t know how its adjusted
(b) I probably didn’t have to take it apart.
Clean and re-grease, put it back together, and hope it is “somehow” fixed.
Seems (from a very short test drive) to be “somehow” fixed!
Brake fluid didn’t work very well as a degreaser, but I did come up with a ( probably well known, but not to me) trick for the snap-ring-ting replacement after a long thumb wracking struggle.
Eventually I tried forcing the end of the snap-ring-ting apart with the chisel end of a small crowbar as a wedge. Worked a treat. A cold chisel or screwdriver blade could probably also supply suitable wedges.
