A little day tour in late November

Winter is late in Oslo.  Its December and I haven't gotten out the studded tires for the Niholas.  But perhaps that is not so impressive; a Nihola has three wheels so a bit of ice is not likely to cause anything surprising to happen.  The other weekend, we even took a little day tour (maybe 25km on significant hills) in lovely sun with a bit of snow and ice on the ground.

Out on a little tour in November with a bike, a Nihola, and two kids

There are a few things to note in order to minimize problems with this.  First, there should be a good load on the rear tire, in this case, several liters of water and hot tea, kilos of tools and random junk, and sometimes a running bike.  It also pays to keep the tire pressure a little on the low side.

Oh, and the kids can get really cold sitting there so bring all sorts of warmth accessories.  We brought an old blanket, a foam mattress for the floor, and left the roof at home.

Anyway, its kind of interesting to spin a tire on a trike.  Its more of a curiosity than it would be in a car, because you're sitting right there looking at the tire and the road, everything is fairly quiet, and you can really feel the interaction of inertia, tire and ice.  Often enough I am going along and start slipping (with the back tire), make it a bit farther, then start sliding backwards and either use the front brake to stop the backwards slide, or just slide into an area of traction.  The idea is then to plot a new course for the back tire, avoiding the ice.  It isn't necessarily helpful to get off and push, because probably you can't do any better on foot than on the pedals.  However it can sometimes be useful to move the rear sideways, onto a better surface.  While this is all going on, you can have a calm chat with the kids.  Lets all sing the praises of three wheels.

But that is kind of off topic.  On this little tour we took, I found only a small area that was icy.  There was also one good climb where I was happy to use the 15 gear-inches ratio, and which also was on snow, ice and gravel.  I could feel the tire slip here and there, but things went well enough.  So the studded tires are sitting in the basement, for now.

Adjusting the front brakes

We got our yellow/orange Nihola around the 1st of May 2012.  I don't know how far we've driven it, but it didn't start getting intensive use until the middle of September 2013, when it was fitted with an Olso-appropriate gearing system.  Since then, the front brakes have seen serious use most days of the week.  I think few Niholas ascend or descend a hill so steep, in their entire service lives, as the hill that ours does each working day.  As the weeks passed, it became clear the brakes were getting a lot weaker.  Almost certainly, the cause was the cables stretching (but the drum brakes can also wear).  So, the question is, how does a person tighten the front brakes on a Nihola?

The brake lever has no adjustment.  Down by the wheels, each brake has what appears to be a standard Sturmey-Archer drum brake cable adjustment mechanism, but its hard to access and nearly impossible to adjust.  Its also partly covered by a rubber part presumably designed to keep water out, which is itself hard to get out of the way.

The cable adjustment mechanism of the left wheel, wedged against a significant piece of metal

On a normal bike, those would be the only two options.  On a Nihola, however, an adjustment can also be made right above where the single cable from the brake lever is split into left and right cables for the brakes.  Two 10mm wrenches take care of the problem (although its not as nice looking once the little rubber cap is too high to cover the threads).

Center brake cable adjustment on a Nihola, with rubber cap moved well out of the way

More about Reelights on Niholas

I thought I should add a bit to the topic of Reelights on a Nihola.  I had noticed that the rear blinker (SL620) wasn't flashing at walking speeds (which is also pedaling speed on a particular hill I drive up most mornings) so I added a third magnet, and that solved the problem.  It seems to flash at just about any speed, it seems to quickly charge up its capacitor (for flashing when stopped), and I can't think of any downside except that I had to find a third magnet.

Reelight magnet and generator on a Nihola.

Magnet placement is actually a little bit important.  My wheels are 36 spoke, so two magnets can not be spaced evenly (unless mounted off-centered on the spokes).  Three magnets can be mounted at even intervals (while all being mounted centered), which is what I did on the Nihola.  However unequal spacing can actually be a good thing with a flashing Reelight, because the light often flashes right when the magnet passes the generator, and if the magnets arrive at uneven intervals, the light flashes less evenly.  But it gets better than that, because the light also appears to try to flash according to a timer.  The precise way that power-pulses and the timer interact is hard to determine, but I mounted three magnets on my wife's commuting bike as well, at highly unequal intervals, and it seems to give a nice semi-random flashing pattern at biking speed.  (And it also flashes at walking speed.)

Three magnets at a good speed, I'm guessing 25 km/hr, gives almost continuous illumination on a Reelight SL620.  It still flickers and does random-looking things, but a human eye wouldn't perceive it as getting dark.

Anyway a final bit about mounting the generator on a Nihola.  The steel frame in the rear is fairly thin, and proves somewhat less than ideal grip to the Reelight generator.  Its not a big deal, but a few times I've had to adjust it to keep it from rubbing on the magnets.

Lights

Its getting good and dark in Olso now, with rain and fog and not really snow or ice yet.  I've still been driving a Nihola to work as its the easiest for for me to get my son to and from his daycare.

Lights.  By default the Nihola has little metal tabs on the top of the wheel wells which are suitable for mounting bike lights that conform to what appears to be an obsolete standard.  In other words, there are tabs for which you will have a hard time finding lights.  There is also the possibility of putting lights on the baggage rack (if installed), on the seat post, or the handlebar (although the handlebar would be hidden behind the rain cover, when installed.)

The tab mounts above the wheel wells are located below the top of the cargo box, so lights on those mounts are not visible from the opposite side of the trike.

The Nihola store sells little lights for the wheel-well-tabs in white and red, powered by 2x AAA's, and a person would have two of each, ideally.  I have two types of these lights, one is bright and focused while the other is more of a marker light, presumably with improved battery life as required by a Danish law from 2012.  (Both may have had the Abus brand but I've never seen them for sale online.)  I think its a real shame lights fitting those mounts are hard to find, because I also have 3 or so plastic mounts for that standard which can be placed anywhere on a bike, and I have maybe 9 lights that fit all these, so I can easily move them around between bikes and locations as batteries weaken.  Yay for standardization.

A brighter, more focused red with a dimmer, unfocused white.

Anyway because of the problems getting these lights, on one Nihola I drilled holes in the front mounting tabs which I can use to mount any sort of fork crown compatible light.  I put some inexpensive 0.5W lights powered by AA batteries on.  They stand up kind of goofy-looking but I think that improves their visibility.  On the baggage rack of the same Nihola I also installed a Reelight SL620 (flash with backup), which is worth spending some more time on.

A fork-crown light mounted on a Nihola.

Reelight is probably the best supplier of battery-free lights for a Nihola.  Their top model (RL720) has a 2 meter cord for the front light according to Reelight (via an email), so the generator should be mountable on the rear wheel, while powering a light mounted on the tab above a front wheel.  This is probably the only dynamo headlight option for a Nihola.  I'm pretty happy with my battery front lights so far, so haven't tried this out yet.  I also am not sure I want to drive a semi-powerful headlight all summer, and there is always the concern when using a hulking cargo bike/trike in the winter that it might not be possible to go fast enough to properly illuminate a dynamo light.  But anyway, they also make stand-alone rear lights for a baggage rack or seat post which are quite effective without adding any perceptible drag.  As I mentioned before, I have one on the baggage rack of a Nihola.  This is usually my only rear light, but when its dark and rainy I like to turn on a supplementary battery-powered rear light or two, which sit on the mounting tabs.

So thats the story of lighting for Nihola.

On our two (soon to be three) regular "Danish-style" commuter bikes, we have a Dynanmo hub and various Reelight models.  No battery lights.  Add full fenders, hub gears and robust tires, and we're ready to go day or night without screwing around.