The SB Cruiser : Amberwolf's 2WD Heavy Cargo Trike & Dog Carrier

Another of the upper-rack LED turn/tail light strips has failed.

previous failure here
pic of that old one (present one is same kind, but replacements i have now are different and were much much cheaper on aliexpress)

The left side unit now has no tail LEDs (the red ones) but the yellow turn LEDs still work normally. (these are just "extra" tail and turn signals to help drivers of taller vehicles see them more clearly. the main ones are large "oval" trailer / truck lights on the back face of the cargo area, one each for tail (bottom) turn (middle) and brake (top) on each side; these are each about the same area as a hand held out flat with all fingers together).

The conformal coat over the IC that drives them all has darkened extremely, so the chip is probably overheating; hard to tell with my finger the difference between that and how hot everything else is in the summer weather, but it feels warmer than the surrounding area. (the strip is mounted to the aluminum rack frame tubing, so it does get some heat dissipation from that, but it has to pass thru the circuit board (thin) and the water-resistant silicone cover of the whole strip (thick) first.

If I can I'll just hardwire the red LEDs on via some current limiting circuit (probably resistive), once I have time and energy to probe with a meter on a working strip to see what is present on them.

Otherwise I'll just replace the strip with the working one, and see about attaching a small heatsink to the IC face of the new one and on the existing still-working right-side strip to prevent heat damage.


Theoretically I have a week off at the end of next month (if it doesn't get cancelled by work again) so will probably do this stuff then if I don't have a chance sooner.


During that time I also have to roll the trike over on it's side and check the frame out to see if I can find the squeak that started a few weeks ago, since those kinds of sounds are usually metal that's cracking/cracked or otherwise fatiguing. I'd rather fix it preemptively than have it fail while riding.

It may not be serious, but it sounds like it is coming from the left rear far in teh back--it's hard to say since it only happens while riding and I am on bumpy areas that flex the trike (which is a fair number of spots on my normal commute), not just while manually pushing at the trike when it's at home, in various ways and directions, or rocking it, etc.


Also, the turn signal switch has begun to wear, requiring an extra bit of push to the right for that signal (left works fine). Probably have to replace the whole unit to fix this as the switch is probably integral to the casing. If so, that requires rewiring that side of the handlebars (and a bunch of other work) that will probably take me at least two days to do.

Last night I and the trike were thoroughly soaked in the sudden unpredicted downpour. NWS had said it would not rain yesterday, but would start today, and it was not really even cloudy, nothing on the rain radar, etc., when I left work to go to the grocery store on the way home. But when I came out of the store after checking out, it was pouring, and had been for a little while; the trike was already soaked and water had gotten into various wiring.

It still worked, and hadn't gotten into the batteries, but I could hear the turn signal flasher clicking away even without the switch engaged. Lights weren't flashing unless I engaged the switch for left or right, but the flasher kept going regardless. And the brake lights were on; I'd guess the microswitch down at the caliper was wet enough to allow enough current thru to light them up; the siwtch wasn't stuck, and the relays for hte ebrake weren't on (that would also keep the motors from working). Didn't have any time to troulbeshoot it in the pouring rain, just had to load up the groceries and get home.

Getting home was quite an ordeal, as the morons filled the roads in their cars and on foot (various pedestrians walking in the deep water in the road lanes instead of on the not-quite-covered sidewalks, in several places along my way home, no idea why). People in cars driving way too fast for wet roads and poor visibility, heard lots of crunches and yelling and screaming from drivers angry at each other, lots of honking, engines revving, etc, in the backed-up traffic on the main roads.

At the south end of Metrocenter (the way I normally go home) it was totally blocked up with solid unmoving traffic because of some event going on down there with super-loud loudspeaker system blaring the "benefits of shopping on Amazon" that I could hear half a mile away. So I couldn't go that way, and with the flooding I wouldn't have really wanted to since it easily gets over a foot deep down near and at the exit intersection in this kind of flashflood rain.

So after getting across the street from frys at 35th ave, I went down the empty sidewalks from there till I got to the street just north of the canal, and went by that empty backstreet parallel to the canal until I got to the place to get onto the empty canal paths, then went from there to the point just south of the blockage at the south end of Metrocenter, crossed the street there and down the sidewalk out of MC, then my usual route home from there.

Too exhausted from the workday and the overlong chilling wet journey home to deal with it, plus it was still raining, so just parked it in the shed and got the groceries in....

After the events of last night, I'd meant to check out the trike and fix anthing damaged by the water, but I'd forgotten till this morning that I had planned to go pickup some Freecycled (Trashnothing, now) bikes and a trike from several miles northwest, from someone that has given me stuff before that let me know she had these sitting around from family members that no longer used them. And this morning the SaintBernard rescue finally had time to come by to pickup a bunch of dry and canned food I was giving them that JellyBeanThePerfectlyNormalSchmoo won't eat.

So, I poked around but didn't find anything actually wrong, and dried out the wiring that was wet, but it didn't stop the flasher cliccking whenever power was applied to the lighting system. The brake lights weren't stuck on anymroe, though.

During the ride to pickup the bikes (mostly along the canal path), the speedometer started going nuts, down to zero, up to 30+mph (which would cut the motor off because it's speed limited to 20MPH for legal reasons), all while going somewhere between 10-15mph down the path, whether or not I was pedalling (which drives the motors via the cadence sensor and CAv3). I stopped and verified the magnets and sensor were aligned (3 wheel magnets instead of just one), but even if they weren't it would be only a low reading, not a high one. The problem got worse and worse until finally teh speedo just totally stopped working, stayed at stuck zero. No time to stop and troubleshoot....but the rest of the system kept working ok.


Eventually I got there ok (after several frustrating adventures with new (since the last time I rode there, several years ago) tightly-spaced bollards and changes to the canal paths that forced detours and going back a mile to go on the other side of the canal, in various places). Met a cyclist near my destination that was interested in the trike and trailer (I was pulling the big MkV (that I built out of the MkIV) to haul the piano home with a few years back) that took some pics and I pointed him at this site and thread to read the history of it and how it was built.


Loaded up the trike and bikes and the ride home was uneventful.



The main thing I wanted for myself was this old Schwinn Tri-Wheeler Town and Country (probably the 1971 or 75 or 78 model, based on info from bikehistory.org). Other than the time-rotted tires (possibly original!) and some rust, faded paint, it's in remarkably good shape. Chain isn't even rusted solid (it is rusty, but it still moves like it should). If it hadn't been sprinkling when I got home with it I would have test rode it around the yard; instead I just took some quick pics.


It has a back end very similar to the one I used to build SB Cruiser with...BUT: It drives *both* rear wheels via a diff (peerless type AFAICT), where mine only drives the left one, no diff.





So I can easily put a middrive on it for primary drive, and a front hubmotor for redundancy and extra power if I need it for loads. I'm considering leaving it nearly original, just replacing the saddle with a platform for one of the StadiumChair seats I use (probably the one I made long ago for the original version of the SB Cruiser; I think it's still in the shed), and replacing the rear carrier area with a deck platform for cargo, or more likely a cargo box built around the whole rear end. Then bolting some boxes to the sides under the seat (like I did with the original version of SBC). Possibly (probably) adding a bolt-on extension frame between the rear frame "trike" section and the front regular bike frame section, to give it the same wheelbase as the SBC (since I know that works) and a tiller for the handlebars (since I know that works for me), and to allow a longer / larger cargo area equivalent to the SBC.

Those I can do with minimal work to the trike, unlike the major construction job to basically build another SBC around the new trike's rear axle (which would be about the only part used from the frame in this case, kind of a waste). Then I get a spare trike for not a whole lot of work that I can still use for many of the same things I use SBC for, and be able to use it for daily work commutes while I do other upgrades and fixes to SBC that have waited years to be done because there just wasn't time to do them and be certain of having it ready and available for work (presently SBC is my only transportation, and I dislike a lack of redundancy for critical things).


Best guess is a few months of sparetime weekend work to do the minimal things, not including developing a reliable middrive out of either a hubmotor or one of my old brushed DC powerchair motors with gearbox (like I used on the original CrazyBike2). A front hubmotor (of which I have several laced in 26" wheels already) could be used until the MD was working.

I have lighting, controls, and other parts required that I had bought for the updated CrazyBike2 that was going to be the Cloudwalker Cargo Bike over here: Amberwolf's Cloudwalker Cargo Bike that I basically haven't touched since losing Kirin and then Yogi.

Battery can be one of the spares for SBC (presently mounted to the lawnmower; would then need to make new busbars for the other mower pack to make it 28s1p instead of 14s2p).

Controllers I have, probably use the generic ones I used to run SBC with before I got the Phaserunners for it. I think I have a spare CAv3 around here, and some magnet-ring cadence sensors (can't use a BB type like THUN or TDCM without converting the Ashtabula OPC this trike comes with into a threaded BB shell).





One of the other bikes I got with it will be fixed up to give to a coworker whose bike was damaged when a car ran her over; if I can I'll also cobble together a lightweight hubmotor system out of stuff I'll probalby never use for her to get around easier as her injuries heal, though she'll have to get her own battery as I don't have anything trustworthy and simple I could give her.

amberwolf said:

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Very cool to see the 1960s style three-speed hub in use. These shift only when coasting as I remember. They were THEE thing before the first 10-speeds came out. How much torque can be put through them I wonder?

Diggs said:

Very cool to see the 1960s style three-speed hub in use. These shift only when coasting as I remember. They were THEE thing before the first 10-speeds came out. How much torque can be put through them I wonder?

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I don't know, but I found the reaction arm stamped Shimano 3SC model. It's casing is custom (probably modified by Schwinn?) but the internals are probably the same as the OTS version (333 type, I'd guess), from the bits of info found with google.

I did a "test ride" around the yard (on the disintegrating flat tires) and it was difficult to pedal but could be done. The chains are rusty but not sticky or jammed, and if I pull the cable manually the IGH shifts correctly, and pedals easily enough in the lowest gear. (anybody with normal strength/etc would be able to pedal easily even in the high gear it defaults to, but I can't).

The plastic cable retainer inside the shifter has flaked away part of it, so I filed it down flat to allow a large fender washer to go in there to replace that to allow the shifter to operate. The shifter cable (and the front "brake" cable) have disintegrating housings, and the cables are rusty and sticking, so replacing those would fix those problems. I'm sure it would roll better if greased / oiled appropriately, but it's doing pretty amazing considering that it has probably not been used in decades and been out in the weather all that time, and that it may not have been serviced at all since it's construction back in the 1970s.

I expect I could change the tubes and tires and brake pads, and the two cables, and just ride this thing around. (for me, very very slowly, and not very far, without a motor...but it would work).


The wheels are all 24", but I will almost certainly change at least the front to 26", and swap out the fork to fit, for one with a disc caliper tab and use one of my "spare" Avid BB7 calipers on it. (but almost anything would be better than the existing ancient caliper brake on smooth steel rim).

If I reinforce the crown (not sure what I'd do yet) I could use that old ex-Luna fatbike fork, and then use the fat-tire front bafang motor on it (until a suitable middrive can be constructed).

Some pics from today at end of post.



Regarding the titular trike of this thread: After opening up the SB Cruiser's covers and bits to make sure no water intrusion / damage occured, and leaving them open for the day to dry out just in case, it's back together and appears to all be working again including the speedo. Guess we'll see how it works out in normal use tomorrow and the rest of the workweek.

Nothing's gone wrong with the SBC since being drenched, soaked, and splattered earlier this week, so apparently there's no damage from any of that.

Never figured out what specifically caused the speedo issue, but it's been working perfectly since the post above.

I can't think of anything that could cause it to show spurious high readings (that would require extra pulses) and *also* have no readings (zero), (which would require no pulses, or too infrequent to trigger the readout), both "at the same time" (alternating back and forth, until the spurious readings stopped after a few minutes and it just read zero).

Since it would certainly be caused by water intrusion somewhere, if I knew what would cause that specific problem, I could find and fix where the water intrusion occured to prevent a recurrence.


The brake lights being stuck on was almost certainly water in the microswitch down at the caliper. The only other place it could occur would be at the relay on the left "ebrake" lever, but if that relay was triggered so would the ebrake / throttle switching relays and I'd've been stuck in regen mode. That never happened, so it's pretty certainly not that. Plus there was no water intrusion in any of the wiring inside the black neoprene covering on the tiller wiring bundle, which is where those relays are, but there would certainly have been water at the caliper, a lot of it, and the microswitch is not sealed in any way. I can "seal" it by filling it with vaseline (dielectric grease) but it may affect the ability of the switch to operate at all; it's very cheap and small, I doubt the return-spring in it is very strong.

I thought about moving the switch to the lever, but the reason I didn't put it there originally is that it would be possible to damage it or catch it on something I'm riding past (bushes or tree branches sticking out into the road), or even on my jacket sleeve in the winter when I'm walking the bike thru my workplace to get to / from the breakroom I have to park it in while working. I could make a box to go around it and the lever base to prevent that; would take some time to work a design out in CAD and 3D print one; dunno when I'd get time for that.


Still letting my brain work out the stuff needed to do the conversion of the yellow Schwinn; it's not likely to be quick.

I had to get some metal out of the shed for the Snuggles The Wolf Robotics Project test skeleton today, so I also got out some square 1" tubing that came in a beige color to use for the extension frame bits on the Schwinn when i get that far, and put it with the trike. Also the Luna nonsuspension fatbike fork and the old dual-linear-pull- caliper-brake suspension fork I used to have on SB Cruiser; both are for 26" wheels (the Schwinn is all 24"), to put with the Schwinn for when I get to working out the wheels and drive.

pardon the typos, the bandaid on my finger keeps hitting wrong keys...but what good would a repair be without a blood sacrifice4?


I took the4 last couple days off work along with my usual days off consecutive with them, because SBC has had a squeak for months, loud enough for me to hear even over my tinnitus and other hearing problems.

It's the kind of squeak that usually indicates broken metal rubbing against other broken metal, but stuff has been happening at work that prevented me from getting time off to do it (the time I did get off last time it was too hot for me to do all this) while it is cool enough to work on it for hours in the middle of the daytime when I can clearly see things.


So in the last two days, I've gone over the whole trike, taking stuff off where necessary to see all of the metal, and can't find any fatigue cracking, broken welds, or broken tubing anywhere. :/ That includes in the bedframe steel that concerned people after I did the keel repair with it, and the keel itself at the point it has twice broken before. Not in the fork, or the headtube, downtube, steerer, clamps, etc. Not in the wheels (rims, spokes, axles, etc).

Because of my hearing I can't tell where the squeak is from; it only happens while riding. No matter how I move the trike around when it's here at home in the yard, pushing, pulling, rolling it on it's side, etc., sittting on it and holding the brake and rocking back and forth or side to side, bouncing up and down on the seat, etc., it doesn't make the noise. :/

So....I dunno.


While I had stuff apart here and there, I did some wiring fixes / changes I wanted to do for a while, such as adding a new switch to disconnect the relay coil that turns the main lighting power on whenever the traction power is also on, so that I can leave it charging without the lights being on, or having to unplug the lighting battery. I used to have a switch on the control cluster that did this, but it failed, and I didn't want to reuse the wiring for it (in case it was also a problem) a long time back, so I ran a new wire pair from one side of the output of the DC-DC that is powered from the traction power, and th4 corresponding input wire to the relay coil, up to a new toggle switch (made in sept 1969, salvagd long ago from the front panel of some ancient room-siz4ed computer; I have a box of them saved from that) up next to the headlight switch (which is also one of these same switches).


I also fixed some stuff on the wiring "bus bar" at the bottom of hte "triangle", where there's been a loose connection on the main ground for the rear lights for a while that I didn't find anywhere else aned suspected had to be at the bus, but it's very hard to get to--the rivets holding the back (rightside) panel on have to be drilled out and the panel taken off and the bus unscrewed from the panel to access this, because the wiring had to be very short down there to get it to all fit in the space. I removed the spade4 lug from that wire and a few others and soldered them directly to the bus tabs, and siliconed around these connections and wires to strain releif them so vibration is less likely to break them at the joint (which is why I originally used spades, but the spades bought for the purpose have prooven crrappy as they keep deforming and making bad connections).


While I had the panels off the triangle, I also added on the stub tube for a front derailer to clamp to, and test fitted a derailer (saved from the crappier green bike in the stuff I recently pikced up). I coudln't add the tube without taking the plastic panesl off because welding the tube on would have set fire to the panels (or at least melted them), so it's been a few years since I had decided on wanting to do this. A front shifter isn't required to operate the trike, since it naturally sits on the granny ring where I'd need it for starting up from a stop, but it would be helpful to shift to higher rings to let me still apply a bit of pedal force for what little exercise my legs can handle at speeds faster than a couple mph. :lol:

I haven't got a shifter on there yet, or a cable to it, as the way all the derailers I have (that will fit in the space and line up with the rings) are all top-pull-upward, so I have to add a pulley abovve the derailer on the stub tube so the cable can go back down and then around up the triangle and thence to the handlebars. Then i have to modify the clamp on the shifter so I don't have to take everything off the bars on one side to get the shifter on (since that would require cutting and rewiring switches, lights, and things as I don't have connectors up there). I may be able to make a stub tube that clamps to the bars and put the shifter on the stub, I have to take a look at the one Grin sells (or other places that have them) to see if I have the right idea. It's an old shimano friction shifter lever; which will fit in among the other stuff up there ok. (gripshifter would be easier to use, but won't fit up there and can't be installed without removing stuff first).


I do still have to change the left rear tire; it's worn down way past the tread (the rightside is still good); I've already got the tire from when I got the one on the rightside, and a tube if I need it...it's just such a PITA to do.

If I have time left after that tomorrow, I might look back thru the thread and see if there are things I wanted to do to the trike that are possible in that time.

amberwolf said:

I took the4 last couple days off work along with my usual days off consecutive with them, because SBC has had a squeak for months, loud enough for me to hear even over my tinnitus and other hearing problems.

It's the kind of squeak that usually indicates broken metal rubbing against other broken metal, but stuff has been happening at work that prevented me from getting time off to do it (the time I did get off last time it was too hot for me to do all this) while it is cool enough to work on it for hours in the middle of the daytime when I can clearly see things.


So in the last two days, I've gone over the whole trike, taking stuff off where necessary to see all of the metal, and can't find any fatigue cracking, broken welds, or broken tubing anywhere. :/ That includes in the bedframe steel that concerned people after I did the keel repair with it, and the keel itself at the point it has twice broken before. Not in the fork, or the headtube, downtube, steerer, clamps, etc. Not in the wheels (rims, spokes, axles, etc).

Because of my hearing I can't tell where the squeak is from; it only happens while riding. No matter how I move the trike around when it's here at home in the yard, pushing, pulling, rolling it on it's side, etc., sittting on it and holding the brake and rocking back and forth or side to side, bouncing up and down on the seat, etc., it doesn't make the noise. :/

So....I dunno.

Click to expand...

I've been in a similar situation on my TSDZ2 mid drive trying to find the source of a clicking noise for the last few months. It's not very loud. On windy days, the wind drowns the noise out. It's louder going down hill than uphill. Does not happen on a bike stand. Only when under load, i.e. riding, which makes it hard to pin point the source.

Naturally I suspected the worst, the sprague clutch bearing. I did not want to tear it apart to remove & replace (bought a spare), since I was not 100% sure.

Today, I tried this trick:

I took wired ear-set from my iPhone, used painters tape to fasten the mic in contact with 3 different spots on the bike and made audio recordings of each.

1. top of the motor
2. seat tube by the chainstay
3. rear wheel dropout

Playing back each recording I found the clicking noise inaudible at the motor. Audible at the seat tube but not very loud. Very loud at the rear dropout.

I am relieved the clicking is not from the motor. It's from somewhere in the rear wheel.

You may want to give this trick a try.

Edit: If you have a walkman cassette recorder with external mic input (remember those?), you can listen in real time. FM wireless mic + Fm radio + ear pones allows mounting it on rotating things like drive shaft. https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256806861133880.html?src=google&gatewayAdapt=glo2usa

Got the tire changed, aligned with zipties keeping it in-round while the bead seats into the rim, but it turned out there had been a 1cm long thorn in the old tire the tube came from, all the way up thru the tube, that had somehow managed to keep holding all its air just fine. I didn't know about the hole, so when I moved the old tube to the new tire, it leaked out all the air in a few minutes.

So, I pulled that tube, checked and found it had TWO holes, one very small and new with a scratch near it--I must have dragged that spot over the thorn while taking the tube out, and pushed it onto the thorn just enough to punch the tube. I checked the old worn tire and foudn that thorn, poking my finger pretty good in the process. It was over 1mm wide at the base sticking out of the inside of the tire, and very hard--it was probably a paloverde or mesquite thorn, most likely from the canal path ride to get those bikes and trike. I razor-trimmed the seam next to the holes, applied the blueglue, let dry, and patched it and clamped the patched area.

While that was curing, I thought, hey, let's just pop in the brand new tube I got with the tire...and I couldn't even air it up--the pump couldn't keep up with the leak.

Turns out the brand new tube came with holes preinstalled. It's a whole new failure mode I've never seen before. There is raised-outline lettering for the tube size, 2.25 - 2.5 x 16, and inside the top line of both 5's there is a tiny slit, either a tear or a defect of insufficient material or bubble voids.

So I dremeled the raised lettering outlines away from the area, and a seam line (since razor trimming didn't get enough of the letters), glued, let dry, and patched and clamped it.

I ended up using the already-patched tube that I carry as a spare on the trike, since that one actually held air. :/

So after about three hours I finally got the tire changed, aired up, wheel reinstalled, and the trike back upright (since it has to be rolled on it's side to get wheels on and off, as I have never gotten the frame rebuilt to allow this to be done from the side).

That wore me out, so I didn't get to even looking at this thread for old lists of stuff I would like to do.


good news bits
the tires here
and the covers here
are both doing their jobs just fine after almost a year


Some pics of yesterday's work, and one of the bean being intensely bored:

List of stuff to deal with if I ever get time/energy (at the same time!) after i get somewhere with the Snuggles The Wolf robotics project (which is higher priority than anything other than required repairs to SBC):

ones i could think of or found references to in the last few pages (going back a couple years or so); i know there are a lot more:

cargo rack tail lights
clamping dropouts on left side
get wp8 connector for pr v6 temperature sensor/etc up to ca
and deal with the misalighment of freewheel/chaindrive otuput at the same time
find solution for this
make a better cotter pin replacement
make an overhang cover for the cargo/seatbox lid, better waterproofing, etc
install the second one of these on the left side
widen the front caliper and either get/make thicker rotors, or just use two bolted together
fix all the marker light strips that have failed or been ripped off by stuff on the road/sticking out past the sidewalk/etc
rewire the lighting so that all the stuff that was added over time and the original stuff is all wired up "the same way" and to the same sources/switches, so that i can turn off all the always-on lighting but leave the turn signals and brake lights operational
(no specific post)
update the ca firmware to the later versions that allow torque sensor operation without cadence sensor so it can start from a stop on just torque input without any pedal motion, and figure out all the settings needed for this plus a safety switch to turn off the torque sensor input when i'm not actually sitting there ready to ride
( )
more permanent fix for trhottle cable sticking though it hasn't recurred yet it probably wll
waterproof the caliper-mounted brake light switch
(no specific post)
finish the lebowksis

Nothing has fallen apart or failed yet on my first work commute back, of the things I fixed or added over the weekend.

The two new BikeMaster tubes I ordered the other day arrived, so I put them in the trike's "toolbox" in case there's an issue with the patched one I used.

I did check them first for problems, especially that wierd thing with the lettering; both are fine (the lettering defect on that other tube was visually obvious even when deflated, once I knew it was there).

Came down with an awful headcold and cough that left me voiceless on Sunday night; still sick and voiceless but I think I'm getting better at this point.

No energy for trying to figure out the shifter/cable/pulley thing for the front derailer though I'd like to try it out. By default it's shifted down to the granny gear so the same as without it.

SBC and the mods and fixes are still working, though i'm still sick and even more exhausted than usual (you'd think I'd have to be dead for that, but apparently not).was wrong about getting better; few hours after the above it all got worse than before.

ribs / muscles hurt from so much coughing, most of which is just tiny "keh"s at this point becaue the pain in my throat or my ribs or both stops the inhale before much air gets in to get pushed out. haven't been able to speak all week (have had to use "sticky note" progam on the phone to "talk" to people by typing stuff out so they can read it; some people won't bother and just walk away).

the recycling of moisture wearing the facemask when at work / riding helps keep my throat from being so dry and painful, but i can't sleep with it on so i bury my face in the snuggles-wolfy fur and breathe thru that and it does about the same thing. been keeping hot tea with me to sip as often as i can and it helps too.

these colds always take me at least a couple weeks to get thru, someitmes more. would be less but i can never take off from work to just get better. they usually happen at the time of year when no pto is allowed cuz of the holidaze; at best i can take off the one worst day near the start (already did that this time, have to just live thru the rest)

Once I had what I thought was a cold, after a week I thought I had the flu, and on the third week I was dying. Finally went to the doctor. He diagnosed mycoplasma pneumonia, and prescribed fortunately the right antibiotic. And that cured what was killing me. Though it took like a month to recover from the effects of the pneumonia. I was mid-thirties, which greatly helped.
What I'm trying to say, is with the symptoms you describe you really need to go to the vet, ah doctor.

I re-added the XLR charging port for the Satiator to charge the lighting pack. I'd had that still present but it wasn't working (broken solder joint, apparently, right at the contact at the back), and because I had it riveted into the frame right up where the wiring busbar (that I moved last week) I couldn't access it without removing it. So I had just been charging the lighting pack by disconecting it from the system and plugging teh Satiator into it's andersons with an adapter.

When I did the other work last week, I'd pulled out the XLR so I could fix the problem, and decided not to put it back in the front frame and instead install it in the box where the pack is and connect it to the wiring there, so now I can plug the charger in without disconnecting things. Much more convenient.

gromike said:

Once I had what I thought was a cold, after a week I thought I had the flu, and on the third week I was dying. Finally went to the doctor. He diagnosed mycoplasma pneumonia, and prescribed fortunately the right antibiotic. And that cured what was killing me. Though it took like a month to recover from the effects of the pneumonia. I was mid-thirties, which greatly helped.
What I'm trying to say, is with the symptoms you describe you really need to go to the vet, ah doctor.

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It's not that bad (and is already better than it was, though I still don't have my voice back--that always takes a week or two after I get even a "sore throat"; has always been like that).

I don't have the money for doctors anyway--it usually costs at least a few hundred dollars just to go see them (since I don't have insurance anymore and I don't have a regular doctor either), then more for whatever they prescribe, someitmes enough more than after paying the doctor I can't afford the meds, making it pointless to have even gone). I spent my emergency fund on JellyBeanThePerfectlyNormalSchmoo's several-thousand-dollar medical stuff earlier this year, and it's gonna take a long while to build that back up, since cost of living has gone up so very much in the last couple years (and pay has not).

(before covid happened I had been rapidly gaining on life, beginning to make enough more than what I spent to start buying new things, but once it started and costs for eveything started going up, and then i got sick and was out of work for a couple months till they would let me come back, and then a while later lost kirin and yogi and was out of work for half a year till they would let me come back, i haven't been able to do much more than catch back up).


If something is really life-threatening and I have to go the ER*** then I'd go and then just have to deal with the bills for the tens of thousands of dollars for it afterward and skimping on everything else (especially food/etc) for as long as necessary like I've had to do before. (used to be hundreds, but apparently it's gone up huge amounts in recent years).

"Free clinics" are not useful because I'd have to stay there waiting to be seen, without leaving or lose my place in line, for at least a whole day (and more likely for days, given how many people need them even more desperately than I do) and I couldn't be away from work without prior-approved PTO like that. I also couldn't be away from home that long; even if the Schmoo could self-feed and self-medicate (she has siezure meds 3x a day and can't stop taking them or that will itself cause siezures that probably can't be stopped and would kill her), I wouldn't make it that long without being able to be in my safe place with her and my snuggle-wolfy, and I can't take either of them with me to a place like that.



***assuming the ER will even see anyone; my brother says many ERs and hospitals are still flooded with covid patients and so have no space or people to help anyone else, and some have tent-city type setups in the parking lot to try to help anyway)

The tube I patched and reused when I installed the new tire on the left rear wheel began slow leaking yesterday--it was flat when I came out to go to work, after being fine since install.

My first thought was "crap, now I'll be way late to work" becuase I thought I would have to change it out, but since airing it up would only take seconds I tried that first, and it held air with no hissing sounds (though these are VERY hard for me to hear anymore over my seriously loud tinnitus), and was still apparently full by the time I got on and rode over to my gate. So I headed off to work, made it all the way there with it still apparently full, but by the time I went to lunch it was totally flat.

Reaired it for the ride home, and again was fine all the way home. Was flat again by the time charging was done, but it was already nearly dark by the time I'd gotten home and totally dark by then, so waited till today to change it.

Found the patch itself was the problem--it had separated at two points on the edge, along wiht the path from there to the hole. Guess I didn't scrub / etc the tube surface enough in those areas, and the patch didn't bond despite the clamping I do on patchjobs overnight.

Replaced the tube with one of the new ones ordered the day I changed the tire, and will re-patch this tube for spare use later. Now we wait and see if the new one holds air.


Still haven't gotten back to the front shifter stuff to modify the actual shifter and then install it and a cable (and pulley) to be able to shift the front derailer.

Forgot to post the pics of the failed patch tube:

Amazing coincidence: I had that same situation last week. The patch from last summer started leaking a few weeks ago. Soapy solution showed the same bubbles from the edge of the patch. The clear thin plastic backer sheet was still attached but it was cracked and flakey. Preparing to replace the patch, I rubbed the plastic sheet to remove it and that process resealed the patch! Still holding!

My theory: The plastic sheet backer does not stretch with the tube and patch so it must have been pulling at the edge of the patch away from the tube surface.

It's possible, but I have had this happen even when I remember to remove the plastic backer. I usually have to sand it off, sometimes by hand with a block and sometimes with the dremel, sometimes by successfully peeling it off but that doesn't usually work without peeling up at least part of a patch edge. I've also tried to remove that backing before removing the patch from the foil but that has never worked.

Almost always when I get the old patch off I can see a difference, even if only slight, between the surfaces where the patch stuck properly and where it didn't, or a bit of debris I somehow missed. Before I figured out that I needed to remove them completely in a patched area, I sometimes had problems with seam lines under the very edge of a patch allowing progressive de-adhesion until it leaked. Those are hard to see why they'd fail the way they do, but it's been more than a couple times over the years, leading to a pattern I can avoid.


I've never had a patch properly re-stick after it starts to come off, but I have not used the self-adhesive ones, only the glue-on types. I don't know which kind you used. Presently I'm using patches and teh blue glue from Rema.

It's worked fine for all the patches I correctly processed, so I probably just screwed this one up.

Sometimes they'll appear to stick back down, but then fail again the same way later.


(I actually have tried self-stick patches now and then over the years with regular bikes, but none of them actually stuck properly even long enough to finish airing up the tire, so I stopped trying them out. there probably are some that really work, but I haven't been lucky enouhg to run into them. I expect adhesives have gotten better in the couple of decades since i probably last tried them).




Speaking of tires, etc, the new ones for the future spare trike / experimental test bed arrived. (some of this crossposted to the other trike thread)
I'll be using 26" x 3" rear wheels, because I have to build new wheels for it no matter how I end up using it, and I already have some rims for those on wheels from a junk bike, but they have worn knobby tires, with pretty thin casing between the knobs, so simply cutting off the knobs isn't a usable option. The size chosen is because 20" wheels on SBC are so small that they "feel" every bump, hole, etc; I've broken axles and a rim (and another rim on the old CrazyBike2 with it's 20" rear wheel). Tires/tubes are better for 20" because I can use moped 16" tires and tubes, which are more durable and cheaper than equivalent bicycle tires, and thicker, and often have better grip...but I really want a more comfortable ride without as much worry about breaking wheels and such, and bigger wheels roll over bigger stuff with less problem, so....

(suspension is complicated for a highly-variable-weight/loading cargo trike, and is another failure point, so I have skipped that on all the trike designs so far)

Why 3" vs more common and cheaper 2"? Because there's a lot more air in there, and that gets me that much more bump absorption, and more distance between the rim and the edges of holes / debris that breaks them. I can't always avoid those when traffic gets bad (and I can't just stop until traffic passes or I could be hit by cars that would otherwise just pass me if I'm moving (because some people are stupid)--even a graze at that speed difference could be fatal while it might just hurt a lot if I'm going my max of 20MPH), so being able to take the hit is important.

26x3 tires are in general fairly expensive, so for this experiment I started looking at the cheap stuff since I don't have the budget for anything decent (well, I don't have the budget for the cheap stuff either but I can skip enough household stuff temporarily for the option I found below). After a fair bit of poking around, and waiting to see what holidaze sales came up, I found these for about $60 (instead of the $90 they usually go for), by "YUNSCM" that I've never heard of:
Can't really tell much from the site page and pics, but if they weren't right I could send them back at no cost to me, and no shipping cost to get them, so a better option than anything else. No really awful reviews, and some positive ones there and elsewhere.

They actually seem decent, even "great" for the price, since that's $30 a wheel for a tire *and* a fairly thick tube. (the plastic rim strips and cheap tire levers are probably not worth even trying out; I already have gorillatape that I use for rim tape, and metal levers that work fine).

I still have to build the wheels, which means disassembling the ones off the junk bike to get the rims and spokes off, designing and building the hubs, which means designing the single-ended axles/mounts the trike will need to have easily-mountable wheels for roadside work, based on whatever stuff I already have laying around here (budget=zero for new stuff).

But if the experiment works on the testbed version, then I can ride that one while I build a version for the SB Cruiser and replace it's existing rear-end with that. (not something that would be anytime soon--my guess is more than a year to work out unforeseen issues with the testbed and get enough miles on it to verify various design features, then however long to gather parts for an SBC version...assuming I'm still able to do all this stuff by then).

amberwolf said:

I've never had a patch properly re-stick after it starts to come off, but I have not used the self-adhesive ones, only the glue-on types. I don't know which kind you used. Presently I'm using patches and teh blue glue from Rema.

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Mine is similar to yours pictured, scalloped feathered edge orange border, common small tube of glue that comes in the kit.

I also have never been able to successfully patch using the glueless patches.