I’ve been wanting to clean up the brakes on my Gulfstream commuting bike for a long time. I put a bit of time on this bike so I’d like it to present as good as practical. The older SRAM Level levers that I’d been using had grown increasingly ugly as bar sweeps increased. They point … Read more

It was about two weeks ago that the university sent another graduating class out into the world. Unprepared and ill-advised, they are entering the most challenging job market since 2008. It might be be worse than that as we are only in early stages. I work around these young people that are hoping to enter … Read more

My friend Philip handed down to me a Bafang MM G320.1000 mid-drive conversion motor. That’s a very nice thing he did. This made more of my R&D possible for very little cost. That’s my favorite. Look and see. I’m not interested in this type of system as it’s sold. I’m looking for something else but … Read more

I want to do an update on the 2024 PVD Gulfstream RD+. A couple of years of riding and this gem is still shining. Good design lasts and has many uses. After a short time using the bike for road riding and testing for fit in that element, the drop handlebars were swapped for a … Read more

I’m doing some R&D for some ideas that have been circulating in my mind. Electric motors and batteries are creeping into everything. For this case, I’m looking at approximately a 40:1 gear reduction in a motor drive line. There would be a primary (??:??) and final reduction (15:40). That means 15:1 for the primary and … Read more

The arrival of the 32″ wheel has given the bicycle marketing people from around the world a chance to demonstrate (in real time) how little they understand about fundamental bicycle geometry and design. I’m actually embarrassed for the media companies, frame builders and marketing companies that are so heavily publicizing their incompetence. Wow! Drawing a … Read more

An idea came to me while riding around Tamarancho the other day. It’s regarding the steerer profile for the 32″ forks that we should be seeing soon. I’m looking for a shorter tapered section so that I can use head tube options below 85mm. I sent an email regarding this to a fork manufacturer.  To … Read more

It was time to test the state of tariffs and overseas machining. I had some parts that I wanted to improve the Samantha fixture so I’d use them to see how things are going. If this went well, I could resume some bigger projects. The changes improve many functional things about the fixture but also … Read more

This is something that I’d been doing in my head for years. I was always guessing. An educate guess, but still a guess. Now, I have it solved. Designing dirt going bicycles is difficult. There are many crucial details that need to be figured out and understood to produce a design. If a few hundred … Read more

Cable management is important on a well designed bike. There is an art to placing them in precisely the right location. It’s even better if that can be done with a tidy and clean appearance. One solution to this that many arrive at is to get the cables inside the bike as soon as possible … Read more

Yesterday was an interesting day. It started very early for me. An hour and a half drive to an 8am tour of the huge Tesla factory in Fremont, CA. We spent the morning looking at state of the art automation and the first steps toward humanoid robots in the workplace. In the shell of an … Read more

This was a fun little project. Something to discover new things. I was interested in working with a crossed roller bearing in a future design. I ordered one and found a project that would introduce me to working with the element and add some value in the shop. It’s a simple rotisserie but it mounts … Read more

Let’s talk about the front of the bike. This has been the part of the bike getting renewed attention in the past few years. New stem products and 32″ wheels have gained some traction in the mountain bike marketplace. As these encroach on what I’ve been doing for so long and do the most advanced … Read more

Back in mid-2023 I produced a run of FM160/30.5 to PM180/60 adapters. These turned out pretty awesome and are still the coolest thing to this day. This was a bittersweet thing to do. I was impressed with how well they worked out but the fact that I had to was insane. Wildly, to this day, … Read more

I’ve been discussing disc brake fitment for at least a decade. Past blog posts are evidence of this. I’ve also been designing parts for myself and other companies that interface with disc brake systems since designing the Independent Fabrications IS dropout back in 1998(?). I’ve even been wildcatting the specifications since my beginning. Over that … Read more

I’ve long acknowledged  a problem with my method of geometry development. I wasn’t prepared to deal with or thought that I could run the clock. The day has come to get it resolved. Looking back in time, being forced to build my special handlebar systems in 2018, and even before that when I started working … Read more

I was so excited when Wolf Tooth released their clipless pedals a few months ago. There’s a lot of nice things about these pedals and, like many of the Wolf Tooth product, they do a classy job delving real value. Yay! The problem, I had been running flat pedals exclusively for the past five years. … Read more

It’s come to this, winter and the 32″ wheel. We knew it was going to happen. Once the rains start showing up in late October and early November it’s time to mount up our front fenders for NorCal mountain biking. I’ve discussed fenders several times in the past. Very few riders around here use a(n) … Read more

I was driving to work after stopping by Paragon Machine Works in Richmond. This was September 26th. I had gone there on my way to work to grab a few 110x12mm skewers and 2mm headset spacers. The folks at PMW were in the ‘warehouse’ having a meeting about product while I was dealing with Coco … Read more

Updated some parts 04/2026: https://www.peterverdone.com/basic-upgrades-for-samantha/ It’s time for a full update on the Samantha frame fixture. It’s wise to capture the state of the art periodically. Some of this will be a repeat of past posts but this is a single page, with all of the updates included, ready for sharing. The Samantha bicycle frame … Read more

The F4U Corsair! Whistling death has bent wings! I knew that this would be the namesake for this bike when designs began. The infamous Vought F4U Corsair fighter/bomber took a signature stance and design to allow for a super powerful 2,000 HP engine (the largest available engine at the time) and an insane 13-foot, 4-inch … Read more

God. This has been so long in the making. For some reason, it’s always been a PITA to mount MiNewt and Lumina lamps to handlebars. It always feels like a Gerry rig operation. It’s rarely solid. Now that I have a extruder printer and with the Headless Horseless ride coming up at the end of … Read more

Back in early March of 2020, Windy and I had begun to plan a bike tour in Europe. We were excited as, after several years together, we were finally going to do something that had been the focus of a bit of our talk. Windy has a bit of experience with bicycle touring. She’d ridden … Read more