欧州自転車レース追っかけ日記

I am now a proud supporter of DCR. I paid the yearly subscription fees (only US $20) and got this message on the screen. I will check my email box later for more info. Since I was in France when I paid it on-line, no doubt that his blog's server knew I was in French territory. It contained a bit of French in the message.

I decided to become his supporter after seeing this very world premier review of Limits pedal power meter. Thank you very much, DCR!

**** Beginning of quote ****

Thanks for supporting, and joining!

Howdy (or, Bonjour as it may be)-

Thank you so much for reading and for helping me launch the reader-supported (and ad free) edition of DC Rainmaker.

Your membership is good for a year, at which point you’ll get notified to renew. Also, if you’ve got any questions or problems on the membership aspect, simply hit up the ‘Contact’ button up in the upper corner and I’ll get back to you shortly. Simple as that!

Thanks again for joining me on this journey and your support!

Cheers,
Ray

PS. Please check the email you entered in your comment (or your PayPal account), you will receive your login details shortly at that email and not your PayPal email address if they are different.

**** End of quote ****

Either official or un-official (but what is an official review, anyway? There is no such thing as official review of a products), Mr. DCR's tentative and inhibited (?) pre-review of Limits pedal power meter has secretly landed. (It has been a while since it landed and I started writing this long ago)

Unfortunately, he had an early engagement so he did not have enough time to finish the test as he wanted it to be done. He promised to resume the test when he returned. June 17 is supposed to be the resuming date but unfortunately for him the weather, here in Central Europe, is so far not favorable for an outdoor ride. I imagine he may be concentrating on the indoor trainer ride test indtead. Fortunately the weather seems to turn for the better as it should beginning this Sunday.


Officially (Limits Technology designated Cycling Weekly as the independent third party tester for the initial review) we are still waiting for the first review of the products.

I don't think that we (Indiegogo crowdfunding backers including me, of course) have not received the products yet except, maybe, for those super early birds benefit backers. I imagine that they (manufacturer) are waiting for the test results to make the last minute firmware tuning before the scaled shipping. I could be wrong but the comments tag (on the Indiegogo Limits page) is yet to see a deluge of receivers' "I've got it" messages.

I myself have not received the thing.

One of the thing I liked about the Limits was its feature that no extra magnet is required to measure the cadence.

One of the things that disturbed me when I read (more like scanned) the review was that there were seemingly incorrect cadence output data from the device. Power is basically calculated from torque and cadence applied to the crank if the cadence output was incorrect, how could the power measured by the device be trustable?

I don't know how it detects the cadence (gyro-meter?) but it puzzles me.

I hope it is arriving soon. I have been looking forward to have it on my bike for some time by now. I don't complain about the delayed delivery but I am not too happy about their not so forthcoming attitude.

Their worst (one of some but in my mind the worst) mistake was to get on non-friendly terms with DCR. Why did they do that? All he (DCR) said was that he had doubts about their too aggressive schedule before the prjected public release. He also said that the product would be complete eventually. For no reason (for I did not find any) they got fiercely provoked and provoked needlessly DCR fans, too.

And look what happened! He was the first to bring the product review to the public eyes. He has been always right about the schedule (initial projected release was December 2015, then delayed till March 2016 and then further) and by now everybody knows that the review that will eventually be published by Cycling Weekly must be taken with a grain of salt considering the close ties between them.


In the comments section of his blog following the tentative review, he reveals that Limits Technology had contacted him. I hope this time, however, they (LT) had been humbly asked DCR for his opinion and consultation.

He (DCR) is the only one (almost) in the world who keeps those impatient campaign backers from exploding with anger and frustration.


In Japanese: 続きをどうぞ [I am a proud supporter of DCR (www.dcrainmaker.com).]の続きを読む

テーマ:自転車用品 - ジャンル:スポーツ

1. 2016/06/25(土) 14:36:08|
2. Bikes and related things
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Sippy did not make it and I don't know why. There are some competitors already selling similar gadgets. The idea is a small portable (outdoor, not necessarily though) expresso maker without electric power.

Wacaco Minipresso
http://www.wacaco.com/
(Origine of China where the products are shipped from)

Handpresso Pump
http://www.handpresso.com/
(It seems that the products are shipped from France)


In principle, they (above two of them) work the same way, I guess.

If you are curious and have time to fool around, please refer to YouTube and search for related videos there. You will, however, find very contradicting videos there. (At least) one says that Wacaco Minipresso makes a better espresso and the other says the otherwise. It may have something to do with tamping the ground coffee bean in the cup before extraction.

If I was going to buy (IF) one of them, I will go for Wacaco Minipresso. Alternatively, I may go for Aeropress by Aerobie (www.aerobie.com). And if I was going to get a Wacaco Minipresso, I would opt for the NS variant. This NS variant utilizes a Nespresso capsule. I guess this mean that tamping or no tamping would have no meaning. If I was going to use those multi-use Nespresso compatible capsules, this tamping or no tamping would make a huge difference on the finished espresso.

This Aeropress is not exactly an espresso maker as it lacks the pressure needed to extract espresso from the ground coffee bean but it is close enough.


Back to the theme. I really don't understand the reason people did not go for Sippy. It seemed to be a nice neat gadget.

In Japanese: 続きをどうぞ [Sippy did not make it and I am not happy]の続きを読む

1. 2016/06/17(金) 15:06:41|
2. Miscellaneous stuff
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DCR has done it again! I am considering of becoming his supporter by paying the subscription fee for his excellent blog that I frequently read and enjoy. US $20 is the fee and it is only a few clicks away through PayPal.

I have not yet received the power meter myself. Since I am one of the original crowdfunding backers (that is I paid up before they reached the 240% of the initial goal within the initial campaign run), I should be receiving it by the end of June or beginning of July depending on the delivery time by the transport media (two or three like British, Dutch and Luxembourg agencies most of the time based on my experience although I don't know their method of logistics as it is not clarified, that is whether they ship directly from the Chinese partner factory or all the merchandise must pass through the Scottish customs ). I don't remember exactly but I am positive that I paid up before the funding reached even 100% so I am assuming that I should be well placed in terms of delivery priority hierarchy if they ship on a "first come first served" principle.

I sporadically check Indiegogo's site to see the comments posted by the impatient backers. They (impatient backers or curious onlookers) are ubiquitous whether here or Cycling Weekly's site where the official review of the product is supposed to appear.

There has been no review yet there but Mr. Rainmaker has managed to beat the latter site despite all the odds. A man who attended the official public inauguration of the products kindly sent his treasured trove to Paris, France (where Mr. R lives).

This quick but world premier review is not easy to find unless you directly follow the URL shown on the Indiegogo's Limits Technology campaign. page (under comments tag).

An excellent job! For this and its inevitable follow-up report deserve a hearty thanks reward from me. I've already read a lot of his minute in-depth reports on his blog but those are not on the items that I own. This time, however, is directly related to the product I am about to own (I hope).


The results are not so encouraging at all. The recorded data are not too bad but it does not seem to be too accurate.


In Japanese: 続きをどうぞ [Limits Power Meter "exclusive" review available!]の続きを読む

テーマ:自転車用品 - ジャンル:スポーツ

1. 2016/06/16(木) 15:10:39|
2. Bikes and related things
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