David Harris' Vanguard
David was nice enough to send us an email in 2006 and I am finally getting it on the site. My apologies to David for the delay!
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It's been about 15 years that I've had my RR (Vanguard), and I lost touch when Dick Ryan moved away. (I did get to try a Duplex once, but couldn't figure out how we would transport it for long rides! I wish we had some pictures of that day...)
Bike to Work day led me to web-search for some more 'local' bike stores, and that led me to look for info on Dick Ryan, which turned up the Ryan Owners Club. So, here I am! :-)
In January 2006, I *finally* got a job within 10 miles of home! In the past, I had some short-term work locations (8- and 16-miles, each way, respectively), but I also needed to carry a laptop and other tools in the panniers, and the 16-mile ride was over a busy freeway-over-freeway interchange to get there. Now, my ride is 3 miles each way, with one street-over-freeway crossing, and good bike lanes most of the way.
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Three photos (attached) show me before participating in a "Unique Bicycles" 'float' in the annual Newark Days Parade. The other shows me in front of my new job, posing for Bike To Work photos.
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My RR was the "Color of the year". It's stored in the garage, so the color has held up very well. I have non-amplified speakers mounted on the top bar of the seat, usually connected to an FM radio behind the seat on the lower strap near my left hand. More recently, I connect an iPod. On the top strp on the right side, behind the seat, I have a leather holster for a Ham Radio (VHF/UHF transciever*), with an L-bracket on the seat post supporting an antenna. This is connected to either a speaker/mic, or to a headset under my helmet (with the transmit control under the front-right edge of the seat, easily actuated with my hand on the right handlebar.
I'm still trying to solve the problem of mounting a headlight, so I'll be looking to see how other RR owners have adapted to this.
Best regards,
David K. Z. Harris, N6UOW
(* = for the technically curious, I use an ICOM handheld radio. Handheld radio transmitters are typically MUCH less picky about the antenna and ground plane than a mobile radio, and consume less power, so I don't need to also carry a heavy battery around. Using AA cells, I get 5-watts of power for a good riding day. (My new pack has NiMH cells, but has one extra, so I *still* get 5-watts!) Also, using a 1/2-wave antenna also minimizes the need for a ground plane, while providing a "lower angle of radiation". That make the signal pattern better for simplex, bike-to-bike communications, versus talking to hilltops.)
More info:
I was first introduced to recumbent bikes by following Steven K. Robert's early adventures (the first 10,000 miles) online on Compuserve. I later saw "version 2" of his bike at a Ham Radio meeting in Palo Alto, CA, after the first 10,000. Later, I worked for Telebit Corp, and found out Telebit was a donor of a pair of cellular-modems...I got to see version 3 of the bike while it was being developed, and Steve was living on-site at Sun Microsystems in Mountain View, CA. I spent 2 years in the Bikelab, doing most of the physical integration (OSI layers 1 and 2) of the audio and data systems on the "Winnebiko". (I even have a few Bikelab pictures...)
During some shakedown rides, I was driving as a 'chase car', taking video and photos as Steve, and Martin Gardener (on a "regular Ryan" (Vanguard?) rode on local streets. After one ride, into the local foothills to a nearby college, to display the bikes at a Ham flea market, Martin asked if I wanted to try riding his bike clear back to the lab(!), "if you'll trust me to drive your car". I handed him the keys, and followed Steve on a 9 mile ride home. It was AWESOME!
A year or two later, my grandmother died, and I received a tidy little gift of money from her estate. I could buy a really nice radio, or pay most of the cost of a new Vanguard. I picked the bike. It's now over a dozen years old, and still going strong.
I ordered my bike through Steve DesJardins, who I also met at the Bikelab. Steve DJ ran Eliptical Cycles, and sold a few different bikes. I got to try a T-38, and a few others, as well as Steve DJs Ryan before I made my choice. (Later, my wife and I got to try a Fleetwood with Steve DJ as well. What a ride, but it took the full width of a small street tomake a U-turn! We decided that we'd wait for the right color of the year, and then get my wife her own Ryan...but Dick moved back east, and I lost track...and my wife still rides a purple upright! :-(
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