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
I like to think about thinking. The process of how an idea gets from A to B is one of the most magical things I can imagine. I try to get better at it but that has always been difficult. Why? Because I want to predict the future. I have a problem. Often in discussions … Read more
Here we are again. The end of the Spring 2026 semester at San Francisco State University (SFSU). Students will be receiving grades and graduating. Sadly, it’s a fraud. At the end of last semester (Fall 2025), when grading was about to happen, our provost posted a dispatch for our faculty to reflect on. She didn’t … Read more
I did a round of development on the skate truck this week. I’m making a push for the G7 truck production. I’m looking into lots of details. I’d like to get these to the point where I can move to a machined aluminum short run version. I ordered some cheap 70mm 82A wheels from Amazon … 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
A bit over a year ago, I sat down with my friend Ronen Sarig to discuss what made him tick. I had been looking forward to this. We share a bond that spans many levels. Riding bikes, engineering, philosophy, etc. I knew we’d have fun with this…and we did. The problem was me. I felt … 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 been working to develop new tools in my shop that expand my capacity in novel ways. As I look at my goals and future projects, hydraulic power is an area of the shop that hasn’t been exploited well but should be. I believe that most would say the same. If you don’t work in … 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
This post is inspired by Adam Prosise. I had posted an image of the new AR handlebars to social media. Adam loves to give me shit. Generally, it’s all fair. I enjoy a worthy adversary and Adam is one of the best. Still, sometimes I worry that the real motivation is more sinister than ‘just … Read more
I work at a failed school. San Francisco State University. It’s a terrible place if you are looking for a quality education. A good student can find opportunities anywhere but any of our students that go on to succeed in life do that in spite of us, not because of us. These are strong words. … Read more
I’ve discussed my issue determining chain length for use with SRAM Transmission on my bikes in the past. Missing Links TLDR; my bikes have rear centers well below what SRAM allows so I can’t use the calculators online or otherwise. That study was entirely theoretical based on published information that wasn’t entirely understood. Was the … Read more
I figured that I would lead this post with an image of my old 2005 CBR600RR after I busted it up against a car on BoFax. Play rough, pay the cost. The forks needed to be swapped. Few people get to break a set of sport bike forks between triples and live to talk about … Read more
Welcome to a new golden age of the donk bike. Big wheels are just so much bigger! Donk the donk to the donk donk. In the mountain bike world, for years we used 26″ (559mm BSD) tires. At the latter stages of this, 2.35″ (60mm) tires were the norm placing the theoretical tire diameter around … Read more