Hi Harrison,
Two things here: Why did you continue to use the little plastic thimble if the needle went through it and stabbed your finger? That would have happened once with me and I would have gone to a sewing store and purchased a metal thimble. Had they not had the thimble, I would have snagged the one out of my old "Monopoly" game--I think the thimble was one of the pieces; (I always chose the little iron as my piece--it reminded me of my Mother ironing my little swimming trunks.)
I had an idea for an improved tire wiper myself: There could be a satellite up in space with a camera that is tracking the very streets you are riding. Here's how it works: You're out on your Masi GC with your freshly glued (and dried of course) Clement's going for a ride. There is a little computer screen mounted to the bars that is part of the satellite system. When you turn your unit on, the satellite automatically begins to detect minuscule debris on the road in front of you. The screen would warn you as to what is "X" amount of distance in front of you on the ground. That way your tires would avoid all of the pricks (from various objects in the road--be it nails, thorns, glass, etc.)
Ted E. Baer
Palo Alto, CA
> As Mr. Paranoia on the prospect of thorns and other
> road debris burrowing into sewups, I have only vivid
> memories of great discomfort to impart on the
> benefits of tire savers. My paranoia grows out of
> my experience with the Velox sewup tire kit widely
> distributed in the late '60's early '70's--it
> featured a plastic thimble. I hope I'm not the only
> unfortunate patcher of sewups to discover the hazard
> of working the needle with that placebo thimble:
> the needle can and will puncture the thimble and the
> entrapped digit. I went to a sewing awl after that
> event; it has all the psychological therapeutic
> value of learning to reflexively jerk your hand away
> from a fire. Hence, the paranoia relative to all
> the unseen evildoers seeking to puncture my sewups.
> As an embarrassingly bad racer, I regard myself as
> Everyman and that goes for gloving as well. As
> someone who recently discovered a cache of tire
> fragments, I realized I had created a mini
> production line for patching sewups and
> tubes. I'm Green now and evidently recycled with a
> latex/butyl passion 35 years ago, but it also
> accurately described my fear and loathing of
> punctures and further possibilities of becoming
> impaled on my sewup needle. So with the passion of
> one borne by the irrational I stuck all sorts of
> tiresaver/thingamajigs on fenders, brake bolts, seat
> clamps and the like. The most ubiquitous was the
> Velox thingie -- punched metal badge, plastic arms
> acting as soft springs encasing a round cable
> cluster that rode on the tire -- that was gentle to
> say the least and was designed to discourage
> burrowing thingies before they got a grip: an
> argument midway between the first stab effectiveness
> of a puncture bound object and the more insidious
> burrowing mini-thingie that worked its way into your
> bad graces. They were popular and effective on
> items that would be the best candidate for gloving
> removal and they were immediately effective...and
> gentle as the cable was round and the plastic and
> only
> a couple pounds force. I have a few of another
> popular tire saver that probably gave rise to all
> the most denigrating jibes at the entire family of
> such devices: an aluminum device with an eye on one
> end to attact to brake bolts, a 2-inch sixteenth
> inch arm that extended from the mounting eye to an
> arching half-moon approximation of the horizon that
> purports to be an outline of the tread. This
> half-moon, perpendicular to the supporting arm,
> conformed to no tread I ever owned, so it
> aggressively scrubbed the tire until some goo such
> as a dessicated fig punched it. Then, being a rigid
> construction, the tire wiping half moon was jarred
> beyond reach of the tire. The good news is that
> because of the aggressive unelastic pressure against
> the tire, wear eventually shaped the "saver" to
> conform to the tire, and yes, the tire managed to
> outlast the saver. Hence, use one at your peril,
> use the other with the understanding that a little
> gloving now and then is a good thing.
>
> Harrison Lee
> Stockton, "you gotta be lost" Calif.
>
>
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