A chat with Tin

I remember seeing Tin's Soma Buena Vista being built up at Treadly. It's a beautiful frame, and together with Tin and Abe's attentions to detail, it ended up a really gorgeous bespoke bicycle. I don't know if Soma expects a Buena Vista to be ridden the way that Tin rides his (more on that later), but I'm sure they would be mightily impressed!

I think Tin turned up to the first or second of the Guerilla Cinemas, and it was really good to put a face to a bike that I'd seen so many times while it was being built. That someone I didn't already know took a chance on cinema evening and rolled up was pretty special, too.

This is a pretty lengthy post, so I will break it up under headings.

Tin and Biking

KO: When did you start riding bicycles?

Tin: As an adult, I suppose, a few years after I started working at EcoCaddy. I was drawn to that job because it was about knowing the city and doing tours and that sort of stuff, which I knew I could do. And because we were on these e-bikes, I was told that the riding anyone could do, it was more about the tour-guiding. I realised it was a fantastic way of getting around, and I often thought of how great it would be to continue riding after the shift as opposed to riding around town, going back to the garage, and driving home like I did for a couple of years. You hold on to the idea, and got on an Ofo (those yellow bikes) as a novelty and picked it up from there. That would have been about 2017.

KO: So quite a recent thing - that's only 8 years.

Tin: Yeah, we all rode as kids of course.

KO: Of course, but that's different. When it becomes part of your personality, that's when you're a bike rider. And you can do the bulk of living in Adelaide without a car. We just need more Councillors to realise. So, you're in Salisbury Council?

Tin: It took longer for me to be able to ride from home to town, and when I first picked up riding I would keep my bike at uni and use it to get around town, and take the train in from Salisbury. And for me, it wasn't necessarily the physical infrastructure available, it was having Cycle Instead.

KO: Oh, the maps and stuff. Because Cycle Instead started as paper maps, didn't it?

Tin: That's right, it started as paper maps, and then they digitised it. They're still around but they're not printing new ones. I wanted to see if it was feasible, you know - it felt like such a remote possibility - and I realised it only took about 20 minutes longer to ride in compared to the drive-train combination.

KO: That's pretty impressive considering it's basically free.

KO: Back 20+ years ago I was doing some work for the City of Salisbury as a civil engineer, and one of the project leaders out there was really into getting cycling infrastructure in to the City of Salisbury. It was really eye-opening for me to see someone who wanted Salisbury, a place that in my opinion has an unfairly bad reputation, to be more like Europe and pushing a cycling agenda out there.

Community

Tin: You have a lot of mental barriers before you can attempt to do it. You don't even think of the ride as something you can do.

KO: I've wanted to do a "my first commute" kind of thing, where people at work who want to try to ride to work for the first time and you take them under your wing and show them that you don't ride up Portrush Road, or that you don't necessarily trust Google Maps to not lead you to your death. And I think that sort of community work could be really handy.

Tin: That's exactly where my mind goes. I run in to a few people who are where I was a few years ago. They ride around out there, but don't think they can ride to town. And I think it's about 70% bikeway, and the remaining 30% is suburban roads and riding through Walkerville.

KO: I was going to ask which way to go, so you don't ride along the trainline and by Churchill Road.

Tin: No, no. That is getting better because they're building the Gawler Greenway, but it can be a bit lonely riding along that way because you're going past industrial areas. I find going through Mawson Lakes and doing the City Bikeway a lot better.

KO: I've not ridden that one, so would love to do it.

Tin: We should do it!

KO: Definitely!

At this point Tin goes into a pretty detailed description of the route, and I think this image sums it up pretty well.

(one thousand words saved!)

The Bike and Touring

KO: I've always been intrigued by your choice of stems - you have this zero length stem. What lead you to try a zero length stem?

Tin: The first bike I rode was a Fuji Feather, with a flat bar. I rode it with a bag on my back and my back started hurting. It was obvious to me that if you sat upright on the bike, your back would hurt less. So I kept opting for a shorter and taller stem. I had an adjustable stem for a while, and it was sticking straight up and I thought that it would be really nice if I could do away with the adjustable bit. It'd look better if it was just straight.

KO: So it's a Soma - I know that much. What model is it?

Tin: It's a Buena Vista from 2019. It's got rim brakes, and more lugs than the new one. But less tyre clearance.

KO: Do you feel hampered by that?

Tin: It didn't let me do what I wanted to do with speccing tyres, but Treadly put on some Gravel Kings and I've been more than happy with that. If I could have my way I would probably go to a disc-brake version so I could fit the full range of gravel tyres available. I think I've got 42s. I don't get that road-buzz. Which is nice. I took it through sand for an extended period of time, and riding with a friend with a Curve gravel bike, I could tell I was hampered by it. But other than that it hasn't really hampered me at all.

KO: Is this the bike you rode from Melbourne?

Tin: Yeah! Powered by ignorance. Why couldn't I do it?

KO: There's no reason why you can't. You think about the touring that people did in the 40s and the 30s and maybe the 1800s. You don't need top of the line everything. If you're comfortable and you cruise along at the speed you want and get your k's done as they come, it's fine. It reminds me of a guy who rode from Melbourne to Adelaide a few years ago on a cargo-trike of some sort, with a three year old. He had bought this bike in Melbourne and needed to get it home, so decided to make an adventure of it. Bundled the kid into the cargo bike and they rode off together. It's brave, but I don't think it's foolish. Riding that bike from Melbourne to Adelaide has similar vibes to you riding your Soma from Melbourne, in that it's not what everyone would do. But then again, not everyone would do it wearing denim like you did. It's just a different approach to it.

At this point we finished up the coffees and set off on a ride together up to Mercato on North East Road where we had a couple of pieces of lemon tart and a softdrink.