March 2023 - TheThinkTank - lists.bikecollectives.org

E-bikes
by Andy Ballentine 01 Dec '25

01 Dec '25

Hi -- How are bike co-ops dealing with e-bikes? We are all-volunteer at the Bicycle Co-Op of Williamsburg (Virginia). We have several very fine mechanics, but none of us is expert in the motors and batteries of e-bikes, and we don't know whether we should accept them as donations or sell them. I'd be interested in others' experience and policies. Thanks -- Andy Ballentine

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Webhosting/domains
by Bike City 24 Mar '25

24 Mar '25

Well, I recently threw together some hand-written HTML and slapped it onto a free (and ad-less) webhost. This seemed great at first, regardless of the weird URL. But after lots of other publicity and potential traffic, I've seen it get hacked twice (by a radical Islamic group after the whole host, nothing personal), and lately it's either painfully slow to load or completely down. So, I haven't done this for about a decade and I'm out of the loop. I'm really not willing to suffer any ads, but since our budgeted is obcenely limited for such fluff, does anyone have recommendations? Are there any more reliable ad-free free hosts? (Probably not, for obvious reasons.) Otherwise, how do you guys handle web hosting? How much does it cost? What's a good balance between reliable and affordable? How much is domain registration nowadays? We don't have our 501(c)(3) status yet so we won't get a deal until later this year, by the way. Anyway, please help. It's rough to find time to FTP an update and find the site's down. Thanks, andrea Bike City Recyclery of Fayetteville, Arkansas http://bikecity.uuuq.com/ (hahaha)

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Seeking examples of liability waivers
by Joshua H. 11 Jul '23

11 Jul '23

Hello all, We need a better liability waiver for our CBS. We need something that is easy to read/understand. I've tried searching through the archives of the thinktank but it isn't returning any results (getting a ht://Dig error). Anything you can send will be very helpful! Bicycle rider solidarity, Joshua Community Bike Shop at Barber Park

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Reusable Repair Checklist Tag
by director 02 May '23

02 May '23

Hey All, We just spent some time and redid the tag we use to track repairs on a bike. I'm sure your shops are similar to ours in that many mechanics of varying skill levels will work on a single bike before it's distributed back to the world for use. This make it challenging to ensure a standard of quality on any given bike leaving the shop. As we fleshed out the tag we realized that it could function loosely as a curriculum. For most mechanics, especially students we suggest starting at the top and working down the list. I've come to realize that no two mechanics will do things in the exact same way, everyone has their own style. We've been suggesting that folks do the first two items in order and then address the rest of the repairs at their discretion. Of course we couldn't put everything on a half page so we had to make compromises. You'll notice as you get closer to the bottom of the tag the categories are a little more broad and don't get into the finer details. We're working on a final check list that will include finer details like checking bearing play, tire wear, fine tune derailleurs and brakes... The final checklist won't hang on the bike but it'll be around the shop and part of our training. Stay tuned for this. We print these double sided, cut them in half and laminate them. We hang them on the handlebars and fill them out with a Sharpie. When the bike is done and gone we clean the Sharpie off with 90% rubbing alcohol and a rag. This allows us to use one tag over and over and over. We've been using these tags for about 2 weeks now and it's been awesome. Communication between mechanics is much clearer and bikes are getting done faster. It's really helped orient Earn-A-Bike students to what needs to be done next on their bike. Anyway if you think it's a good idea feel free to adapt it to your shops needs. -- Ride On! Rich Points http://communitycycles.org Executive Director (c)303-589-0597 (w)720-565-6019 Community Cycles is Boulder's only bike shop dedicated to bike commuting. Find us on facebook https://www.facebook.com/CommunityCycles

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Service Tickets and Bike Tags
by Amanda Chilson 28 Apr '23

28 Apr '23

Good Afternoon, I am wondering if bike collectives and shops could share what they are using for service tickets or slips when a bike is being purchased, when preparing a bike to sell, when people drop off a bike to be fixed/tuned and/or a bike that was donated? Thank you so much for your help! Amanda Chilson Health and Wellness Coordinator Northern Berkshire Community Coalition 61 Main St. Suite 218 North Adams, MA 01247 413-663-7588 Ext. 16 www.nbccoalition.org

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Bikes for a family shelter
by wade＠bikeconnector.org 22 Apr '23

22 Apr '23

We are looking for ideas related to providing bikes to adult and children residents of a homeless shelter? An emergency family shelter recently opened in our community in a suburb outside of Boston. The shelter has 105 rooms and is designed to provide temporary housing for 3 to 5 days while more permanent housing is located; and for 2 – 4 months when more permanent housing isn’t readily available; and providing temporary housing for pregnant women and infants. The shelter is located in a former motel at the edge of a state highway. It is situated equidistant (2 miles) between two village centers, each with shopping and public transportation (commuter rail). There are sidewalks and busy local streets that connect the shelter to the villages. It's walkable and rideable. Getting to one of the village center requires crossing the state highway (there is a pedestrian crosswalk). Our local collective reached out to the agency managing the shelter inquiring if there was an interest in bikes. Their response was, "There is a lot of logistics and some liability behind this that would take some thought." True. I would like your thoughts and experiences. Wade The Bike Connector https://www.bikeconnector.org/

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Our Community Bikes is hiring a Senior Mechanic & Floor Lead
by Sophia Suderman 28 Mar '23

28 Mar '23

Hello! Our Community Bikes promotes the use of bicycles as a healthy, affordable and environmentally sound form of transportation. Our full service shop is open four days a week. The other three days and evenings are reserved for programs including Do-It-Yourself Stands, Women Trans Queer Night, and Bike club. We offer education in mechanical skills to empower people and to enable their access to community services and opportunities. This includes significant ‘on the job’ training for people who are underrepresented in the industry to build their mechanic skills. We are hiring a Senior Mechanic & Floor Lead as part of the senior leadership team. Here <https://ourcommunitybikes.org/wp-content/uploads/2023/03/Senior-Mechanic-Po…> you can find the job posting with more information :D Sophia -- Sophia Suderman (she/her) Executive Director Our Community Bikes 2429 Main Street Unceded Coast Salish Territories www.ourcommunitybikes.org <http://www.pedalpower.org> | (604) 879-2453

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Working Bikes is Hiring
by Xail Hernandez 23 Mar '23

23 Mar '23

Hola a todes! La organización sin fines de lucros, Working Bikes, localizada en Chicago está contratando a una persona para manejar el departamento de servicio. Estamos buscando a alguien que tenga conocimiento en reparación de bicicletas y que sea bilingüe, español/inglés, ya que la bodega se encuentra en una área habitada por muchos hispanohablantes. Adjunto está la descripción de la posición de trabajo en Ingles (disculpen el inconveniente, si necesitan que traduzca por favor mandenme un correo electrónico a xail(a)workingbikes.org). Si les interesa, por favor manden su resume y referencias a jobs(a)workingbikes.org. Gracias. The non-profit organization, Working Bikes, located in Chicago is hiring a person to run the Service Department. We are looking for someone who is knowledgeable in bike mechanics and is bilingual, english/spanish, since the warehouse is located in a predominantly spanish speaking area. Attached is the job description. If interested, please send us your resume and references to jobs(a)workingbikes.org. Gracias. -- *Xail Hernandez *(Ella / She/Her) *Community Bike Repairs Manager* Working Bikes *|* 2434 S Western Ave. Chicago, IL 60608 *P* 773.847.5440 www.workingbikes.org

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Milestone: New MailMan delivering soon!
by Jonathan Rosenbaum via Thethinktank 21 Mar '23

21 Mar '23

Dear Thinkers & Researchers @ the Tank, In the next few days we will be migrating our discussion lists away from DreamHost to a modern MailMan software platform (mailman 3) hosted at our own server. This is an awesome milestone for us, and a long time in the making. As far back as 2015 (almost 8 years ago), I observed that the archives for TheThinkTank became unavailable when DreamHost updated their hardware. At that time, in a conversation with the subject line "Update on the Archives", I suggested that we should consider moving away from dependence on a third party hosting service. Ironically, that conversation does not exist in the current archives at DreamHost because all the data between January 17, 2015 to May 13, 2015 was lost by their system. However, I recovered those conversations from my personal email stash, and they are now included in the new archiving system called HyperKitty. Better Search Capability: Another issue we have frequently experienced over the years has been the unavailability of the search engine known as htdig (ht://Dig errors). We now have a new search engine called Xapian. Even when htdig was available, as I pointed out at our recent Tech meeting, the level of detail when performing searches with Xapian is like comparing the difference between the Hubble Space Telescope and the James Web Space Telescope. HyperKitty (Achiver): HyperKitty provides a modern frontend to MailMan. You can now create an account where you may associate your email addresses subscribed to bikecollectives.org discussion lists. When you are logged in to your account, one powerful feature, similar to google groups web interface or traditional online bulletin boards, is that you now have the ability to directly interact with email threads or create new ones without having to utilize your own email client. You can favorite and/or like discussions, and if you have a Gravatar ( https://wordpress.com/me ), it will be visible. Markdown capability is available, but it only works in HyperKitty, so if you want to experiment with this capability, keep in mind that people will see your markdown in normal emails. Directions can be found at https://docs.mailman3.org/projects/hyperkitty/en/latest/rendering.html under Rendering Rules. _Recommendation for digest subscribers:_ Because we now have this awesome capability, rather than replying directly to digest emails, please utilize the login capability of HyperKitty to easily jump into the parts of the threads you want to interact with. This avoids breaking up the thread, which makes the discussion easier for all to understand. Migration and New Home Considerations: After the migration, the web interface will be available at https://lists.bikecollectives.org/ and will no longer say "The list overview page has been disabled temporarily" as found at the current non-secure web interface at http://lists.bikecollectives.org/ . This should all happen, no later, than by Monday, March 20, 2023. The migration consists of changing the DNS addresses to our new email server and mailman 3 discussion list software. Usually in most parts of the world this is a fast process, but there are some DNS servers that are slow to update their cache. This means that some of you may experience the phenomenon where your emails will still end up at the DreamHost instance, and you continue to see the old website. If that is the case, you may want to consider using a different nameserver, like 1.1.1.1, and to ask your service provider to update their DNS servers. Because our email server is brand new, it doesn't have an established reputation for its IP address. However, fortunately our lists address, lists.bikecollectives.org, has a good reputation. Most likely, hopefully, we won't experience issues from larger services that scrutinize bulk email. However, we will be monitoring our logs carefully. Google (gmail), which represents a large percentage of TheThinkTank subscribers, rate limits the number of emails received by their service to 60 per/minute. Erring on the safe-side, we will rate limit emails we are sending out to 30 per/minute, which means emails sent to TheThinkTank should reach everyone in about 30 minutes. If you are experiencing issues after the change, please contact me: Jonathan Rosenbaum <bike(a)bikelover.org> . Other: It should be pointed out, that gmail users who are normal subscribers generally do not receive back a copy of the email they send out to MailMan, see https://wiki.list.org/x/4030680 for an explanation. However, gmail users who are normal subscribers should receive replies, as well as new threads. Other than that .. Yay!! -Jonathan ____________________________________ The ThinkTank mailing List Unsubscribe from this list here: http://lists.bikecollectives.org/options.cgi/thethinktank-bikecollectives.o…

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Bike measurements
by Claude Ferron via Thethinktank 12 Mar '23

12 Mar '23

Hello community, bonjour à tous.tes! I'm planning to put our bike inventory online and I was wondering what are the typical data that are relevant to inform potential buyers? What are the key dimensions you would suggest? What is considered a "Large bike" for exemple. Or let's say someone is 6ft tall... What information would it best for them to find. Would you recommend the buyer to measure it's inseam? Kinda looking for best practice here. Thanks all, merci! Claude Ferron La Cyclerie, Trois-Rivières, QC, Canada Bike culture + Community workshop www.lacyclerie.ca ____________________________________ The ThinkTank mailing List Unsubscribe from this list here: http://lists.bikecollectives.org/options.cgi/thethinktank-bikecollectives.o…

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