Harris Cyclery

The Harris Cyclery Blog has moved!!

2009-10-28T08:37:00.000-07:00

After many false starts, there is a new Harris Cyclery Blog that will be updated on a regular basis!

Team Harris Cyclery at the Races...

2006-08-09T11:19:00.000-07:00

We on the Harris Cyclery Racing Team like to cover all our bases so to speak. Last night was the final night of the New England Track Championships up near Londonderry, New Hampshire.

If any of you track-bike junkies out there have ever thought about riding on a track, well, this is the premier spot to do it in New England. The best part is, that every Tuesday they will do an introductory coaching/racing session for those who have never been on a banked track before. I have even heard rumors that people who don't even ride track bikes have gone to the track and ended up racing that night.

Last night wrapped up its third year under the immaculate direction of Tony Eberhardt and Laurie Daly. It was pretty amazing...there were medals, mosquitos, and plenty of free RedBull to go around. However, they may be doing a few more Tuesday sessions before the light runs out...
http://www.leadcycling.com/

So, next Tuesday if you don't have anything to do, come check out some Track racing...

Custom Shimano Hyperglide cassettes

2006-07-26T07:44:00.000-07:00

Shimano's Hyperglide cassettes are designed with 'windows' that catch the chain and help
pull it onto the new cog. The cassettes are designed so that the windows are staggered, ie. the
windows on adjacent cogs are located so that the chain can come off one cog and move directly
onto the other. This makes for much faster shifting. This is one of the core concepts of the Hyperglide
system, and why everyone else has copied them.

Therefore, each cassette has a letter combination that is marked on each cog of that set. That designates
the cogs that are designed to work as a Hyperglide set.

If one swaps cogs and/or changes the stock Hyperglide configurations, the new cogs probably won't have their
windows in the optimal Hyperglide configuration. Therefore, one gets slower shifting, as the cassette may
have to make a 1/2 or almost full rotation before the chain will move to the next cog.

Our custom cassettes are built from stock Hyperglide cassettes, with only the end cogs changed.
This limits the slow-shifting problems.

MySpace

2006-07-20T15:09:00.000-07:00

Hey everybody, we just started a Myspace account. Come visit us there. We would love to have all kinds of friends. Bike friends. Bike friendly friends. Bikes.
http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=94683547

Know your UPS shipping methods!

2006-07-19T07:00:00.000-07:00

We are having a hard time getting online shoppers to choose the correct shipping method.
Unfortunately, our shopping cart doesn't give our customers clear choices during checkout.
Many are choosing costly UPS expedited services when UPS Ground service will get it there in the same amount of time. Here is a Time-In-Transit map for UPS Ground Service. There is a link to this map during the checkout process but most people are not looking at it.

Shimano Capreo items are in stock!

2006-07-19T06:33:00.000-07:00

Attention all 'small wheel' enthusiasts - The Shimano Capreo hubs (32 and 36 hole) are back in stock. We have plenty of the matching 9-26t 9 speed cassettes. AND we have the cassette lockring tools in stock.

Harris Cyclery's normal activities

2006-06-12T12:57:00.000-07:00

For those who wonder what we actually do here, here's our standard daily schedule.

First thing in the morning,(9AM EST) we answer emails received since yesterday afternoon. At the same time, we review and print all new on-line orders. Our focus is to get all on-line orders picked, packed, and shipped that day. We then work to fill all orders we can, or mark 'backordered' on those items we don't have in stock. If it's an item we won't be able to get for more than 3-4 days, we email the customer to let them know of the delay.

Simultaneous with the order processing, we also will check inventory and place distributor orders for items getting low. Sometimes we have to do some investigating to find a distributor who has what we need.

All of the above usually take the 2 or 3 of us about 4-6 hours to complete. At that point, we can get phone calls as well as answer incoming emails. At 3 PM (East Coast Time) we start putting the day's UPS orders through our UPS software. US Postal orders are usually processed every 2 or 3 days, as each one takes about 10 to 20 minutes to do and requires a trip to the local Post Office.

This takes pretty much all our time till our UPS driver comes (shortly after 5 PM). We usually can't get any phone calls during those hours, as we have to get everything ready for UPS pickup. If we have more people in, we can pickup some of your calls. We pack up around 6 PM and head home.

In between the normal activities, we try to fix web page errors and add items.

We are normally not in on Saturday and Sunday.

Mondays are usually very busy answering all emails and processing orders from the weekend. A large portion of Tuesdays is spent creating the Quality Bicycle Products (QBP) weekly order. We order from QBP each Tuesday and receive on Thursday. So Thursdays, we spend a good portion of the day receiving the QBP order, then packing and shipping the orders that were waiting for QBP items.

Hope This Helps in understanding what we do and why.

Kool Stop Continental Price Increase

2006-06-11T09:36:00.000-07:00

FYI: The price increase on the Kool Stop Continental Salmon brake pads was more than the usual price increase. This was due to a cost analysis done by Kool Stop when they moved into their new facility last month. The Continental is their oldest production model. It is the only model made on their oldest machine. It is also one of their lowest volume models, so it is expensive to do a production run. Kool Stop considered discontinuing the Continental. Luckily, they decided on the price increase instead.

Michelin World Tour is Back!

2006-05-23T13:09:00.000-07:00

After a short hiatus (something close to a year) the Michelin World Tour is "tanned, rested, and ready to go." This 27 X 1"1/4 little beauty is, in the words of Sir Sheldon himself "excelent for classic restorations."
A 33 mm width and slightly aggressive tread pattern makes this tan walled tyre excellent for city riding.
*Click on the title to be taken to our tyre page.*

Avocet Cross II shipment due in soon

2006-05-19T19:26:00.000-07:00

I talked with Avocet last week. They are commited to having a better stock of tires than in the past. A shipment of Cross II wire bead tires is due in soon. We'll have more sizes with the Kevlar belt.

A Great Deal On Open Pro/ Suzue Promax Track Wheel set

2006-03-05T11:57:00.000-08:00

Good news - bad news.

Bad news: Japanese hub maker Suzue has closed up shop. They will no longer be making the beautiful, sealed-bearing Promax track hubs.

Good news: We bought a bunch of our Mavic Open Pro/Suzue Promax wheel sets and we're offering them at a great price! (Click on link for info)

http://harriscyclery.net/itemdetails.cfm?catalogId=39&id=662

Welcome to The Harris Cyclery Blog!

2006-03-05T08:04:00.000-08:00

Greetings!

Welcome to the Harris Cyclery Blog. The staff at Harris will be using this blog as another way to keep everyone up to date on the goings-on at Harris Cyclery.

Please bookmark this blog and come back early and often for:

*New product information

*Status on out-of-stock items

*The latest specials and closeouts

*Trial balloons for possible Harris Custom Components and new products

To all of our loyal customers and potential new customers, we apologize for not being able to provide the level of telephone service we have in the past. We are continuing to implement new computer software and warehouse systems to streamline our order processing, hoping to free-up more time to answer phone calls.

Thank you,
The gang at Harris Cyclery