coker and 170mm cranks

Unicycles and Equipment
1

How many of you use 170mm cranks for Cokers? And how many people use =
150mm cranks?

2

Re: coker and 170mm cranks

I only know one person who uses 170s on a Coker all the time - Gary Kanuch,
world record holder of the Mt Diablo Challenge. I’ve used 170s for extremely
steep downhills and they are great. They make idling etc on a Coker feel
like on a 24" unicycle. The problem is that on normal roads, they are just
too long and even Gary, who has really long legs, can’t keep up and gets
sore.

If you do lots of offroad and steep stuff on a Coker you’ll probably find
152mm too short, but going all the way to 170 is a bit much. I also tried
165s for a while. Now I use 140mm and 155mm settings, and plan to use 120mm
for smooth flat cruising days. Adjustable cranks are great!

—Nathan

“JL” <JL@hiy.com> wrote in message
news:DROfa.75758$fa.4762729@twister.austin.rr.com…
How many of you use 170mm cranks for Cokers? And how many people use 150mm
cranks?

3

I use 150s on my Coker. I guess I’ve ridden over 100 miles on these in the last week or so, some of it on quite tough cross country. That includes patches of deep soft sand and gravel, slimy mud, undergrowth, and tussocky grass. They are good for medium inclines with a smoothish surface, and short sections of quite steep downhill, as long as i don’t let the uni run away from me.

I tried 125s. Riding on the flat was easy. Cross country became hard work. Safety was compromised on the road due to the longer stopping distances.

I have 170s on my 26, and find the movement too exaggerated for comfort. I’m only really comfortable on 170s when I’m standing up for the difficult sections.

Experience, technique, balance and timing will help more than simply walloping a pair of longer cranks on any uni. I have ridden stuff on a 24 with 102s which stopped me dead on a 26/150 a year ago.

I’m only 5’8" when I stand on a phone book, so taller people might find 170s less of a pain.

4

Re: coker and 170mm cranks

I use 170mm cranks for Coker, but I ride mostly offroad.

  • Mika
5

I Use 170’s because I live in the mountains, have long legs, ride an occasional trail and am over forty years old. On level ground it would be nice to be able to use 160’s or less, but changing cranks is just too much of a hassle, besides which I only have the one set anyhow… carjug

6

Right now I’m using only 170s for off-road and for Coker Freestyle. When I’m skilled enough to climb the steepest paved hills around on 170s, then I’ll try to go to 150s for the road. Off-road, though, it will be a while before I change… the 170s make mounting and low-speed maneuvers much easier for me.

7

What freestyle skills are you practicing on a Coker? Do the 170’s make a huge difference for developing these skills? Do you expect them to translate when you switch to 150’s? This is an interesting approach.

8

Right now I’m pretty consistent with 2-f idling (each foot), 2-f super-idling, backwards, seat-in-front, the static, rolling, and the normal side mounts. Working on reverse side mount, backwards turns, side mount directly into SIF, SIF idling and SIF backwards. When I have videos of the others ready, I’ll post them. I’m heading for 1-f idling and riding, but have yet to learn to do those things without my other foot on the frame. Also I’m keen on doing a floor mount to show off the Coker wheel, but can’t do one on the 20"er yet. The floor mount is rough on the rim, too, because at that extreme angle, the rim hits the pavement and gets chewed up. So that will have to use a rubber mat or the like.

I’m not as brave as Sofa to do jumps and suicides!

I think the 170s help a lot until I get more subtle with balance and wrassling the wheel around. Then I think I should be able to get them all going with the 150s, but perhaps not on the muddy, rutted driveway.

Ben Edwards and others have paved the way; I just want to add my little bit. :slight_smile: I’m sure there are many people out there that do this kind of stuff.

Also, all this low-speed stuff really increases my confidence in overall handling of the beast. And my successful mount percentage is now much higher.

9

Yeah Sofa!

I took off my 125’s and put the 152’s back on. I’ll keep them on now. I just did my now longest ride of 55km’s (with 152’s), taking me 4 hours and 10 minutes. That last 15 Km’s had a lot of getting off and walking, though

the last bit was along the side of the highway in the sloped squishy dirt. This killed me. Had I done the loop backwards (facing forwards, though) 'twould have been better, I would’ve still had the strength to power through it.

I can’t fathom you freaks doing 100 miles! (yet)

10

Yeah my longest is 25 miles, taking about 5 hours, with walking a couple of hills at the end. I bonked about halfway but no stores around for food. That was with 170s on.

11

Re: coker and 170mm cranks

Thanks everybody for the answer. I guess I will continue to stick with =
my current 150mm cranks.

12

U-Turn:

One thing I picked up, even just going from 20" to 24" nimbusII cycles, is that one foot (extended) and one foot (on crown) aren’t your only two options. I’m sure this would apply to a coker as well [haven’t had a chance to ride one yet >:| ], but even without your foot on the crown, you can brace the inside curve of your shoe against the frame somewhere above the height that the pedal swings.

I actually came to this realisation after starting to work on one foot (extended) riding on my 20", and then riding adam’s 24" fireball [26" frame]. The first time I tried to pop my foot up to the crown, it ended up against the side of the frame, and lo and behold, everything worked.

…all of which is not to discourage you from learning to ride one foot (extended), but to give you extra options :smiley:

probably knew that,
John M

13

Cool, John, I’ll give that a go. With my 26" Pashley Off-road, I can jam my heel up on the curve where I’ve added some rubber and plastic ties for traction. But the Coker curve is up even higher. I have a Wyganowski frame in progress which will have a flat crown; we’ll see if that works or if the surface is still too far up.

14

So Wyg is doing custom coker frames now? That’s sweet.

Wyganowski’s frames are also another thing I’ve never had a chance to try out >:| [although I suppose that resembles the borrowing of bike shorts, in a way, that either is something that’s really geared for one single owner, and wouldn’t be quiiiiiiiite the same for the second participant]

!,
John M

15

Re: coker and 170mm cranks

He’s been doing them for a while. The first one I saw was Andy’s at Toronto
in 2001. His handle extensions date from then too and are great.

—Nathan

“billnye” <billnye.kxa2c@timelimit.unicyclist.com> wrote in message
news:billnye.kxa2c@timelimit.unicyclist.com…
>
> So Wyg is doing custom coker frames now? That’s sweet.
>
> Wyganowski’s frames are also another thing I’ve never had a chance to
> try out >:| [although I suppose that resembles the borrowing of bike
> shorts, in a way, that either is something that’s really geared for one
> single owner, and wouldn’t be quiiiiiiiite the same for the second
> participant]
>
> !,
> John M

16

Wow, the timing on some of these threads is amazing. I rode my coker about 35 miles in 3.5 hours on Tuesday -with 150 cranks. (I need to get yet another computer.) Looking to improve my speed, I have my tools out and some 125 cranks. I recently learned to idle smoothly with the 150s and after reading this thread, I know what to expect from my shorter cranks. I am riding in Houston and we have what the locals consider hills, but they’re nothing some of you would notice. They are short and I must stand on the pedals to make it up, but I find going up easier than going down.
Jer