Fall Riding, Compact Bikes and a Quieter Old-School Mountain Bike

Fall has a way of making a familiar bike feel newly appealing. The colors are brief, the air is changing, and the season’s rides arrive with a reminder that winter is close behind. Lately, that has meant more time on a compact PashMo and an older mountain bike called the Anti-Riv, with each offering a different kind of pleasure: one is easy to live with at home, the other rewarding to get running quietly.

The autumn scenery is part of the draw. Its short window may be exactly why it feels so good to get outside and ride while the colors are still there.

A small bike with room to spare

The PashMo keeps earning its place in the rotation. On the road, it feels fast and smooth; at home, its small footprint makes it easier to fit into a crowded apartment. That practical advantage has let me bend my usual one-bike-inside rule. The rest of the fleet stays downstairs, while this little bike gets a spot indoors.

That combination helps explain the appeal of mini velos. A compact frame and small wheels can make storage simpler without turning every ride into a compromise. The PashMo has been enjoyable to ride in its own right, and the fact that it takes up little space is a welcome bonus. Readers interested in its background can revisit the earlier look at the PashMo, which also featured Velo Orange.

Mini velos can also take on a distinctly modern road-bike look. A commenter shared an example with electronic shifting and an integrated cockpit, and it appears to be available through a shop in Dubai. The link is here, and the bike itself is listed here. The contrast is part of the fun: a small-wheeled bike can be a simple space-saving choice or a highly specified road machine.

Clothing, jokes and an image-generation detour

The accompanying clothing imagery leans into the joke of pairing a compact bike with an equally tiny cycling jersey. The pictures also play with the familiar polished look of cycling apparel, including models presented in both younger and older guises. The linked green jersey is described as a “low-intensity” piece, a label that makes the contrast especially amusing.

The wardrobe joke then turns into a fictional clothing line called JBARA, built around the phrase “JUST BUY A RIVENDELL ALREADY.” An image-generation experiment supplied the punchline: the resulting picture showed cyclists wearing the shirts, despite the prompt not naming either the phrase or bicycles. The generated image is included below.

The detour is a reminder that generated pictures can land on a surprisingly specific visual idea from an unexpected prompt. Here, the result worked as a cycling gag; it also sat neatly alongside the article’s larger affection for bikes with character.

Chasing a quiet drivetrain

The Anti-Riv has been getting plenty of rides, partly because fall has brought on a taste for the kind of mountain biking that predates today’s more specialized styles. The bike offers a way back to that older feel, and it also became a small mechanical project. I tend to keep riding a bike until it works the way I want, even when its appearance suggests otherwise. My standards are often audible: a noisy drivetrain can turn a good ride into an ongoing distraction.

The main worry was the bike’s i-Drive system. The thought of taking that mechanism apart was intimidating, so the noise initially seemed like the start of a more involved repair. Instead, removing the crank and related parts, lubricating them, and tightening everything again made a noticeable difference. The drivetrain quieted down enough to make the next ride feel smooth.

The work also brought a close look at Shimano’s Octalink-era fondness for splines. There are plenty of them in the crank and bottom-bracket arrangement. The pictured XTR crank is a reference image from Bike Recyclery, rather than the crank on this bike. Splined chainrings later became common on mountain bike cranks, but this older XTR setup has its own dense arrangement of interfaces.

After the outer ring came off, a regular lockring tool was enough to remove the lockring. With the components lubricated with Dumonde Tech and reassembled, the Anti-Riv was ready for a quiet ride to the Forbidding Trails Behind The Mall. That result matters more than the wrenching itself: the bike felt settled, and I could finally set it aside without wondering where the noise was coming from.

From the Anti-Riv to the Faggin

Once the drivetrain was quiet, Sunday brought a change of focus to the Faggin. A reader had sent a saddle after hearing that I liked that style. It adds comfort and strengthens the bike’s Italian theme, and the package also included a pin. Thoughtful gifts from readers have a way of making a familiar bike feel newly personal.

That’s a satisfying seasonal rhythm: find a bike that fits the ride, listen closely when something sounds wrong, and move on once the fix holds up on the road. The PashMo keeps fall riding convenient in a small home; the Anti-Riv is ready for a pause after its drivetrain service; and the Faggin gets a comfortable new detail. With the season moving quickly, a quiet bike and a good ride are reason enough to head out.