Sheldon Brown's Bicycle Technical Info • Hacker News Board

Re: Sheldon Brown's Bicycle Technical Info

#51

Post by mikestew » Fri, Feb 06, 2026, 9:18 PM UTC

foco_tubi wrote: post #9

hackingonempty wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...and his widow, Harriet Fell, is a CS Professor (emerita) at Northeastern[0], and an accomplished cyclist who completed Paris-Brest-Paris (a 1200km ride and to qualify you have to complete 200km, 300km, 400km, and 600km rides in the 8 months leading up to it.) 0: https://www.ccs.neu.edu/home/fell/

For PBP2027 you have all of 2026, as well as 2027 leading up to registration, to complete the required BRMs. I'm riding my qualifying 300k tomorrow!

Allez! Allez! Bonne chance pour demain!

Re: Sheldon Brown's Bicycle Technical Info

#52

Post by neoromantique » Fri, Feb 06, 2026, 9:19 PM UTC

Ask HN: How does one archive websites like this without being a d-ck?

I want to save this for offline use, but I think recursive wget is a bit poor manners, is there established way one should approach it, get it from archive somehow?

Re: Sheldon Brown's Bicycle Technical Info

#53

Post by cbm-vic-20 » Fri, Feb 06, 2026, 9:37 PM UTC

jmclnx wrote: post #23

rsingel wrote: post #14

R.I.P. Sheldon https://www.wired.com/2008/02/sheldon-brown-w/

Came to say the same, I meet him once in his shop, what a great person he was. His wife also has a great amount of bicycle knowledge from what I heard.

And the shop itself closed in 2021 after being open for nearly 70 years. I purchased my Brompton there.

Re: Sheldon Brown's Bicycle Technical Info

#54

Post by ho_schi » Fri, Feb 06, 2026, 9:39 PM UTC

I’ve learned about that website only four years ago. It is still helpful, teaches me how to install front derailleurs properly (as deep and far to the front as possible, better chain line with less trimming and better shifting).

The German Wikipedalia tries to safe some stuff.

Re: Sheldon Brown's Bicycle Technical Info

#55

Post by LTL_FTC » Fri, Feb 06, 2026, 9:41 PM UTC

This is such a great website. I have enjoyed reading the articles in the past. It was the final push that inspired me to build my own wheel set instead of buying a complete when I was building my new mountain bike piece by piece. The art and zen (and frustration of trying to feed a shift/brake line through a frame), I tell ya.

Re: Sheldon Brown's Bicycle Technical Info

#56

Post by 2color » Fri, Feb 06, 2026, 9:56 PM UTC

hilsdev wrote: post #15

This was a major influence for me, both getting into single speed and fixed gear biking before the craze, and building geo cities sites with my friends in high school

same

Re: Sheldon Brown's Bicycle Technical Info

#57

Post by luqtas » Fri, Feb 06, 2026, 10:22 PM UTC

i built a set of wheels following his instructions, using my brake pads as the reference for centering and truing, rode dozen of thousands kilometers on them, daily, part of my courier job. all the wheels i had after that old Mongoose were also built the same way. i cycle a 1997 Trek 430 as my main transportation and i freaking love it. soldered a custom rack for panniers after its geometry. farewell Sheldon, i literally read your entire blog, at least twice

if i had found a cycling crazie to date back in the days, i would certainly use "building a tandem" section of that blog for suuuure

Re: Sheldon Brown's Bicycle Technical Info

#58

Post by OJFord » Fri, Feb 06, 2026, 10:23 PM UTC

neoromantique wrote: post #52

Ask HN: How does one archive websites like this without being a d-ck? I want to save this for offline use, but I think recursive wget is a bit poor manners, is there established way one should approach it, get it from archive somehow?

A single user's one-off recursive wget seems fine? Browsers also support it iirc, individual pages at very least (and saved to the same place, the links will work).

No doubt it's already in many archive sites though, you could just fetch from them instead of the original?

Re: Sheldon Brown's Bicycle Technical Info

#59

Post by neoromantique » Fri, Feb 06, 2026, 10:27 PM UTC

OJFord wrote: post #58

neoromantique wrote: post #52

Ask HN: How does one archive websites like this without being a d-ck? I want to save this for offline use, but I think recursive wget is a bit poor manners, is there established way one should approach it, get it from archive somehow?

A single user's one-off recursive wget seems fine? Browsers also support it iirc, individual pages at very least (and saved to the same place, the links will work). No doubt it's already in many archive sites though, you could just fetch from them instead of the original?

I ask in more general sense, if there is a way to fetch this stuff directly from webarchive or something along those lines.

Gotta hit the search I feel :)

Re: Sheldon Brown's Bicycle Technical Info

#60

Post by II2II » Fri, Feb 06, 2026, 10:47 PM UTC

jacquesm wrote: post #11

I wished more of the web was like this. if you like this you may also like: https://outspokencyclist.com/tag/harriet-fell/

I loved the wedding photo. It also left me wondering if they played "Bicycle Built for Two" at their wedding. It would be appropriate, both for the bicycle angle and because Dr. Fell moved over to a computer science department.