Two-Wheeling Instead of 3-Wheeling

Today's Spotty Tracking

(Just a short clip showing Jazzy's cuteness)

Man, the warm weather just keeps getting better and better.  We still normally have to build at least a small fire in the wood stove late evening and early morning but after about 10:00 AM it just gets wonderfully balmy around here.
Yesterday's ride on the  Tandem Terratrike was very noisy, with the chain rubbing and grinding against something, even though the chain restraints appeared to not be rubbing every time I tried to take a look.  Today before I took off on my solo 2-wheel ride I worked on the trike:  It was still in the trailer, and closer to my eyeball level so I could hopefully investigate what was going on.  I merely elevated the rear, drive, wheel with a jack-stand and cranked the pedals and watched the action.  The chain and idlers and derailleur were all pretty dry so I realized they needed a good lubrication, but I also noticed the chain up front was sagging and rubbing no matter what I tried.  The spring-loaded idler was pressing all the way "trying" to take up the chain slack but it appeared the chain had either stretched or worn sufficiently that the idler no longer could hold tight enough to keep the chain taut.  I finally decided to break the chain and remove a link (of course with bike chains "removing a link" actually means TWO have to be removed).  With the links removed it was a bit of a struggle to rejoin the shortened chain, but I was able to get 'er done, and now the idler is able to keep the chain taut enough to avoid rubbing the chain guide all the time.  This done, I broke out the expensive "bicycle chain lube" bottle and carefully juiced each link on both chains, which of course ate up at least another half hour.  Then the wipe-off of the chain to remove the sloppy excess lubricant which always results from a lube-job.  All chain action is now much quieter.  Hopefully this will get us through a few dozen more rides before other major 'surgery' is required.
As per usual, it was later in the PM by the time I actually got saddled up on my 2-wheeler and bouncing down the goat-path from home to highway.  Jazzy was in the belly-pack and happy until about halfway down the mountain we met Jacque coming home in her Subaru:  Jazzy suddenly lost enthusiasm for the bike ride and whined piteously until I unbuckled her from the harness and handed her off to Jacque.
This is my usual easier 10-mile ride and nothing of consequence happened, not even encountering any friendly or unusual folk.  On the return leg home I saw another cyclist coming towards me and I assumed it was going to be Brian K, who I often meet around this area.  Nothing doing, it was one of the many "too-busy-to-wave-back" types, so it CERTAINLY wasn't Brian.
What beautimous weather.  I neglected to take any windbreaker or jacket with me, and as I rode the return route it started getting JUST a little cooler, reminding me that I should never "assume" the weather couldn't change enough during an hour's bike ride to require layering up..... or down.  Thankfully I made it home without getting unduly chilled.
Still not sure how much, if any, good the solar panel might be doing.  The sun was fairly high during this ride but the recorded battery voltages looked better yesterday powering the trike electronics.... withOUT any solar assist.  Stay tuned.

Ride Started: 3:33 PM    Ride Ended:  5:10 PM
Beginning Battery Voltage:   13.5   Ending Voltage: 13.1  Lowest:  13.0
Lowest Temp  64 F      Highest Temp:  75 F 
Stats from the GPS:    Total Miles:  10:52
Overall average speed            Moving Avg               Max Speed
  6.6 MPH                               8.6 MPH                  28.7 MPH
Total Trip time                       Moving Time             Stopped Time
1 hour 35 mins                      1 hour 13 minutes       21  minutes