Spoke Spotting #1: Life was meant for two.

When you find your one true love its pretty special and you need a special bike just for these moments. Today we came across a Ranger tandem bicycle that would fit the bill! There is something about old tandems that we here at Drum fine beautiful. Perhaps its their long gangly shape, or the sense that they are so fucking unwieldy that you might just die at any moment while pedaling around with Miss or Mister right that gives us goose pimples when we come across one.



Here we have a Ranger which seems to a "brand" that had their bikes made by other cycling companies, then popped their badge on the head tube. Not a bad way to keep manufacturing costs down, although we doubt they were on the cutting edge of biking technology! From what we've been able to dig up it appears Ranger was purchased and sold on multiple occasions, and unlike Schwinn or Raleigh, that means there isn't a good central database available online for this brand. Since information is sparse we will leave the history lesson at that.



On closer inspection we realize that this tandem has had more than a few romantic couples take it for rides during it's life time. The seats are sun baked, torn and tattered. It's front lantern points toward the ground as if to signify that it is exhausted from the late night rides home. There is a rear rack (yes, a rack on a tandem seems like a grand idea!!) that has become rusty but is still sturdy, and can probably still hold up to hauling all those picnic baskets and wine bottles out to the beach.
From years of service this Ranger has acquired two different shoes. On the front there is a slick tire for optimal control in the corners. While the rear is equipped with a knobby tire that we can only assume is for those loose dirt Chicago back roads and traction on those romantic sandy beach rides.
A small hint of whom may be the current owner comes from the disengaged front brake. Common sense tells us that not having a front brake on a bike that weighs this much is not a particularly good idea. And we also know that hipsters love their bikes to have no real means of stopping at high speed, and 2+2 is 4 so perhaps a hipster is looking to make this into a fixed gear tandem?*


The saying "rode hard and put away wet" was invented by this here tandem and we're proud to have the pleasure of meeting it.
*(see fixie)