A previous study suggested the gene corresponding to the cDNA clone aco245 and coding for V-ATPase subunit H as the candidate gene for Dw6 locus since the multimeric V-ATPase enzymes were functionally conserved in plants and known to play a key role in regulation of cell elongation and plant growth (Obroucheva, 2008; Sharma et al., 2009). In this study, the gene corresponding to 6D aco245 was ∼80 and ∼700 Kb distant from marker SSR65 and SSR120, respectively. Besides, based on the reference genome sequence, sequences of the open reading frame of this gene in both tall and dwarf parents were cloned but showed 100% identity with each other (data not shown). All these results together may suggest that variation of the gene corresponding to 6D aco245 should not be responsible for the dwarf phenotype.

Despite these challenges, the Dw6 gene has been considered as the most potential gene resource to breed dwarf varieties with good yield (Milach and Federizzi, 2001; Tanhuanpää et al., 2006). Efforts have been made to map Dw6 gene by using different mapping populations (Milach et al., 1997; Tanhuanpää et al., 2006; Molnar et al., 2012; Zhao et al., 2018) and finally located it on chromosome 18D by comparative analysis (Zhao et al., 2018). However, to be partially limited by the number of available markers, the associated markers are still genetically far away from Dw6 (The closest marker is 1.2 cM distant from Dw6). Recently, great progress has been made in the development of a high-quality hexaploid oat reference genome by using a complementary approach combining short and long-read DNA sequencing technologies1. This will greatly facilitate the development of DNA markers, identification of genes underlying agronomic traits and other genomic research in oat.

This section collects any data citations, data availability statements, or supplementary materials included in this article.

I’d almost always recommend most customers do MORE of what I do to Kate’s bikes. One exception is probably the thing I’m asked how to do most, ironically, and that is the treatment to her BB that enables it to spin almost frictionlessly. Most BBs are consumer-proofed anticipating a life of neglect (as a shop mechanic I can state emphatically that this is a good idea for most bikes I see). What it means is elaborate water and dust sealing, and the use of thick, long-lasting grease to reduce the amount of service the BB requires. It also creates a lot of drag.

Euro 2 bolt flange cast housing.

Of course, different oil weights can create different sensations in suspension components and can be tuned to rider preference if you’re willing to take on that experiment (most manufacturers start at a good benchmark but everyone is different, and this is one more way to take things to the limit). The best thing an individual can do is to familiarize themselves with the products on their own bikes first, take a look at the manufacturer’s recommendations, and talk to a reputable bike mechanic. Walk into any shop and you’ll see half a dozen or more types of chain lube— consider that this represents about 1% of all chain lube options in existence, and you can imagine how many differing opinions you may hear. Most of what I’ve learned has been through this practice and then my own observation of using these products and observing the outcome.

I used to see over-lubed road bikes where excess chain lube has slowly migrated up the spokes via centripetal force from rotating parts until it coated the rim and brake track, leading to power loss and rapid wear of the brake pads from the extra squeezing force applied to try to get more power from their well-lubed brake pads. Now the problem I see is the same, but it’s migrating across the rear hub and onto the disc rotor, and the effect of power loss is magnified in a disc brake system, as is the cost to fix it. People do not clean their bikes enough and overcompensate with too much lube. Also, simply wiping the chain off after a ride goes a long way and is probably not done enough by most folks. We could write a whole article about things I’ve seen in bike shops that horrify me, but lubing disc rotors (almost always WD40 too!) has got to be the most absurd thing I see often.

We would like to thank Brad Copeland for taking the time to share all of this helpful info with readers. If you have lube theories or tips to add please share them in the comments below.

Attempts have been made to genetically map Dw6 by using various types of molecular markers (Milach et al., 1997; Tanhuanpää et al., 2006; Molnar et al., 2012; Zhao et al., 2018). The initial study mapped Dw6 using RFLP markers, which identified one unmapped RFLP marker Xumn145B to be putatively linked to Dw6. Further analysis revealed this locus was absent in oat lines missing chromosome 18, thus located Dw6 on chromosome 18 (Milach et al., 1997). Tanhuanpää et al. (2006) identified two SNP markers that were closely linked to Dw6, which were located 5.2 and 12.6 cM from Dw6, but their locations on a reference map were not determined. Later on, Molnar et al. (2012) identified an RFLP marker aco245 to be closely linked to Dw6 by using a set of NILs for Dw6. This RFLP marker was revealed to be located on the KO LG_33 linkage group, which is homologous to chromosome 18D (Oliver et al., 2013) and linkage group Mrg04 of the most recent consensus map (Chaffin et al., 2016). Mrg04 has been found to be homologous to chromosome 6D of the recently released hexaploid oat reference genome (data not shown). In this study, the aco245 sequence was blasted against the recently released hexaploid oat reference genome, which identified three highly similar sequences located on 6D, 6A and 6C, respectively. Five SSR primer pairs around the 6D aco245 sequence showed polymorphism in two parents and in two contrasting bulks. These results confirmed that Dw6 is located on chromosome 6D. By using these five polymorphic SSR markers, Dw6 was mapped at an interval of 1.0 cM flanked by markers SSR83 and SSR120. Caution should be applied in using this information since the genetic orders of the five polymorphic markers on the genetic map in this study were not fully consistent with their physical locations on the reference genome (Figure 4). Such inconsistencies may reflect the actual structural differences caused by, for example, chromosomal segmental rearrangements, segmental duplications, between the reference genome and the parental lines used in this study. However, the discrepancies might also be addressed by assembling errors, which often happened, particularly in genome assemblies of the large, highly repetitive genome as oat (Liu et al., 2019). Previous studies have identified some markers to be putatively linked to Dw6, however, none of them are perfectly diagnostic for marker-assisted selection (MAS). For example, the SCAR markers developed by Molnar et al. (2012) were monomorphic on some NILs of testing. SSR marker bi17 was assumed to be linked to Dw6, however, fragments representing the dwarf allele existed in tall NILs as well as in some tall cultivars (Zhao et al., 2018). In this study, SSR120 was revealed to be the closest marker linked to Dw6. To validate the accuracy of these markers in the identification of Dw6, the polymorphism of SSR120 was examined in a range of oat lines including seven pairs of NILs with different genetic backgrounds and 48 diverse cultivars. The results indicated that marker SSR120 accurately discriminated the lines with Dw6 from the others (Supplementary Figure 3), demonstrating their usefulness in the rapid identification of Dw6.

Previous studies associated an RFLP clone, aco245 with Dw6 in seven pairs of NILs contrasting for the presence of Dw6 (Molnar et al., 2012). However, recombinants between an SNP marker that derived from aco245 and Dw6 have been observed, hence suggested the variation in aco245 might not be responsible for the dwarf type (Zhao et al., 2018), additional effort is necessary to further map Dw6. To this end, a BLASTN was performed using the sequence of aco245 (GenBank accession JF913493) as a query against the recently released hexaploid oat reference genome (Avena sativa – OT3098 v1, PepsiCo; see text footnote 1). Since Dw6 has been mapped on 18D (6D in the hexaploid reference genome) chromosome (Zhao et al., 2018), therefore 1 Mb flanking sequences around 6D aco245 were extracted, which were then used for SSR identification and primer design by MISA (Thiel et al., 2003) and Primer3 (Untergasser et al., 2012), respectively. After taking into account the putative PCR production size (at least 100 bp) and chromosome location (1 marker per 20 kb), a total of 81 primer pairs (Supplementary Table 3) were used for mapping analysis. Linked SSR markers were identified using DNA bulks from 10 short and tall progenies as well as from short and tall parents. Polymorphic markers were then used to generate genotypic data for the whole RIL population and a partial genetic linkage map was generated by JoinMap version 4.0, utilizing the regression mapping algorithm to calculate marker order and the Kosambi mapping function to estimate the map distances. A LOD score of 3.0 was considered evidence for linkage. Linked markers were further validated in other oat materials as described above.

FVP wheel bearings and hub assemblies are built to the industry's highest quality standards. Each hub assembly or wheel bearing matches OE design ...

If you’ve ever wondered how often you should lubricate your mountain bike chain, or what grease goes on the pawls inside your freehub body, this article is for you. Nearly every component on modern bikes calls for a different lubricant, with its own chemical makeup and related viscosity. That’s a lot of info to research and keep track of.

What are some of the most common lubricating misconceptions riders have? What mistakes do you often see in the bike shop?

Of course, wet or dry conditions dictate which chain lubes we might select for a race. When it’s dry we want the fastest lube possible. When it’s wet we want lube that will still be present at the end of the race. In the nastiest conditions we usually even have a strategy where Kate might be prepared to stop to re-lube mid-race. Many riders could be seen doing this in Leogang at World Championships last season, for example. We also handed up lots of bottles of plain water simply for Kate to spray on her cassette and around the crank/chainring to offset mud accumulation which can derail (pun intended) even my best efforts to prepare a fast bike.

This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

An F6:8 recombinant inbred line (RIL) population derived from the cross between WAOAT2132 (Dw6) and Caracas along with the two parents were used to evaluate the genetic effects of Dw6 dwarfing gene on plant height and other agronomic traits in oat (Avena sativa L.) across three environments, and develop closely linked markers for marker-assisted selection (MAS) for Dw6. The two parents differed in all investigated agronomic traits except for the number of whorls. The RIL lines showed a bimodal distribution for plant height in all three tested environments, supporting the height of this population was controlled by a single gene. Dw6 significantly reduced plant height (37.66∼44.29%) and panicle length (13.99∼22.10%) but without compromising the coleoptile length which was often positively associated with the reduced stature caused by dwarfing genes. Dw6 has also strong negative effects on hundred kernel weight (14.00∼29.55%), and kernel length (4.21∼9.47%), whereas the effects of Dw6 on the kernel width were not uniform across three environments. By contrast, lines with Dw6 produced more productive tillers (10.11∼10.53%) than lines without Dw6. All these together suggested the potential yield penalty associated with Dw6 might be partially due to the decrease of kernel weight which is attributed largely to the reduction of kernel length. Eighty-one simple sequence repeat (SSR) primer pairs from chromosome 6D were tested, five of them were polymorphic in two parents and in two contrasting bulks, confirming the 6D location of Dw6. By using the five polymorphic markers, Dw6 was mapped to an interval of 1.0 cM flanked by markers SSR83 and SSR120. Caution should be applied in using this information since maker order conflicts were observed. The close linkages of these two markers to Dw6 were further validated in a range of oat lines. The newly developed markers will provide a solid basis for future efforts both in the identification of Dw6 in oat germplasm and in the determination of the nature of the gene through positional cloning.

Spoke Prep is essentially a light thread locker like the blue Loctite (#246 is what I tend to use on bikes), but probably lighter in its “locking” strength given the size of the spoke/nipple thread interface and is formulated specifically for this application as the name suggests; essentially it prevents the tendency of a spoke to “unwind” or loosen either from vibration or flex/load of the wheel itself as it’s being ridden. On high-performance wheels, I use this because it can’t hurt, even if it’s overkill for some. I know other mechanics who simply use grease and swear by it, claiming that a properly built and perfectly tensioned wheel shouldn’t require a thread locking agent. However, in these moments I point to products like the DT Swiss Prolock nipples which are like a nyloc nut and prevent unwinding, while also enhancing the strength of the wheel allegedly. I prefer spoke prep or a “locking” nipple like this for race wheels.

Plant height is an important agronomic trait that is highly related to lodging, a major problem of oat (Zimmer et al., 2018). In wheat, the introduction of the dwarfing genes into commercial varieties has reduced the lodging risk and greatly increased the yield of wheat, and led to widespread adoption of the dwarfing genes throughout the world (Gale and Youssefian, 1985). Similar strategies have been used in oat breeding programs. Until present, eight dwarfing genes have been officially reported in oat (Zhao et al., 2018), however, only a few including Dw6, Dw7, and Dw8 are present in readily available germplasm (Molnar et al., 2012). Of these, Dw6 is the most extensively used gene that has been introduced into commercial oat varieties (Milach and Federizzi, 2001).

Further, a DT Swiss Star ratchet design (a ubiquitous and in my opinion probably the best overall design licensed – or copied – by numerous other brands) has very small teeth on two ratchet rings with very shallow engagement. Too thick of a grease can actually get in the way of good engagement, preventing the teeth from fully grabbing onto one another, and can lead to slipping or a failure to engage because a thick grease barrier can be too much for the light force of the springs driving the engagement to displace. Very thin oils or grease that is so thin it is practically an oil is the prescribed lube for 90+% of all freehubs. I made that number up but I also almost said 99% but rounded down just to make sure I wasn’t totally lying.

The cultivated oat (Avena sativa L.) is the sixth important cereal crop that is widely used as both animal feed and human food. Its cropped area, however, has rapidly declined during the past decades (FAOSTATS, 2019), even the demand in oat for human consumption has increased in recent years due to its documented health benefits. This is partly attributed to the lower yield of oat compared with that of the other cereal crops (FAOSTATS, 2019; Yan et al., 2020). Thus, breeding high-yielding oat varieties are urgently needed to turn oats more competitive and attractive for farmers.

The F6:8 RILs and its parents were grown at Wenjiang (103°51′E, 30°43′N) and Chongzhou (103°38′E, 30°32′N) during 2018–2019 cropping season and at Wenjiang (103°51′E, 30°43′N) during 2019–2020 cropping season. Field trials were arranged in randomized complete blocks with no replication at each location. Each plot comprised two 1 m rows with 20 plants in each row and spaced 30 cm apart. Early one week of sowing, nitrogen and superphosphate fertilizers were applied at a ratio of 80 kg/ha. To avoid water stress, supplemental irrigation was provided as needed. While other field managements were following local standard practices (Yu et al., 2018).

A small amount of work has been conducted to evaluate the effects of Dw6 on yield and yield components (Brown et al., 1980; Barr, 1984; Marshall et al., 1987; Anderson and McLean, 1989; Kibite and Clayton, 2000), however, no consistent results have been observed. Brown et al. (1980) reported the dwarf line produced similar yields to standard-height cultivars at five locations in the eastern Canadian prairies. In Australia, Dw6-containing cultivar Echidna outyielded most of the formerly widely grown tall cultivars, especially in the south-western, high rainfall areas. However, both Marshall et al. (1987) and Kibite and Clayton (2000) observed a strong negative association between Dw6 and yield. In this study, the genetic effects of Dw6 on three yield-related traits, including productive tiller number, spikelet number per panicle and hundred kernel weight were evaluated. Dw6 has no significant effect on spikelet number, but is strongly negatively associated with the reduction of kernel weight (Table 2 and 3). The average hundred kernel weight of 30 RIL lines with tall plant height across three environments was 4.5 g, which was 20.07% lower than that of RILs with short stature (Figure 1 and Table 2). Further comparing the kernel sizes of these two groups revealed that the kernel lengths of dwarf lines are significantly shorter than that of tall lines (8.9 vs 9.6 mm on average across three environments), whereas the kernel widths of these lines are similar (Figure 1 and Table 2). These results were in line with previous studies (Brown et al., 1980; Kibite and Clayton, 2000), which also observed a negative effect by Dw6 on kernel size. All these results together suggested that the potential yield penalty associated with Dw6 should be partially caused by the reduction of kernel weight which is largely attributed to the decrease of kernel length. Indeed, most of the reported dwarfing genes in wheat like Rht1 (McClung et al., 1986), Rht13 (Rebetzke et al., 2011), Rht18 (Yang et al., 2015), Rht14 (Duan et al., 2020) and Rht15 (Zhao et al., 2021) have negative effects on grain weight and grain size, suggesting a common defect of dwarf genes. This might not be unexpected because most dwarfing genes reduced the plant height via blocking the biosynthesis or utilization of phytohormones, predominantly gibberellins (Liu et al., 2018), which were also required for grain development. Besides, the flowering date of the Dw6 dwarf lines was 3–7 days later than that of the tall lines (data not shown) as observed by a previous study (Kibite and Clayton, 2000), which might be another reason for the small kernels as the grain-filling stage was reduced (Duan et al., 2020; Zhao et al., 2021). The small grain associated with Dw6 might be improved by combining with the genes regulating grain-filling (Duan et al., 2020; Zhao et al., 2021). Moreover, the yield penalty caused by the small kernel size associated with dwarfing gene might be compensated for by increases of other yield components. In turn, harvest index and grain yields of these dwarf genotypes are similar with or even higher than that of the tall genotypes. For instance, wheat cultivars with Rht1 produced much smaller kernels compared to the conventional tall wheats, but this was completely compensated for by a greater number of tillers and kernels per spike (McClung et al., 1986). In this study, RIL lines with Dw6 had a significantly higher number of productive tillers than that of the tall lines. This attribute of Dw6 would partially attenuate the negative effects of Dw6 on yields, but further work is required to confirm this since the yields were not evaluated in this study.

For brake fittings, since you mentioned it, there are even products that don’t react negatively with the fluid or hose material or bladder/seal material within caliper or lever; SRAM offers a DOT grease to be used with its DOT-fluid based braking systems on the coupling nut.

The other thing people could do more and benefit from immensely is lubricating your shift cables occasionally (and brake cables if you still have brakes that use cables). Shimano makes a great grease called SP41 that I like to use for assembly of new bikes; however, dripping a light oil like Triflow into the housing (most of the time there are ways to do this without disconnecting the cables) and under the BB cable guide if your bike is externally routed will improve shift feeling and performance considerably.

Large and repeatable differences were observed for plant height in the WAOAT2132/Caracas population varying for the Dw6 allele. This morphological variation could be largely attributed to allelic variation at Dw6 loci (Figure 1 and Table 2). That is, the presence of Dw6 was closely related to reductions in plant height ranging from 37.66 to 44.29% across three environments of testing. The large height reduction associated with Dw6 was consistent with the height reductions reported for Dw6 in Kibite (2001) and Milach et al. (2002). Likewise, there were large and repeatable differences in the panicle lengths among lines in the WAOAT2132/Caracas population. The variation in panicle length was strongly correlated (r = 0.69, P < 0.01) with plant height, indicating the panicle length to be an important determinant of overall stature. Lines with Dw6 had reduced panicle length by 17.51% on average compared with tall lines. This was well in accordance with the previous study (Milach et al., 2002).

Because most dwarfing genes are associated with the reduction of cell length in the peduncle, they might also affect the length of other organs. Coleoptile is a sheath-like tissue that protects the emerging shoot and delivers it to the soil surface (Luo et al., 2020). It plays an important role in early crop establishment and its length determines the maximum depth at which seed can be sown (Sidhu et al., 2020). Considerable studies have been conducted to evaluate the relations between wheat dwarfing genes and coleoptile length (Ellis et al., 2004; Rebetzke et al., 2012; Chen et al., 2013; Tang, 2016). The results indicated that the GA-insensitive gene Rht1 is strongly positively related to the short coleoptile (Rebetzke et al., 2012), whereas most GA-sensitive dwarf genes have no significant effects on coleoptile length (Rebetzke et al., 2012; Chen et al., 2013; Tang, 2016). In this study, the dwarf parent showed a significantly shorter coleoptile compared with that of the tall parent (Table 1), however, this large difference had not been observed between the tall and dwarf groups of the F6:8 RILs though the coleoptile lengths of the tall lines are longer than that of the dwarf lines (Figure 1 and Table 2). These results indicated that coleoptile length is genetically independent of the height reduction caused by Dw6, thus breeding oat cultivars with a combination of long coleoptile and reduced plant height (Dw6) is practicable.

Jun 1, 2019 — Have you rotated your tires lately though? Moving the fronts to the back and back to front, if the wheels are out of balance, the noise will ...

Despite the negative effects of Dw6 on grain yield or yield components, it may have great potential in oat breeding for the following reasons. First, the effectiveness of Dw6 in reducing oat plant height was observed in all studies. Second, great variations were observed in both tall and dwarf groups in this study (Table 2 and Figure 1), which provided great potential for selecting individuals with proper height for oat production (i.e., choose relative higher individuals without lodging). Third, Dw6 had a significant positive effect on productive tiller number (Figure 2 and Table 3). Hence, the potential yield penalty would be compensated for by an increase of panicle number per unit. Indeed, previous studies have demonstrated that an increase in seeding rate and reduction of row spacing would largely increase the grain yields of dwarf cultivars, making both dwarf and tall cultivars having similar harvest indexes (Meyers et al., 1985; Marshall et al., 1987). Besides, no significant effect of Dw6 on coleoptile length has been observed in this study. This indicated Dw6 may be useful also in regions with less rainfall, under which conditions, deep sowing is often necessary. However, a previous study reported QTL for Fusarium head blight (FHB) resistance were overlapped with the QTL region for Dw6, suggesting a negative association between Dw6 and FHB resistance (Stancic, 2016). Another study also observed cultivar with Dw6 is more susceptible to FHB (Herrmann et al., 2020). Whether the increased FHB susceptibility associated with the Dw6 is attributed to genes linked to FHB susceptibility or/and a pleiotropic effect of Dw6 allele enhancing susceptibility are not clear. This needs further studies to clarify and then provide better guidance on the utilization of Dw6 in oat breeding.

Fortunately, we don’t race in extreme cold, but I’d imagine some different suspension fluids could be used to improve performance in extremely cold conditions. I hope to never have to find out, I don’t know how these cyclocross mechanics survive.

A heavy grease is similarly beneficial on contacting surfaces of pressed-in bearings; the difference here is that in press fits, it is a corrosion barrier as well as a lubrication method to limit creaking sounds as the two surfaces slide against one another under load or flex. So here, a thick grease that is hard to displace will act as lubrication between contact surfaces so the micro-slipping that occurs is quiet as the parts slide against one another, rather than sticking and slipping, sticking and slipping, with dry or even gritty surfaces moving against one another. This is where creaks come from.

In general, waiting a little longer is better than doing it too soon. As I’ve hinted at already, most people overdo it with the chain lube. But it comes down to what type of lube you use, how much, how much you ride, and the conditions you ride in. Paying close attention to your own methods and their results is how you can optimize them completely. A little at a time with lots of wiping off between applications is my general recommendation, and a full degrease and scrub once a month is probably sufficient for most folks. Dry lube doesn’t last as long as wet lubes/oils, and dry conditions are friendlier to chain lube than wet, so it comes down to these and other factors. If it sounds like you’re being chased by a flock of angry sparrows, it’s time for lube.

Details of phenotypic variation between two parents were summarized in Table 1. The results indicated that all investigated traits except number of whorls are significantly different between two parents in all tested environments. The tall parent Caracas displayed significantly higher values in plant height, panicle length, spikelet number per panicle, hundred kernel weight, kernel width, kernel length, kernel perimeter as well as coleoptile length than the dwarf line WAOAT2132, and it also showed more whorls per panicle compared to the latter (Table 1). However, the productive tiller number of the dwarf parent WAOAT2132 was significantly less than that of the tall parent.

This depends a lot on the freehub and the design of the mechanism. Most manufacturers have a recommendation for their respective systems. Generally, a very thin grease or light oil is prescribed here, because thicker stuff can cause drag in the system which can lead to a droopy chain as the freehub tries to “push” the chain forward when coasting, leading to weird shifting moments and chain suck symptoms among other things. Also given the very light spring action on most freehubs’ pawls, a light lube is necessary so this spring action of the pawl is not inhibited by grease friction.

Chainz! There are so many ways to lube a chain, from heavy winter oil to boiling wax. What are some of the ideas behind proper chain lube? How do you lube Kate’s race bike chains?

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YP and HY conceived and designed the experiments and wrote the manuscript. KY, PZ, JZ, YX, YL, and XL performed the field experiments. HY and KY analyzed data. HY, CR, and YP revised the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Yes, to put it simply. We don’t race in wildly fluctuating temperatures so I do not really change the fluids used in suspension; however I will sometimes alter air pressure in suspension and tires in anticipation of temperature change (long stages at the Cape Epic began at temps of around 50° F some mornings, with temps reaching the 80s or higher by mid day). This caused pretty substantial changes in tire pressure and suspension pressure as the air heats and expands within them, so we had to play around with that. I also like to check air pressures afterwards anyway to see how they change — observing these trends and tendencies over many years of racing has influenced how we set the bikes up for short races, too.

Biplot following principal components analysis of F6:8 RIL lines from the WAOAT2132/Caracas population varying for Dw6 alleles.

This really depends a bit on how much maintenance you want to do or not do, and what your goals are. For racing, I strip all grease from these bearings and use a light oil to eliminate drag, freeing up a handful of watts otherwise spent overcoming the friction of thicker grease and also seal drag. On bikes I’ve race-prepped, you can spin the crank and it will remain spinning for 20-30 seconds with practically no resistance; however, this is not something I typically recommend as it requires extensive disassembly of the bike to keep it working this way for long periods of time. A thicker grease formulated for bicycle applications is probably best for most folks.

Based on the plant height, the RILs were classified into two classes as tall (dw6) and dwarf (Dw6) in each of the three environments of testing. To avoid potential contamination in field practice, only these RILs that were uniformly grouped as dwarf or tall among all environments to be retained for further analysis. The differences in phenotype due to dwarfing gene were tested for significance by a one-tailed Student’s t-test. The relative effects of Dw6 were estimated following the formula: effect = (Meandwarf - Meantall)/Meantall × 100%. The Pearson correlation coefficients between plant height and other agronomic traits were estimated following with significant test by using base packages of R language.

Which lube, if any, do you use when installing a seat post or other components that can seize if left in place? What about with steel or alloy frames?

aPH, plant height; PL, panicle length; NW, number of whorls on the main tiller; SP, spikelet number per panicle; PTN, productive tiller number; HKW, hundred kernel weight; KL, kernel length; KW, kernel width; KP, kernel perimeter; CL, coleoptile length. bWJ, Wenjiang; CZ, Chongzhou. cDifference was calculated by the mean value of the dwarf parent minus that of the tall parent, and tested for significance using one-tailed Student’s t-test (*, significant at p < 0.05; **, significant at p < 0.01). dThe percentage was estimated by percentage of the difference to tall parent.

aDifference was calculated by the mean value of dwarf group minus that of the tall group, and tested for significance using one-tailed Student’s t-test (*, significant at p < 0.05; **, significant at p < 0.01). bThe effect was estimated by following the formula: Effect = (Meandwarf - Meantall)/Meantall × 100%.

Funding. This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 32072025 and 31801430), the Sichuan International (Hong Kong/Macao/Taiwan) Innovation Cooperation in Science and Technology (Grant No. 2019YFH0125) and the Applied Basic Research Programs (Grant No. 21YYJC2007) from Science and Technology Department of Sichuan Province.

A cross was generated between an early, high-quality and Dw6-containing line WAOAT2132, with another early, high-quality but tall oat line Caracas. The self-pollinated F1 produced 306 F2 progenies (Zhao et al., 2018). Further self-pollination without selection for four generations resulted in F5:6 individuals. Seeds from these lines were threshed and then sown in the autumn of 2016 into rows for plant height assessment. A single panicle was harvested from each of 269 lines homogenous for plant height and increased during the 2017–2018 cropping season to produce an F2-derived, F6:8 recombination inbred lines (RILs). This F6:8 WAOAT2132/Caracas RIL population was used for mapping the Dw6 locus in this study (Supplementary Table 1). DNA samples from other materials used in previous work were also used to test markers linked to Dw6 in this study (Supplementary Table 2). These included 44 diverse tall lines from 13 countries, four semi-dwarf lines [three of them, OT207, Potoroo and AC Ronald, have been reported to have Dw6 (Mitchell Fetch et al., 2003; Zhao et al., 2018)], and 14 near-isogenic lines (NILs) contrasting for the presence of Dw6 provided by Molnar et al. (2012).

A total of 12 and 5 transcripts from Hu et al. (2020) and PacBio data generated by PepsiCo were found within the region where Dw6 was mapped, respectively. After de-redundancy, nine transcripts were retained and BLASTN analyzed. Of them, six showed high homology to wheat, Aegilops tauschii, and other plant sequences annotated as auxin-responsive protein SAUR32, histone-lysine N-methyl transferase SUVR4-like, pentatricopeptide repeat-containing protein, Avena OP45 receptor kinase, MIS2 protein, and E3 ubiquitin-protein ligase WAV3, respectively (Table 4).

Relubrication for spherical plain bearings and rod ends.

Pearson correlation coefficients between plant height and other agronomic traits in the F6:8 RIL lines of WAOAT2132/Caracas.

Are there other special lubes that average home mechanics might want to know about? For example, are there better ways to lubricate a brake hose end before tightening it into the lever? How about derailleur pulleys and joints?

Reviewed by: Matthias Heinrich Herrmann, Julius Kühn Institute, Germany; Kirby T. Nilsen, Brandon Research and Development Centre, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada, Canada

My favorite everyday chain lube if I could only pick one would be Rock’n’Roll Gold lube, great for road and MTB, wet and dry, it’s pretty clean, and tests very fast for a cheap everyday product. Great stuff for the money. In my opinion, a bottle of that, some blue Loctite thread locker, a bottle of Triflow, and a decent mid-viscosity grease like Motorex 2000 along with a mild degreaser and/or some blue Dawn dish soap+water and some scrub brushes is all anyone truly needs to do quality general service of their bike at home.

A u-joint, or universal joint, is a component that connects the driveshaft to the differential, and sometimes connects the driveshaft to the transmission or ...

This is all decreased once I’ve disassembled the bearing shields and seals. This is actually the trickiest part of it all, disassembling and reassembling something that wasn’t designed to be serviceable. I actually trim the bearing seals around the edge to reduce the drag of the contact between the rubber seal and the bearing race. If you ride in a lot of wet weather don’t do this. It’s not worth it. Once I’ve degreased the bearings completely, I use Ceramicspeed Pulley Wheel oil and reassemble the whole thing carefully. We use standard SRAM DUB press fit BBs but everyone always assumes they are some fancy ceramic option because of how effortlessly they spin after this treatment is completed. But yeah — it’s a lot of effort for small gains that most people won’t really benefit from in the same way a World Cup/World Championship winning rider would. However, it is probably the number one thing I am asked about on the topic of lube and bearings and such.

Fundamentally what you are doing is lubing the rollers within the chain. The exterior of the chain could be totally free of any lube and work perfectly if the rollers themselves were lubed. It is somewhat impossible to achieve this with conventional chain lube but the point is there is no point to having any extra lube on the outside of the chain. It only attracts dirt and grit which add friction and promote wear, so the least amount possible is the goal.

The BLASTN analysis by using the aco245 sequence as a query against the recently released hexaploid oat reference genome identified three sequences located on 6D, 6A, and 6C to be highly similar with aco245. Because Dw6 has been mapped on the D chromosome (Zhao et al., 2018), hence one Mb sequences flanking the sequence on 6D were extracted and used for SSR marker identification. A total of 81 SSR primer pairs were used (Supplementary Table 3) to test for polymorphism in the F6:8 RIL population. Of these, five pairs showed polymorphism both in parents and in the contrasting bulks. These polymorphic SSR markers were used to genotype the whole RIL population (Supplementary Table 1 and Figure 3A), and then the generated genotype data were used to create a partial genetic map where the plant height of the RILs was scored as a binary trait and mapped as a genetic marker. Dw6 was mapped to an interval of 1.0 cM flanked by markers SSR83 and SSR120 (Figure 4). The linkage between Dw6 with SSR120 was further validated in seven pairs of NILs contrasting for Dw6. Polymorphisms were observed for SSR120 in the 14 NILs, which corresponded exactly with their plant heights (Figure 3B and Supplementary Table 2). The allelic frequency of the most linked marker SSR120 was tested on a set of 48 diverse oat accessions including ten hulless oats and 38 hulled oats (three accessions OT207, Potoroo and AC Ronald have been reported to carry Dw6). The result showed that marker SSR120 differentiated all semi-dwarf lines including these Dw6-containing accessions and one dwarf line Drummond with an unknown dwarf gene from the others (Supplementary Figure 3 and Table 2).

This study was carried out to get a better understanding of the genetic effects of the GA-sensitive Dw6, the only dwarfing gene in oat that has been used for cultivar development, on a range of agronomic traits, including plant height, coleoptile length and yield-related traits. Homozygous F6:8 lines derived from a cross between WAOAT2132/Caracas were used in this study to evaluate the effects of Dw6 in a subtropical environment in southwest China.

No lie, two weeks ago a customer came into my shop stating he had seen online that there is a product to spray on disc brakes to quiet them down, and he came in to see if we had some he could purchase. So I don’t know where people are getting their information but as long-winded as my answers are I am afraid no one will read this and people will continue to buy bulk shipments of WD40 from Amazon and douse their bikes in it and I will be fighting this battle until I die with no measurable improvement among humanity at large. I have accepted this.

I should mention Loctite and similar brands here, too. Loctite manufactures dozens of products with very specific applications formulated to work with different materials; for most pressfit bearing assemblies (particularly when the bearing seat is alloy rather than carbon) I will use a retaining compound Loctite (typically green color) which fills micro-voids and gaps between the two contacting surfaces and prevent movement, and also eliminating creaks. It works best in metal on metal applications and they make a rubberized type that is better suited for carbon applications. As a thread locking agent, (Loctite 246 for example) it also works as a “grease” of sorts, in that it prevents the likelihood of corrosion by coating the surfaces to which it is applied and acting as a moisture barrier.

The effects of Dw6 on plant height (PH), panicle length (PL), Number of whorls on the main tiller (NW), spikelet number per panicle (SP), productive tiller number (PTN), hundred kernel weight (HKW), kernel length (KL), kernel width (KW), kernel perimeter (KP) and coleoptile length (CL). Significance between tall and dwarf groups was tested using a one-tailed Student t-test. ns, non-significant; *, significant at p < 0.05; **, significant at p < 0.01.

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W2X HEPCO-BWC Track roller. Plewiska (73) on stock. Katowice (9) on stock. Log in to see the price. HEPCO-BWC Attributes. Substitutes (1).

World Cup mechanic Brad Copeland took the time to go over nearly every moving and clamped piece of the bike, sharing his knowledge from working on Kate Courtney’s Scott bikes as well as his off-season work at a local California bike shop. Copeland has shared loads of info with us in various tech articles and in a podcast episode. This time we asked for a lot, and he delivered. So let’s learn about lubricants together.

I like dry lubes on mountain bikes if the conditions are good. They dispel dirt and grit rather than clinging to it and drawing it further into the drivetrain; some test very fast including a proprietary blend we use that is derived from a lube used for R/C helicopter motors (insanely high rpm on a fairly small motor needs low friction, high durability and doesn’t get slung all over the place at high RPM). It doesn’t last very long but long enough to complete a mountain bike race. I also really am impressed by the treated race chains from CeramicSpeed and IceFriction which I’ve used over the years, mostly because they start out “fast” but more importantly they don’t degrade as quickly as conventional chain lubes. They may start 3-5w faster (in terms of coefficient of friction as measured in a lab) but could end up 10-12w faster than a chain lubed conventionally by the end of a race. So that’s something to think about as well. Many of the boiling methods (molten speed wax comes to mind) simulate the process the fancy treated race day chains go through and are repeatable/re-treatable at home. Not a bad product but it’s a lot of effort!

Oh god. The things I’ve seen. First of all, do not spray ANYTHING on your disc rotors or calipers. I’m worried the world isn’t ready for disc brakes. Or bike shops aren’t doing their job educating consumers. Something is wrong here, that is for sure. I will also say I think road cyclists tend to be less concerned about maintenance things than mountain bike riders, maybe because the road bikes are a bit less dynamic so it’s not something many road cyclists obsess over in the way some MTB riders do, and the bikes have less tunable functionality in general. Most people just get on a road bike and go, at best maybe they pump their tires up every time to a specific pressure but even that is a long shot for most road riders.

Indeed, many reported dwarf genes in crops have negative effects on yield and (or) yield components. Short coleoptile and low early seedling vigor associated with some dwarf genes, particularly these GA-insensitive genes, such as wheat Rht-B1b, Rht-B1c, and Rht-D1b, are the likely reasons for the lower yields in an adverse environment (e.g., deep sowing) (Allan, 1989; Rebetzke et al., 1999; Addisu et al., 2009). Other studies showed some dwarfing genes negatively affected the grain yield by decreasing the grain size (Chen et al., 2013), kernel thousand weight (Kantarek et al., 2018), or other yield components (Kowalski et al., 2016). However, the yield penalty caused by Dw6 has been assumed to be the failure of the panicle to fully emerge from the leaf sheath (Milach and Federizzi, 2001).

The current version (Avena sativa-OT3098 v1, PepsiCo) of the oat reference genome has been independently annotated by using transcripts from Hu et al. (2020) and PacBio data generated by PepsiCo, respectively (see text footnote 1). Hence, transcripts from both sources between the flanking markers were retrieved. The physical positions of some of the transcripts were overlapped, indicative of the presence of redundancy among these transcripts. Hence these transcripts were filtered based on their physical positions (i.e., the transcripts with the largest coverage were retained as the representatives). The remaining transcripts were used to search for orthologous sequences in the NCBI database2 using BLASTN and an E value less than e-10.

Seeds from the 60 RILs described above were used to assess the coleoptile length by using the method as described (Luo et al., 2020). Briefly, uniform, healthy-looking seeds of each line were sown at 2cm depth in individual 6 × 6 cells of germination trays filled with washed river sand (13% v/W moisture) and placed at 4°C for 2 days to remove any residual seed dormancy and ensure even germination. These trays were then stored in a growth chamber with a constant temperature of 20°C. After 14 days, the seedlings were pulled out carefully and the coleoptile length was assessed as the distance from the end of the grain to the coleoptile tip. Ten coleoptile length measurements from each line were ranked and the six longest values (free from any abnormalities) were used to calculate the mean.

So my opinions are based only really on what I’ve seen, and the conditions I find myself in. What works for me may not be as effective in a different environment, or a different application, so it’s important to really feel things out and keep an eye on how things seem to be working. Talking to an experienced mechanic in your home environment may give some insight into what works well locally for the application you require. Local bike shops are probably the greatest underutilized resources to really dial in your lube theory if you can find a good one.

Here it is a little dependent on the bike and the application. Anti-seize is great when combining two dissimilar metals because it acts as a barrier preventing chemical bonding (seizing) from occurring. As water enters the seat tube, it can catalyze chemical exchange between metals, so a complete coating of anti-seize can prevent this exchange. Of course, simply pulling and cleaning the post and seat tube periodically is a wise idea, also because grit and dirt particles enter the system with the water that inevitably works its way in, and this can lead to creaky sounds as well whether from frame flex under lateral loading or weight-bearing creaks from hard, seated efforts. Of course, grease is also fine and helps with water resistance and creak reduction.

The original contributions presented in the study are included in the article/Supplementary Material, further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding author/s.

Can you tell us a couple of the specific lube practices you use with Kate’s race bikes that you might not use on a customer’s?

A preliminary annotation has been performed based on transcripts from Hu et al. (2020) and PacBio data generated by PepsiCo for the version 1 OT3098 reference genome assembly. A total of nine transcripts with non-redundancy were identified within the region where Dw6 was mapped in this study. One (TRINITY_DN32248_c0_g1_i1.path1) of them was found to have high homology to wheat and other plant sequences annotated as auxin-responsive protein SAUR32 (Table 4), a potential candidate gene for the Dw6/dw6 locus. SAURs (Small auxin-up RNAs) are the early auxin-responsive genes represented by a large multigene family in plants (Hagen and Guilfoyle, 2002). Many studies have reported the wide involvement of SAURs in regulation of plant growth, particularly cell elongation, via auxin signaling, as reviewed by Stortenbeker and Bemer (2019), hence this gene might be considered as the potential candidate gene for Dw6 locus. A previous study revealed that line with Dw6 is responsive to exogenously added GA (Milach et al., 2002), but no such study has been performed to test the response of Dw6 to auxin. However, much evidence has been reported the crosstalk between GA and other phytohormones functions in plant height control, as reviewed by Wang et al. (2017). Besides, there is one gene (Pepsico2_Contig3963.path1) that showed high homology to sequences annotated as E3 ubiquitin-protein ligase, which belongs to a protein family that is well known to control every aspect of eukaryotic by promoting protein ubiquitination and degradation (Zheng and Shabek, 2017). In barley, the dwarf gene Brh2 encodes a U-box E3 ubiquitin ligase, brh2 mutants showed a strong semi-dwarf phenotype (Braumann et al., 2018). Likewise, a spontaneous rice mutant, erect leaf1, a gene encodes a U-box protein which possesses E3 ubiquitin ligase activity, produced a dwarf phenotype with short grains (Sakamoto et al., 2013). Caution is also advisable when drawing conclusions because the current annotation is relatively preliminary which might underestimate the actual number of genes in this region. Therefore, additional efforts and a fully annotated reference genome are needed to identify the causal gene for Dw6.

This is a question that a lot of riders struggle with to get right, I think. It depends on many things — although every ride is probably too soon for most people (unless it follows a degrease and scrub session first). And that’s not entirely necessary either unless you like your bikes to be showroom quality at all times.

Presence of Dw6 and subsequent effects on plant height and some other agronomic traits including panicle length, number of whorls, productive tiller number and spikelet number per panicle was plotted in Supplementary Figure 2 and also examined with PCA and the fundamental patterns among the traits were illustrated by a GT-biplot (Figure 2). The GT-biplot explained 77% of the total variation of the standardized data. The large, obtuse angle between vectors defining plant height and the Dw6 allele indicated a strong negative correlation for these two traits. A strong negative correlation between Dw6 and panicle length was also revealed by the large obtuse angle. The near perpendicular vectors indicated a near-zero correlation between Dw6 and number of whorls, as well as between Dw6 and spikelet number per panicle, whereas the 45° angle between vectors defining Dw6 and productive tiller number suggested a positive correlation for these two traits. Other prominent relations revealed from the GT-biplot included a strong positive correlation between number of whorls and spikelet number per panicle and independent variation between panicle length and productive tiller number. The relations among agronomic traits revealed by the GT-biplot were well matched with correlation coefficients as shown in Table 3, indicating the usefulness of GT-biplot in graphically summarizing relationships among agronomic traits.

It all depends! But here are some examples: for threaded BB assemblies I typically reach for a copper paste type anti-seize compound or heavy waterproof grease. I’ve had great luck with grease formulated for marine/water-intensive applications because it is formulated to resist being washed away and is meant to keep water out — two things that are very good in the BB area! Anti-seize accomplishes this as well. Because this is not a lubrication application but rather a layer of grease meant to resist corrosion and bonding between two threaded components, a grease that won’t be displaced or washed away is the best idea. If the frame is titanium especially I would use anti-seize compound as it is specifically meant to prevent chemical bonding between two dissimilar metals, and titanium is notoriously prone to this phenomenon, particularly in bikes that do not see regular service. A single application of Anti-seize will outlast humanity on this planet.

Ranges, means, and differences for investigated agronomic traits between tall and dwarf F6:8 lines of WAOAT2132/Caracas population and the estimated effects of Dw6.

My favorite chain lube of all time is Ceramicspeed UFO Drip. They call it a chain treatment. Whatever you call it, it’s amazing and the amazing feeling it creates is pretty obvious if you have a sense for things like that. It’s dry, clean, lasts a long time, is super fast, works well in wet conditions too, and closely approximates the performance of a factory-treated race day chain like their own UFO treatment or IceFriction’s similar offering. And of course, you can reapply it and keep the dream alive once it wears off. It is very expensive, but so is everything else that I like. These factory-treated raceday chains are probably the best option overall for pure performance, but most people wouldn’t experience life changing benefits from using them, and they cost a lot for a relatively short-lived experience. But the benefit is real and they do perform extremely well and we do use them occasionally.

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3 x 8 x 4 mm Deep Groove Ball Bearing, 10 Pcs, Double Metal Shielded Miniature Ball Bearings, Fit for Skateboard Bearings, Hand Spinne, Cooling Fan etc. (Pack ...

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

There’s a tradition of using linseed oil on spoke nipples when building a wheel. Is that still effective, or is there another lube that’s preferred?

It is not a very good lube, and is referred to sometimes as a packing grease, meant to inhibit corrosion in the presence of moisture. It won’t hurt anything to ride it this way, but it will have more drag than quality chain lube would have and it’s quite a sticky substance so it attracts dirt. I will wipe them down with a degreaser in a rag to get the external grease coating off and run them like that when new if it’s not for a race because it’s a pretty durable lube, but if it’s for a race application I’ll degrease it out of the package when new and then a few more times before the actual race so I know it’s as flushed of this factory grease as possible so I’m therefore getting the most benefit from the higher performance lubes we use for racing.

However, neither grease nor anti-seize should be used on carbon frames as they act as a lubricant, and carbon bikes typically spec light torque values on their seat collars or binding mechanisms so as not to damage the lightweight materials. For these bikes, a carbon paste (fiber grip, etc.) is recommended because it enhances friction between the post and frame, allowing more clamping friction at lower torque values, so your seat post doesn’t slip even at only a handful of Newton meters’ worth of torque. You can often get away with a bare post in a carbon frame these days, but I recommend a carbon paste. For aero seat posts the theory gets weirder — I often use carbon paste at the front and back edge of the seat post here, so it is creating extra friction, and a bit of grease only on the flat sides of the post to offset any creaking that can occur. Typically the fit of an aero post into a frame is not as “perfect” as a round post in a round tube, so small gaps and imperfections of the fitment between the post and frame can leave tiny gaps or other opportunities where creaky sounds due to slipping or sliding of the contacting of surfaces can occur. Most of these aero frames use a clamp, or internal wedge mechanism that pulls or pushes the post against either the front or back of the seat tube, so the front and back is in contact with the frame and/or clamp where the “hold” comes from on these frames, so that’s why I use a bit of friction paste only at those locations on an aero road or TT/Tri frame. I never put it on the sides because it only increases the likelihood of creak sounds as the post and frame slide against one another under load. So either grease or nothing at all on the sides to mitigate this tendency.

Plant height and other yield-related traits including panicle length, number of whorls (branches) on the main tiller, spikelet number per panicle, and productive tiller number were evaluated in all three environments with the exception of productive tiller number which was not counted in the 2019–2020 cropping season. For measurements of the abovementioned traits, five representative plants in each line from the middle part of the row were chosen, and the mean values of each trait were used for further analysis. To evaluate the effects of Dw6 on kernel weight and size, 30 RIL lines with short stature and 30 RILs with tall plant height were randomly selected. These lines together with their parents were used to measure the hundred kernel weight and kernel size including kernel length, kernel width and kernel perimeter. Hundred kernel weight was measured by a random selection of 100 mature seeds from each line after air-dried at 35°C to constant weight, and the mean value of three replications was used. Whereas for measurement of kernel size, 30 dried seeds were randomly selected and dehulled by hand following by scanning on a flatbed scanner. The scanned images were then analyzed using the WinSEEDLE Pro 2012a Image Analysis System (Regent Instruments, Inc., Quebec, Canada) to obtain the kernel length, kernel width and kernel perimeter data.

Dw6 was derived from oat line OT184 through fast-neutron irradiation (Brown et al., 1980). It is a dominant and gibberellin (GA) sensitive gene that conditioning semi-dwarfness (Brown et al., 1980; Milach et al., 2002). Mutation line with Dw6 allele has a normal internode number but with a significant reduction in length of the highest three internodes compared with its non-dwarf counterpart (Milach et al., 2002). The Dw6 allele could reduce up to 37% of the plant height on average in some cultivation environments (Milach et al., 2002). Though the effects of Dw6 on oat plant height have been extensively investigated, there has been only a small amount of work exploring the potential yield improvement offered by Dw6, or its effects on other important traits. Field experiments in Australia showed oat cultivars with Dw6 have outyielded taller types in most regions of Australia (Barr, 1984; Anderson and McLean, 1989), and have rapidly replaced the formerly widely grown tall cultivars (Anderson and McLean, 1989). However, such an increase in yield has not been observed in other studies. Marshall et al. (1987) observed the conventional height cultivars have a higher yield than the dwarf ones at different management levels in Pennsylvania. After examining the effects of Dw6 on yield and agronomic features that are closely related to yield of oat at three locations in central Alberta, Canada in three consecutive cropping seasons, Kibite and Clayton (2000) reported a significant negative effect of Dw6 on grain yield, test weight, and kernel weight.

Yes I do — a heavy grease on the spindle/bearing interface is great for preventing […] load-bearing creaks and also helps everything slide into place during assembly. Pedal spindles may be titanium in which case I use a copper paste/anti-seize compound; however, a very thick, moisture-resistant grease (such as what might be used on the BB spindle) can also work well here, and for bikes whose pedals are regularly removed, this works fine.

I also coat as much of the bike as I can (without hindering its performance) in silicon-based spray to help prevent mud accumulation when racing in those conditions. Bikes weigh 8-10 pounds more when covered in thick mud so whatever can be done to offset this is significant. If you look at Kate’s bike post-race you’ll see the wheels and sidewalls of the tire are still perfectly clean despite the atrociously muddy conditions at Worlds last year. I like to think the accumulation elsewhere on the frame was also less than it would have otherwise been. These are some good things to think about if you race in mud or ride in mud frequently

There is a whole massive industry behind grease and oil theory, as well as their alter ego: solvents and cleaning agents — and there are sub-genres within these categories aimed, at times, at specific bike-related applications (whether legitimate or a product of targeted marketing). Most pro teams have sponsors in these areas and it’s a large industry that employs lots of smart people. So put down that can of WD-40 before you hurt yourself. Grease and oils can be engineered to promote or enhance a distinct characteristic, whether it be lubricating, supporting contact/loads, preventing corrosion/seizure/chemical bonding, or penetrating stuck fixtures. Some grease and oils are marketed as all-encompassing or universal in their application, but while some lube is (almost) always better than none, having the right stuff for the job makes the results much better.

The original contributions presented in the study are included in the article/Supplementary Material, further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding author/s.

I say use it. It almost never is better to not use it, as it allows the least amount of bolt torque to create enough grip that things stay put, fundamentally that’s what it’s all about and where it differs somewhat from grease in theory. Carbon paste reduces the need for bolt torque and thus clamping force, eliminating or reducing the stress applied to a clamped carbon tube — carbon is super strong but over tightening it inside of a stem clamp for example can expose its Achilles heel— once it is crushed and the integrity of the fibers or the resin structure is damaged, it is not safe to use. A good torque wrench and some carbon paste is a pretty cheap insurance policy.

The RIL population showed a bimodal distribution for plant height in each of the three environments of testing (Supplementary Figure 1), confirming the height of this population was governed by a single major gene. RILs in this population were subsequently divided into two groups, tall vs dwarf, on the basis of the plant height. Most of them (264/269) were consistent in categorization in all environments and used to evaluate the effects of Dw6 on agronomic traits (Supplementary Table 1). The ranges, mean values along with standard deviation (SD) for the tall and dwarf groups were summarized in Figure 1, the mean differences between these two groups and the effects of dwarfing gene on agronomic traits were estimated and were given in Table 2 (see Supplementary Table 1 for raw data). The plant height and panicle length of the dwarf group were significantly shorter by at least 37.66 and 13.99%, respectively, than that of the tall group (Table 2), indicating a very strong negative association between Dw6 and plant height, as well as between Dw6 and panicle length. However, such reduction in plant height and panicle length between the tall and dwarf groups in the RIL population was less than that in the two parents. A strong negative effect of Dw6 on kernel weight was also observed (Table 2), which could cause an average reduction of 20.07% for kernel weight across three environments. Further comparisons of the kernel sizes revealed that the kernel length of the dwarf group is significantly shorter than that of the tall group in each of the three environments of testing (Table 2). These results indicated a strong negative association between Dw6 and kernel length. Correspondingly, the kernel perimeter of the dwarf group was less than that of the tall group by 3.79% in general (Table 2). Unlike the negative effects of Dw6 on kernel length, the effects of Dw6 on kernel width were inconsistent in three environments (Table 2), which suggested that kernel width might be affected more by the environment, rather Dw6 in this study. By contrast, lines with Dw6 have more productive tillers than Dw6-absence lines by 10.53 and 10.11% in 2018–2019 (WJ) and 2018–2019 (CZ), respectively, indicative of a significant positive association between Dw6 and productive tiller number. Number of whorls per panicle was the same for lines containing tall and dwarf Dw6 alleles. Interestingly, the spikelet number per panicle, a closely yield-related trait that was much lower (26.81% on average) in the dwarf parent than that in the tall parent, showed no significant difference between tall and dwarf lines, suggesting a weak association between Dw6 and this trait.

Editor’s note: Purchase links included here do not necessarily represent a specific product endorsement, and were added during the editing process by the Singletracks team.

The mean value along with standard deviation of plant height and other investigated agronomic traits observed in Dw6 containing parent WAOAT2132 and tall parent Caracas in different growth environments.

Correlation coefficients between plant height and other agronomic traits in the RIL lines were shown in Table 3, which revealed that plant height was very positively and significantly correlated with panicle length (r = 0.69), whereas it had a negative but not significant correlation with productive tiller number. Highly significant correlations were also observed between plant height and hundred kernel weight (r = 0.57), kernel width (r = 0.53), and kernel perimeter (r = 0.37). No significant correlation was observed between plant height and number of whorls, spikelet number per panicle, kernel length or coleoptile length.

What are your thoughts on products like Fibergrip for holding handlebars and other carbon-on-carbon components in place?

I should maybe elaborate that on slip-fit systems (a BB30 spindle that slides through a bearing) rather than a threaded system that screws together to a hard stop (like a pedal) dictates my choice between the two — anti-seize has very fine particles of soft metals suspended within it to enhance its chemical barrier between two contacting metal surfaces. Therefore, on pressfit or slip-fit assemblies this can act as a micro-abraiding compound and slowly wear the contacting surfaces under load and over time if it is used in these applications. If you aren’t sure, heavy grease is a safe option. Anti-seize does a great job but if you are careful and have routine maintenance performed on your bike you are unlikely to encounter scenarios where seizing of parts actually occurs.

What are some of your favorite lubes to work with as a professional race mechanic? Are there any that you won’t substitute, regardless of sponsorship agreements?

19852 Vice Parallels - QuickChange. for use with QuickChange master jaws 19850, material: Cast iron.

The Supplementary Material for this article can be found online at: https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpls.2021.668847/full#supplementary-material

*A BLASTN search against the NCBI database (http://blast.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/Blast.cgi) was performed to search for orthologous sequences with an E value less than e-10. NA: No significant similarity was found.

Most suspension manufacturers today have pretty specific fluids and greases that they specify for their products. If you don’t know exactly what you are doing and why, I would advise against deviating from these specifications. To answer the question, yes and no — some products are interchangeable among fork and shock but some oils and other fluids are of a specific weight/viscosity to be used only in one or the other suspension component. All manufacturers offer this information and most sell their own formula of oil and grease to be used in these service applications with their products specifically. I do occasionally use a product called Hyper Wiper which is just a dust seal lube and works well to get the sliding surfaces sliding really well on fork, shock, and seat post, and helps overcome the “stiction” sensation that can come from the tight tolerance of the fit between stanchion and external dust wiper seal. Otherwise, when servicing these items I follow the instructions and use the recommendations provided by the manufacturer.

Example of marker profile generated by the primer pair SSR120 in two parents and partial F6:8 progenies (A), as well as in 14 near-isogenic lines contrasting for Dw6 (B). M: marker, P1: WAOAT2132, P2: Caracas, D: dwarf progeny, T: tall progeny. The dotted arrow indicates the polymorphic bands in this locus. Character after underscore line in part (B) represents the phenotype of corresponding material, T, tall; D, dwarf.

The objectives of this study were to evaluate the effects of Dw6 on plant height and some other yield-related agronomic traits, including panicle length, number of whorls (branches) on the main tiller, spikelet number per panicle, productive tiller number, kernel weight, kernel size (length, width and perimeter) and coleoptile length under subtropical growth conditions, and to develop new SSR marker using the recently published hexaploid oat reference genome for further mapping Dw6 using a RIL population.

I’m betting some impassioned wheelbuilders will take issue with my remarks, and I’m sure many effective approaches exist here. I’m also sure linseed oil works perfectly well most of the time, just as I’m sure its use predates modern, high-end wheel technology including alloy nipples and teeny tiny gauge spokes. Additionally, the way bikes are ridden can dictate which lubes are used across all manner of lubrication points, so while linseed oil may be just fine for many people, some who take things to the limit may need something more robust than that.

Yes, absolutely. I’d say there are special lubes I still don’t know about. There really are so many specific and nuanced products out there and they exist, for the most part, for a reason. Sometimes, products from other industries perform as well or better than things commonly found in the bike shop, too. Marine-grade greases are a good example of this. Anti-seize is in fact basically derived from automotive or more industrial applications.

A partial genetic map of Dw6 based on data from 264 F6:8 families of WAOAT2132 × Caracas population. Genetic distances in centiMorgans (cM) are given on the left and marker loci are named on the right side of the map (LOD = 3.0).

I have a few formulas from CeramicSpeed that are excellent and made for different conditions. That’s what I use on my bikes and the race bikes I service. Motorex and Muc-Off make some great ones too that I have personally experienced using. Essentially you want something that is both a lubricant and also a moisture barrier, as moisture-induced corrosion leads to rapid deterioration of the bearings on your bike, and the BB is the lowest point in the frame where all water wants to end up. Grease acts as a barrier against water incursion, and also the bearings and races coated in grease will dispel any water that does make its way in, forcing it to go somewhere else (think “oil and water”).

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2024423 — Then show that the value of 'k' is '7'. Marks 10 15 20 25 30 No. of students 3 4 k 5 1 ​.

To visualize the relationships existing between the investigated traits, a genotype by trait (GT) biplot was generated using package GGEBiplots implemented in R. GT-biplot is an implementation of the GGE-biplot technique [a methodology to graphically summarize the effects of genotype and genotype × environment interaction (Yan et al., 2000)] to study of the genotype by trait data (Yan and Rajcan, 2002). To this end, a two-way matrix of means was generated for lines and agronomic traits averaged across environments. An additional column was included in the matrix giving the grouping information (0 = dwarf or 1 = tall) for each line. A GT-biplot was built by plotting the first principal component (PC1) scores of the genotypes and the traits in relation to their corresponding scores for the second principal component (PC2) resulting from singular-value decomposition (SVD) of trait-standardized data (Yan and Rajcan, 2002). The correlation coefficient between any two traits is approximated by the cosine of the angle between their vectors (angle ≤ 90°, positive correlation; angle = 90°, no correlation; angle ≥ 90°, negative correlation), while the variations of the traits are reflected by the vector lengths (Yan and Rajcan, 2002).

Fundamentally the approach is always the same: to strip every last molecule of oil/old lube/dirt from the chain and then apply the appropriate lube for the given conditions of the race. Four or five revolutions of the crank add up to the full length of the chain so I don’t go much beyond that, and I pinch the chain and run it through my fingers to squeegee it all in there to try to help it get into the rollers. I wipe the rest away. If you lube your chain once in a while and wipe it off every time you ride you’re doing it right. More lube does not really help but a lot of people feel like they are doing something productive by lubing their chains a lot. Most cyclists could probably stand to do it less. Nearly all could stand to wipe their chain off more. If you do, your drivetrain will not accumulate gunk and turn black and disgusting nearly as fast. That happens from over-lubing it.