08/04/2021
That’s really not cool right now! Unfortunately, the two people who built the trailer for us didn’t manage to finish one of the most important things: the bike rack for spontaneous passengers on the Tastdem. We were told that yesterday when we picked it up. Stupid, really stupid. I rarely get annoyed, but this is definitely one of those rare moments.
Anyway, we tried to find a quick solution yesterday and called master carpenter Seidel from Dresden at eight o’clock in the evening. The grandfather of a former student agreed and this morning we went to his workshop at eight in the morning, after we were warmly entertained and looked after by Julius’ family and found a dry place to sleep there.
In order to attach the whole thing, we naturally had to take the whole vehicle off the roof of the car. While the carpenter quickly fetched something from the blacksmith, we took advantage of the opportunity to do a little ride for the first time, which was really annoyingly not possible before, because the engineers unfortunately work in a similar way to us: at the last minute. The student Julius and I on the tandem and Andreas on the cargo trailer. At about fifteen km/h downhill you naturally want to brake, which is what I did with the relatively lightly loaded trailer…
Or rather, I tried to, because as it turned out, the tandem braked wonderfully, but the trailer’s overrun brake apparently didn’t work as it should, because it pushed the trailer hopping past us, sideways, with Andreas looking panicked. Luckily we all came to a stop unscathed and can only be very happy that 1. we weren’t going fast, 2. WEREN’T FULLY LOADED YET!!! and that 3. we were not yet in the Czech Republic but on the doorstep of a carpenter with contacts to other craftsmen and bike shops in Dresden.
Because what turned out after the first moment of shock was that the suspension fork of the front wheel of the trailer had bent. Really bad shit! It’s unthinkable if that had happened with the fully loaded trailer. That shouldn’t have happened and it didn’t even come close to happening with the prototype.
Now we’re sitting here in front of the workshop and trying to use the time as best we can. Andreas is working on the stream so that you can get live videos and I’m just writing the status of things for you.
What happens next? Now that it’s finally 10:00 a.m., we’re going to rush to the bike shop and hope that they have a suitable replacement for us. Then everything will be attached, the brakes adjusted again, everything charged and then we’ll just drive off when we can get going and see when we get to the source.
If everything doesn’t work out, we’ll fly back to Potsdam and swap the prototype trailer for the current one, which we’ve already agreed on. Man, man, man, what excitement after all that excitement!!! Somehow the fun could finally start…
Keep your OPTIMISM!!!!
Next entry: We are exhausted!
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