Bicycle, unchained at Bikerowave

Ever stained your favorite pair of jeans on your bicycle chain? I've actually never had this problem, but many of my friends have had their pant legs greased or torn up during a bike ride. Today, I put together a bike that'd get rid of this dirty issue altogether -- because the bike is entirely chain-free!

Dynamic Bicycles makes a snazzy line of chain-free bicycles that look good and ride easy (here's an explanation of the chainless technology). The Web-based company only lets you order their bikes online. Mine arrived in a box via UPS a few days ago -- and today, thanks to the good people at the Bikerowave, it got assembled!

Bikerowave is a little DIY bike shop in Santa Monica, which serves as the Westside counterpart of sorts to the Eastside's Bicycle Kitchen. For just $5 an hour, you can drop in to use all the bike tools and equipment in the place, maybe even find salvaged parts at a bargain, and work on your bike with guidance from one of Bikerowave’s volunteers.

So that's where I took the bike-in-a-box. Now, it's an actual bike! There it is in its black-and-white glory, above.

Overall, assembly wasn't hard, especially since Dynamic Bicycles includes in its box pretty much all the tools necessary to put the bike together. However, we did run into a couple unexpected issues. The biggest snafu was an unnecessary ferrule on the brake line (right), which we had to take the line apart to remove.

The second issue was that the back fender and one wheel spoke got slightly bent / dented in the shipping -- though neither issue affected the mechanics of the bike at all. The last issue: The back reflector (left) didn't fit anywhere on the bike.

But we got it together! The Bikerowave people attached a couple lights, and now the bike's ready to hit the road. I and a bunch of people at the 'wave tried riding it around a bit. One person even tried attaching a video camera to the handlebars (right).

So far, the Dynamic Bicycle appears to work just like "regular" bikes, sans the problems that come with the bike chain. In addition, the chain-free bike was quieter and the body looks more spare and clean.

A fuller review will come once I have the chance to ride it for a little while. For now, I'm glad that Bikerowave will be using both the tools and leftover parts that came with the bike! Bikerowave even has a recycling system set up, so most of the plastic bags and cardboard wrapping will go into the blue bin. The big bike box itself is being saved for reuse.

Photos by Siel