Watch Movies When Riding!
Another world first from BicycleWA. Watch movies whilst riding your bike. On a long boring ride or a tour through wasteland, you can watch a movie or two. Also you can use the age old motorist's excuse when you run into someone - "Sorry Mate! I didn''t see you!" (I was too busy watching a movie). You can also remove it from the bike and sit in your tent and watch movies in the evening. It also allows you to turn it up to full volume and watch a movie at 2 AM and annoy everyone else in the caravan park. We review two devices here so that you can watch movies whilst riding and relieve the boredom.
It all started when I was looking at the touring bars (Aero Bars) hanging off of my handlebars. I thought "What a waste of space". I needed another gadget to put on my bike for those long boring rides. That's when the light bulb went off. They have DVD players in cars now so that the driver can watch movies whilst driving and drinking coffee, so why not on a bike?
Room for a movie player!
Firstly I glued some velcro to the top of the touring bars, so that any device I use can be held there securely. I also discovered that the BOB trailer is good for carrying DVDs around, and also good for placing a solar panel on. The solar panel can power the movie player when it's batteries start to run down. A hub dynamo could also be used to power the player.
The first device I tested was the Sony PSP, (Play Station Portable). This device has several extra bonuses in that you can play games whilst riding, listen to MP3s, and it also has wifi, so if you can obtain a signal, you can surf the internet whilst riding too. It also can view images, so if you have a Sony digital camera, you can take the Pro Duo memory card out and insert it into the PSP. There you go, now you can view the photos of your tour whilst you are actually riding on the tour. I chose a Japanese model of the PSP, as this version is not zoned, so it will play any zone movie on a UMD (sort of a mini DVD), which is a good choice for a touring bike that is likely to go anywhere in the world.
The Sony PSP mounted in place.
The PSP also comes with a remote and earphones, which is handy if the traffic noise is too loud. I found it gave about six hours on the battery, but the good thing is that, you can carry spare PSP batteries, and recharge them at night. There was two shortfalls I discovered with this device. One is that it's volume is not loud enough to annoy people in the caravan park at 2 AM in the morning and the other is if watching it in bright sunlight it's hard to see the screen.
I found that when riding in bright sunlight, I had to lean forward onto the touring bars and rest my arms to cover the screen. After long periods like this I have a tendency to fall asleep and miss the rest of the movie, and a lot of other things as well. As shown in the above photograph, there was still some room, so why not go for a bigger device.
Enter a portable DVD player. Some of these models come with two screens, which will be good for tandem riders. The one I chose has a rechargeable battery which gives about two hours, which is long enough to watch a movie. The good thing about a portable DVD player is that you can pick up DVDs just about anywhere. Hey people even throw them at you from cars. Let's hope the next one thrown at you is a good movie that you haven't seen yet.
Portable DVD player on bike.
The unit I selected also has a carry bag with straps, which give it some extra security when mounting it to the touring bars. This type of unit also allows me to sit in a more upright position and watch a movie. I had to fit a mirror, because the remote doesn''t work when the unit is in the bag. The mirror reflects the remote's invisible rays into the unit, so I can sit back and relax while riding and still be able to pause the movie should something on the road demand my attention. Note in the above photograph, my brifters have no gear cables coming out of the housing. That's because there isn't. I fitted friction shifters.
I also found that this unit was loud enough to annoy the other residents in a caravan park at 3 AM in the morning. This particular portable DVD player has a couple of other useful extras especially for the cyclist. The screen is able to swivel, so you can keep the sun off of the screen. It also has two earphone outputs, so if you are giving someone a ride and they are sitting on your cross bar, they can also watch the movie and listen in.
The other feature, which is really good is that it will accept an input signal from a TV. By hooking up a TV reciever, the signal can then be fed into the unit. Place an aerial on your bike, and you can ride and watch TV as well and not miss an episode of any of your favourite TV series or the Tour de France. This unit also plays VCD and JPEG CDs. This unit also allows you to review your tour photos while you are actually riding the tour. You will need to burn the CD first though.
The portable player and bag.
Both of these units reviewed are not water resistant, so on a rainy day you will have to sit in your tent and watch them. This will give you something to do on those long rainy days. It will save riding in the rain, and you can have an enjoyable day watching movies.
Stay tuned to this area of BicycleWA, because next we will be reviewing the ultimate gadget of all bicycle gadgets, the handlebar mounted ashtray.
Just a short footnote, about why I call aero bars by the name of touring bars instead of tri bars. Legend has it that touring bars were invented for touring cyclists to take the weight off of their arms, long before they were used by tri-athletes. You watch it now, they will steal this idea too.
