What Have You Fettled Today?

[ColinJ]

... checked the brake blocks on mine but left them on as there's at least another 2 weeks worth of rubber left on them yet

Been there, done that, destroyed a rim!

It was my first mountain bike which had V-brakes. I thought "I won't change the blocks, there's enough rubber left for a couple of rides yet". Dry rides, maybe, but not a really wet one. I ended up bombing down a treacherous, wet, rocky descent. I could hear the grit wearing the blocks away, and then sparks started to fly but I couldn't stop braking or I'd have crashed for sure. By the time I got down to level ground, one rim was toast!

Changing brake blocks is cheaper ...

 

[potsy]

I may have been exagerating slightly
If I was riding tomorrow with you I would certainly have changed them, those descents are lethal!!

Am impressed with the life of the koolstops though, I expected to be changing them every 1000 miles or so but they've lasted much longer than that.

 

[ColinJ]

Am impressed with the life of the koolstops though, I expected to be changing them every 1000 miles or so but they've lasted much longer than that.

I find that road brake blocks last an awful long time except when doing a lot of heavy braking in wet, gritty conditions. I think I might be only on the second set of blocks on my Cannondale and I've had that for nearly 10 years. I've ridden at least 10,000 miles on it, but only about 400 miles or so were in wet conditions.

 

[Theseus]

Put snow tyres on the utility bike.

 

[mcshroom]

Took the rack off of my mountain bike. Then went and got it very muddy

 

[deanE]

I didn't think it was possible to have more than a 16T jump between front rings.

you are right of course. Senior moment. It was 50/34.

 

[slowmotion]

I took off the back wheel and tried to remove Dutch sand/oil gunk from the cassette. Twisted up baby wipes just moved it around, particularly on the smaller cogs, but matchsticks and wipes were wonderful. ( Fish around with matchsticks to get rid of the worst crud before using wipes. Cut the baby wipes into three strips before twisting them up. They get into a ten speed cassette more easily) . Off came the chain, and into a bottle of de-greaser, detergent wash, thorough rinse in clean water and then into the oven at 70 centigrade for a couple of hours before re-oiling. I took off the drop-out hanger for the rear mech so that I could get to the pivots more easily, wiped the whole thing down with baby wipes and re-oiled the pivots. Oh well, by now I was on a OCD roll so I took off the biggest chainring and cleaned it with wipes... ditto the other two rings. In so doing, I dropped a connecting bush into the grass on our lawn.....never try to fettle your bike outside, even if it is glorious sunshine. By some miracle, it was found.

On it went...oiled the brake pivots, wiped the road grease off the rims, checked the tyres for crud, wiped down the frame, and realised that I needed a ride before the whole day was lost. I went for a three hour pootle and came back in the dark. It's probably just a psychosomatic delusion, but the bike felt really good.

That's the annual clean sorted...

 

[hooter]

Hi

It was my birthday recently and friends and family bought me bits for my Orbea Aneto. So today a

Brooks B17 saddle
XT front mech
XT Shadow long cage rear mech
24t inner chainring
wider ratio Deore casette
chain
SJS XT style thumbshifters
Titec bar ends

went on and the bike got a 15 mile run to see all was well.

The bits that came off will find their way on to the winter hack as things wear on it.

 

[slowmotion]

Hi

It was my birthday recently and friends and family bought me bits for my Orbea Aneto. So today a

Brooks B17 saddle
XT front mech
XT Shadow long cage rear mech
24t inner chainring
wider ratio Deore casette
chain
SJS XT style thumbshifters
Titec bar ends

went on and the bike got a 15 mile run to see all was well.

The bits that came off will find their way on to the winter hack as things wear on it.

Lucky man

Welcome.

 

[gbb]

Yesterday...
I've got too many wheels in my shed, mostly cheap MTB ones, so i decided some have got to go.
Dragged a couple out that were true and overhauled the hubs, ready to sell.
They're running nicely now.

 

[hooter]

<br />Lucky man <img src='http://www.cyclechat.net/styles/default/xenforo/smilies/biggrin.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt='' /> <br /><br />Welcome.<br />

<br /><br /><br />

Cheers mate!

It's great kit and everything is working SO smoothly!

 

[HLaB]

Put snow tyres on the utility bike.

Pessimist Actually I know where you live, you'll probably need them next week

 

[threebikesmcginty]

Treated a shed.

What did you do, take it to the cinema and then a slap-up meal!?

 

[mcshroom]

Will people please stop putting winter stuff on their bikes - I'm going touring in what is going to be sunny warm Scotland in a fortnight!

 

[Hacienda71]

Prepared to fettle front mech due to clicking when using the big ring. Put bike on stand turned crank and noticed that the crank was hitting the ferule on the end of the front mech cable. Bent cable 10 mm clicking sorted.