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Oy Stu! Stop taking the mick 🙂
And when did you last ride a singlespeed?.... 🙂
Back to the OP - Probably the worst that can happen is one of those cr*ppy cartridge headsets falling apart in a pile of rusty muddy dust and then trying to work out from the remains exactly which actual bearing it was. If you have to take it to a shop half done, then if you're not a regular at least they won't make too much fun of you......
I was annoyed last year when I paid LBS for a full service which involved stripping the bike and asked them to additionally swap the suspension forks for a set of rigid forks and got billed an extra £25 to do so.
ey ey mick hope you and mrs mick are both well.
Rode one up and down the road a while ago....
jmatlock.
Just trying to divert thinking about work tomorrow.
Just a bit of light hearted banter.
Really?
Oh sorry I forgot that you think that you working in a bike shop makes you into some kind of a wizard and no one can learn even basic stuff…
Get back in your gravel pit.
Wow, did it take practise for you to learn how to be such a colossal asshat or were you born with the ability?
Just trying to divert thinking about work tomorrow.
Dont turn up, I’m sure your colleagues won’t miss you. Everyone happy.
Even buying a new crownrace would be cheaper and allow swapping back and forth.
And with that comment Stu you have shown that for all your bluster you don't really know what you are talking about . Crown races are specific to the headset that they are supplied with so while you may sometimes get away with it you are likely to get an incorrect fit that will never work properly and may well shorten the bearing life substantially . When you do stuff for yourself you can bodge away till your heart's content but when people are paying you to do this stuff you have to know what you are doing and do it right .
Crown races are specific to the headset that they are supplied with so while you may sometimes get away with it you are likely to get an incorrect fit
I thought they came with forks? 😉 we had a thread and everything!
more seriously, you’d buy the crown race that matched your headset, Shirley?
Crown races are specific to the headset
Noshitsherlock.
You can buy a crownrace to suit you know...
You can buy a crownrace to suit you know…
Do you offer a crown race buying hand holing session too?
Ooh the hitting is Big in this thread...
Do you offer a crown race buying hand holing session too?
What's holing mick?
what you don't know? It's on the MAN test
I have nothing against men that are into holing but it's not for me thanks mick.
Each to their own though.😉
best hand you badge back in then
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Well if you must stalk
Bit stalky.
I’ve fitted two sets of forks with no problems.
The third I measured the steerer tube with the stem off. Didn’t go so well.
I took some forks into green machine in horwich and had the steerer cut down and a new star nut fitted.
£2 (Gave him £5) and completed while I waited....
so errrr you should have paid that much
mick.
Stop taking things so seriously.
Just a bit of fun.
I'll even chuck a couple of quid in your fund if you lighten up a bit.
It's easy to lighted up just follow rule 1......
I'd be honest it's one of the worst features of this forum is hammering people who dare to pay for a bike shop, lots of people in a bubble here. Having done everything from fix things in a LBS workshop to paying for everything to be fixed it's an interesting perspective.
and very seriously unless you are trying to be a **** don't call me Mick, you don't know me and you are certainly not on the list who can.
I’d be honest it’s one of the worst features of this forum is hammering people who dare to pay for a bike shop
No one has hammered anyone but whatever.
It's worth a couple of quid for the entertainment.
Sorry mick it's too funny to stop now.
Sorry mick it’s too funny to stop now.
As an outsider to this, i respectfully disagree.
And people wonder why this forum has a reputation for dickheadism.
Just answer the OP’s question or bugger off, it’s embarrassing and definitely not ‘too funny’ 😳
OP, no more than £50 seems fair.
I took some forks into green machine in horwich and had the steerer cut down and a new star nut fitted.
£2 (Gave him £5) and completed while I waited….
so errrr you should have paid that much
That's a completely different and much easier job
Hands down, Stu has properly gone up in my estimations here. As a very petty man myself I can see the humour in trolling when it’s done well. And this is A grade roasting.
Every, single time people take the bait he lays out and it’s proper comedy genius.
SO many people on here act all serious and are disillusioned into thinking they actually know anything about.....
the bike trade
The design process
suspension fundamentals
geo fundamentals
its cringy.
Also, nice on on the charity thing Mike. I sent a bit your way.
Great thread 😁
As a LBS manager, it’s probabky an hours workshop time.
Possibly, booking in, doing the job, creating an invoice, booking out. So..
OP, no more than £50 seems fair.
But in reality 90% of the time it's only 15-30 minutes of a mechanics time. All the possible problems could happen, but in all probably their just whativery.
I’d be honest it’s one of the worst features of this forum is hammering people who dare to pay for a bike shop,
Yes there's a bit of that, but mostly it's just advise saying, your an intelligent human being. Spend £50 on a few tools, your capable of riding the bike so your capable of learning to do basic jobs on it.
Surely that's what's the forums for ? Advice, passing on knowledge, and when required general pisstaking 😉
I seem to be from the same school as singlespeedstu in that I always do everything on my bike myself (we differ in the fact that I don't act like a dick about it though)
I will however admit that I bodge a lot of it (not cutting steerers straight, not getting SFN in straight, hitting crown race with screwdriver and hammer and you really need to see me fit a headset with blocks on wood and a hammer!). Not only am I too tight to pay a shop I am also too tight to pay for the right tools for the job. It somehow seems to work but I know I am bodging it even while doing it.
too tight to pay for the right tools for the job
Block of wood and a hammer is the correct tool.
It’s easy if you know how and have the tools and experience to hand. If not it can easily go fantastically ruined my new forks wrong.
Even with the most rudimentary tools I fail to see how this could be considered a difficult task, certainly not something worth paying 50 quid for (do you pay the garage extra when working on your car just in case?).
Mike, he's royally taking the mick out of you, stop biting and getting so wound up about other peoples opinions. In all fairness to stu you piled on after he retaliated to peterpoddys snarky remark so stop acting like you're the victim here, if you can't take it don't dish it out in the first place.
Honestly it's like a friggin primary school in here, frankly it's embarrassing to think most of you are about 20 years my senior.
It's very unlikely to involve a crown race anyway.
Bloody amateurs!
Its not a difficult task if you have mechanical knowledge and sympathy but not everyone has.
I seem to remember a thread on here of someone who scored their steerer badly by hamfistedness.
Calm down Mick.
When you know how to do something, it always seems simple and obvious. When you don't know how, most things are not simple and obvious.
When you know how to do something, it always seems simple and obvious. When you don’t know how, most things are not simple and obvious.
Exactly. And it is where you draw the line between having a go or not. I have always done my own bikes since I was around 7 (had a car mechanic father so a lot of tools and advice/assistance when very young). However, I don't tend to do my own cars as don't have the tools or the trust on myself to do it properly. The amount of times I would use any specific tool on a car are so small it would never recoup the price whereas I am forever messing around building up bikes so makes sense to have some tools yet still I don't buy thing like headset presses, SFN installers and the like.
I happily do all my own maintenance, but the last fork swap I did was definitely not easy due to needing to swap the crown race. Carbon forks with no lip to get any purchase on. Going at it with a screwdriver would definitely have gouged the forks. Took two box knives, a hammer and a lot of patience. Refitting was only easy because I happen to have some plastic tube of exactly the right size and a heat gun.
One of my other bikes has the lower bearing press fit onto both the frame and the fork. Removal requires smacking the (carbon) steerer firmly and also having a plan for what happens when the fork does come loose and leaves the frame at high speed.
So yeah, if you've got a split crown race, and loose-fit cartridge bearings, understand how to fit a SFN (and know that you mustn't in a carbon steerer), the steerer is the right length or you know how to measure and cut it, and the brake mounts are the same then yes, swapping forks is a doddle.
Otherwise there is plenty of scope for screwing it up and it might just be worth paying someone with some experience.
if you’ve got a split crown race,
All "crown races" are split if you have a hacksaw.
Very true, but converting to split with a hacksaw before removing it probably won't help the goal of not damaging the forks.
if you’ve got a split crown race,
All “crown races” are split if you have a hacksaw.
I don't get this I have seen it said a load of times on here but surely it only works with a cartridge bearing headset. With a headset where the crown race is actually the bearing race ie one with loose balls then surely you end up with notchy steering as the bearings drop into the cut you have made. Or am I missing something?
Hence using quotes - what most folk are calling a crown race isn't one and I can't think of a single instance when I've had a problem removing an actual crown race from a steerer (YMMV)
what most folk are calling a crown race isn’t one and I can’t think of a single instance when I’ve had a problem removing an actual crown race from a steerer
What is it called then?
I've seen plenty that were a PITA to remove.
in a cartridge bearing headset its not a part of the bearing race at all - its just a spacer / locating wedge / something diffferent
Piece of cake to do yourself, it's really at the beginners level of bike maintenance.
As with everything, if you're really not sure then Youtube is your friend.
I've never seen them called anything other than a crown race even though they're not technically a race.