I bloody love maintaining my bike, love a bit of time in the garage but yesterday, yesterday was horrible. The task was not overly complex on paper, but involved those 2 most horrific of maintenance tasks, mud guards and cable disc brakes.
It was horrific. BB7 brakes are a nightmare to set up at the best of times, when combined with fitting guards, a task that always seems so much harder and more bodgy then it should be. I have bloody hands, grime in my hair, feel like tools every where and the buggers are still not perfect. Horrible, horrible day work.
Never, ever will i fit guards to any of my bikes again, LBS's of the midlands, you can have my business, I'm not interesting in doing it any more.
I don't know why I'm writing this, maybe it's in the hope someone else will agree and can make me feel I'm not alone in my hatred of these tasks.
I know what you mean. It took me nigh on 4 hours on Saturday to get an Stealth Dropper post set-up correctly. Cable length being my main problem. I suppose the 30 minutes scouring the garage floor trying to find a tiny grub screw that ejected itself didn't help. In the end I did a hack - another screw ended up having an altercation with my dremel so it would fit..
I would agree about setting the cable disc brakes up, but gave up on buying these a long time ago.
Mudguards, yes bit of a pain to fit and fettle. But I don't think most bike shops will really go to the extra trouble of making them fit perfectly.
I usually fit them in two separate sessions due to the faff. Fit the front mudguard first, and then fit the rear mudguard later.
I seem to have more patience and a better temperament this way.
grime in my hair
You have hair to get grime in and you're still complaining!!!
Not noticed cable discs are particularly awkward but mudguards...I feel your pain brother. Hateful, loathsome task. Now if you'd added in fitting and getting a front mech to run nicely...that's when tools get thrown.
BB7 brakes are a nightmare to set up at the best of times
Keep the mounting bolts loose, wind the outboard side in by 2 full turns then wind the inboard side in as far as it will go to clamp the disc tight. Fasten the mounting bolts and the cable. Wind back the pads by one full turn and they should be good to go.
Mudguards are one of those things that take practice to get right, and experience to know how to solve any problems that crop up. I’m pretty bloody good at it after working in a shop where most of our bikes were commuter types. You just fit loads of them all the time. Knowing how to solve odd little ways of attaching the mounts and bending the stays, knowing what to trim and where (and having a good set of snips to do it with) and having a supply of odd bolts and spacers is where your LBS comes in. Also the adjustment, which can be tricky to get them following the curve of the tyre perfectly
its usually a 20 min job for me.
Agree with above, I set my TRP up by screwing the pads right in then bolting up.
What Steve said.
Easiest brake in the world to set up. Barely had to touch mine in 14 years & they're still as good as anything newer.
Mudguards... usually a 20 min job for me.
Easiest brake in the world to set up.
Is that the sort of moral support you were after, lunge? 😀
what peter said not hard jobs just need to be methodical and accept that they are designed to fit many bikes and its not bodging its just making them fit (as they were designed - with the many different components they supply)
Only thing that makes BB7s a bit of a pain is the fact they come from factory dry .... so first thing i do is strip them and anti sieze all the threads.
Love fitting mudguards. Actually I love fitting SKS mudguards. The trick is to have the right tools and copious spare fittings from errrrr older SKS sets! They come with spacers now for disk brakes, but these spacers have so many uses! The new plastic stay covers are a big improvement and make readjustment for tyre clearance much easier.
Oh, and I have a dedicated set of heavy duty screwfix cable cutters just for cutting mudguard stays. Of course they weren't originally dedicated, but once you've cut a couple, they aren't fit for much else.
New PC1 chain and brake blocks on the Paddy Wagon yesterday, and I treated her to a metal Kona headbadge over the yellow painted decal. Now that really is love. Plus some fettling of the Ti cross bike too after a long road/swinley/road ride on Saturday. New half price mtb saddle to replace the Arione (needed for another bike) and replaced the white silicone bar tape with black.
Mudugards? No problem. Mudguards whilst using mini-Vs? Trickier...
Reminds me of the mildly frustrating day over Christmas I spent sorting my commuter out with new mudguards / inner & outer cables / bar tape. I didn't even encounter any particular snags, just took me bloody ages - the mudguards were those SKS commuter ones with just the one double-stay that fit round the discs fine, so that wasn't even a problem, every time the clearance at the tyre was perfect, the front of the guard would be off at a jaunty angle - and it still is 🙂
Thank you for your reassuring words! The task was left with a slightly ticking rear brake and distinctly not straight guards. Close enough though and it'll do for the moment.
And yes, in theory BB7's are easy to set up, in practice when you're trying to get the cam lever in the right place compared to the mud guards and they're old, muddy and well used then it's not quite as easy as you might have hoped.
bend the stays on the mudguard so they dont interfere with the brake at all - the two should be entirely independant....
if i remember after lunch ill dig out a photo i took when i set up the wifes mudguards and a bb5....
I spent an hour the other night trying to get a tyre off.
It was glued to the rim with Stans but even so.
Broke a tyre lever and took the skin off every knuckle.