Bike maintenance woes

I’m beginning to think I should have bought a new bike in the sales.

Measured chain, needs replacing. No problem I’ve spare chains. Oh! None that are 11 speed. It’s ok though as after a quick Google I find that people are happily using 12 speed chains on their 11 speed drivetrains. Happy days.

Chain skips like a bastard. No problem I’ve spare cassettes. Oh! None that are 11 speed. I spie that my son’s old bike has an 11 speed cassette I can borrow so I can join the midweek gravel ride. Shifting is not great but good enough.

Also noticed that the bottom bracket was rough, no problem I’ve a few of these spare, took no time to change.

Ordered new xt cassette and chain.

(all above as per my previous thread)

Back late from work last night, nothing like a bit of late night bike mechanic works.

Cassette and chain fitted no issues.

Shifting is still not great. Maybe I’ll change the cable and outer whilst I’m at it, I have a plenty spare.

Bartape looks shabby, no problem, I’ve spare ones. Fitted gear cable and bartape, no issues (I actually quite like fitting bartape).

Gears are still shifting crap. Spend time trying to sort out the indexing with no joy. Hanger looks a bit off. Then notice the scrape on the rear mech from a fall I had on an icy night ride a few weeks back. I’ve a spare hanger I’m sure, nope already fitted last year. That’ll be £25 please! Better buy two, one as a spare, so now £50.

Jockey wheels look knackered too. Ordered new ones.

Looking at the shifting, it’s not just imprecise it’s also slow moving to the smaller cogs. I suspect the spring has lost some of it’s er… springyness? A new mech is £50 +. It’s a full gear outer and has been since I built the bike in 2020. A quick rummage in the spare bag that came with the frame and I find parts to allow you to run with no outer within the frame. So this is cheaper than a new mech so this is the route I’ll go with but does mean that I’ll have to alter the new gear cable and outer I’ve just installed. Fiddly work.

The new cable does provide better shifting but will need to wait until my new mech hanger and jockey wheels are here to be sure.

Hmmm, the rear brake could do with a bleed and the rear tyre is looking a bit bald, and the rear wheel has a bit play in it…… Aaah! When will this ever end…..

Should have bought a new bike 😞

LOL. This is one of the reasons I have a “spares wall” and that I’ve also tried to standardise across my bikes. I buy components when they are cheapest, then they’re ready to fit when required and I replace them when I see them cheap again.

@scotroutes I grow a little more jealous every time I see that wall.

@didnthurt I had a similar saga getting rid of a creak on my commuter bike. Replaced the whole drivetrain because it was knackered. Still creaking afterwards. Driveside bottom bracket bearing felt a bit rough, so replaced that. Still creaking. Swapped pedals. Still creaking. Headset bearings were done so replaced those. Still creaking.  Regreased cassette on free hub body, creak finally gone. For now. 🤷🏼‍♂️

@scotroutes why have you still got haribo in stock!  That’d get “used” in no time in my garage 🙂

Aaah! When will this ever end…..

See at this point I’d give the entire thing a complete total strip down, right to the bare frame. Then tidy it all up, work out what needs replacing and buy it all, then rebuild it. I hate working piecemeal on bikes. It bugs me to fit (eg) a new chainset without giving the rest of the bike a good going over at the same time.

I think I have enough spares to put some bike shops to shame, but I have real envy of scotroutes’ spares wall.

A mate bent a chainring and replaced it with a new bike.

Chainring= cassette, chain, all three chian rings

The rims were worn ( v brakes), the forks needed a service

And he wanted a new bike 😄🙂

@scotroutes, that is impressive !!
You have inspired me to make a spares wall for the bike shed. I made the most the recent fire sale with enough drivetrain and other consumables to keep me going for years. At present, it’s all in a big cardboard box.

Spent 6 hours on Friday – ‘sorting’ the indexing on a friends bike.  All “worked well” apparently,  but then when he replaced the chain – it started slipping and the indexing “went”.

Bike used for commuting a 28 mile round-trip 3 days a week.

I should have heard the alarm bells ringing or in fact the air raid sirens.

So in order of what was wrong with his bike:

• Snapped rear mech barrel adjuster screw.
• Front mech limit screws seized.
• Outer chainring teeth – I’ve seen sharks with less deadly teeth.
• Both down tube barrel adjusters seized.
• Righthand STI, gear outer not engaged in shifter.
• Rear wheel 10mm out of true.

Then today, “could I at least adjust the front mech so he can at cycle permanently in the big ring and just use the rear mech ” as “he’s signed up for a charity ride in the Isle of White in May”…

So help me…

So help me…

My LBS mostly makes his living from repairing bikes and generally does decent enough business, a weird mix of bikes from the low end stuff right up to top end road bikes cos he sponsors the local cycling club. It’s not uncommon for there to be a Di2-equipped carbon £8000+ road bike hanging up next to a 10-yr old Apollo.

But OMG, the state of some of them. 😳

I saw one in there brought in for a “can you just fix the gears…?” but the bike was missing half its headset (this is completely true – the top bearing had basically disintegrated leaving the steering knocking about like a bag of spanners but the owner didn’t realise this was wrong and just wanted the gears fixing).

Some guy had fitted a new chain himself but routed the chain the wrong side of the little tab on the mech leaving the whole thing rattling away – again he had no idea this was wrong, it had been brought in for something else entirely.

Numerous cases of “can you just…?” but actually it needs a complete overhaul. So many – on the face of it – simple jobs that turn out to be complete nightmares requiring a bespoke order of parts. Recently there was a case of “the brake is making a weird noise…” and he found the rear rotor was worn to 0.6mm (the stated minimum being 1.8mm!)

I got into my groove and have also cured a creak on my full sus, just needed to strip down the pivots and clean, regrease and a rebuild. It was been subjected to a hard week’s riding in some filthy weather so wasn’t unexpected.

Then serviced my hardtail’s bottom bracket, finally I fitted my new Ass Saver Win Wing after my standard Ass Saver was looking worse for wear. This should – hopefully – ensure we go into a period of dry and sunny weather 🙏

Cool spares wall scotroute, I’m actually going to create an inventory on all my spares, but this will have to be after our long period of fantastic weather 😉

I go through all my bikes and those of my spouse twice a year, in the fall and springtime. Full stripdown, service all cup and cone hubs and headsets + pedal bearings, check bottom brackets, swap new pulley wheels when necessary. Change cables and outers as necessary, check brake pads and change fluids to brakes, clean calipers. Put some anti-seize on seatposts.

Drivetrain – under constant surveillance, check chain wear every couple weeks with a good chain checker tool, check cassette cogs and chainring with a piece of brand new chain to see how worn each is – and I stock small cogs for my 11-speed cassettes so they can be swapped separately. On most bikes I rotate 3 waxed chains, to keep them all at about the same amount of wear. Especially the e-bike – rotate chains every couple of weeks of riding.

Keep all spares in a cabinet – several chainrings, cassettes, chains, brake pads, bottom brackets, cables and outers, hoses, a few new chains waxed and ready to go. A few spare hubs and a couple of rims and a pile of spokes, if I need a wheel. And a few wheels, couple of sets for winter studded tire use only (relegate older wheels for winter use).

I work as a mechanic too, so I hate having to do something to my own bikes when its busy season – it is much better to do them all in good time before and after season, so I always have bikes in great shape and ready to go with minimum faff.

crazy-legs, sounds familiar to me re:LBS 🙂 Many customers only bring their bikes for service when they develop some fault that absolutely prevents them from riding anymore, and it is often only that fault they mention when booking the service.

Then when you start to go through the bike when taking it in, everything else is close to ruins too and it usually escalates to a full service + replacing most of the parts on the bike, with the rest of the bits needing an hour in the ultrasonic cleaner to be usable again…

A friends bike, before service (the whole bike looked like this)

After 🙂

Cool spares wall scotroute, I’m actually going to create an inventory on all my spares, but this will have to be after our long period of fantastic weather 😉

I have a spares box instead, errr, several spares boxes. And no inventory.

You know that moment your new headset arrives and you get it out of the box, ready to fit, then remember that you bought one last year and it’s in the storage box that you are literally looking at but you forgot about it and then just bought another one… Yeah, that’s me, every, single, time.