Whats the silliest thing you've forgotten for a bike build?

Just had a message asking if I’ve got a spare star flanged but and stem cap for a mates new build.

What have you forgotten you needed until you’ve tried fitting it?

Clown race 🙂

^^ They’re good ones! 😆

On various builds- chainring bolts, gear cable and outter, steerer spacers, BB & disc brake mount to space to 180mm.

Always seems to be little things.

I was quite pleased that I remembered the tubeless valves for the latest project as I already have the tape in stock.

I’m waiting for the photo from northwind when he forgot which way his frame should go.

Cables, usually.

I am wondering if the hoses will be long enough for the wife’s transplant but I don’t want to order 2m of goodridge hose “just in case”.

A torq key (back when they were only ever used for attaching discs to hubs).

I had a beautiful bike in front of me, completely built with no way to get the brakes set up.

My sweary rant on here was my first and only warning.

Not so much forgotten, but on a bank holiday weekend I only had the brakes to finish, and had two lengths of hose, 100cm and 200 cm. I measured very very carefully, then measured again, and then again just to be certain. I needed 75cm for the front, and very carefully cut it from the 200cm piece.

Oh no! ^

Grips were an annoying one. Was happy to no miss anything small or silly then overlook something daft like that. Having the wrong style front mech (back in ye olde times) in the bits box when I thought all the parts were ordered was also annoying 😀

I needed 75cm for the front, and very carefully cut it from the 200cm piece.

Thats tremendous 😆

tidying out box of spares this afternoon and looked through bag of bits I’d bought to replace knackered 9speed on my CX – good news is that I noticed I’d thrown a 9speed cassette in – that won’t work too well with 10speed shifters oh and of course spare inners but no outers 😳 boxing day sales here i come

It took a few failed attempts at clipping in before I realised I had put the drivetrain on the left hand side on my fixie

Build? You guys seem to be talking about assembly problems 🙂

Building frames is where you can really screw it up!

For the last STW balance bike project, we used front wheels on both ends (to keep it lightweight and narrow). Rear disc IS mounts are flush with the inside face of the dropout, whilst front mounts are 4mm (?) outboard. I forgot this…..

Had to chop off the disc mount and make a bolt on doofer with the 4mm offset.

once forgot my brake adapters which wasn’t to clever. Also once neglected to buy the cassette for a new build…

It took a few failed attempts at clipping in before I realised I had put the drivetrain on the left hand side on my fixie

That wasn’t the problem, you were using the wrong pedals, set of eggbeaters and you would have been all good 😉

I swapped my steel Switchback for a Ti one.

I had assumed that all the bits wood swap over as they were the same frames, just different materials. Turns out the seat tube is bigger on the Ti, so had to order a shim for my Reverb.

I’ve forgotten: –
– Headset spacers
– Gear outer

I’ve also: –
– Cut the short length of gear cable from the longer length in the pack – as per the brake hose mentioned in a post above
– Had a rear brake adaptor rather than the front

I have, on more than one occasion, forgotten that I’d already threaded the inner through the outer before deciding to cut the outer down to size…it’s both sad and irritating when you repeat the same mistake.

A torq key (back when they were only ever used for attaching discs to hubs).

Torx. Torque is a turning force. Torq make energy products. Torx are the tools to fit the matching star-shaped fasteners. Sorry, riles me that one.

I don’t think I’ve ever forgotten anything too critical, amazingly!

Cable outers and chain usually for me

Pedals

I always think i have some lying around somewhere but i rarely do.

I once drove from Newcastle to Sheffield to go riding and when I got there I realised I didn’t have my back wheel in the car.

I turned up to a race without a seatpost/saddle some years ago.

Installed a shiny XT crankset on my Orange 5 off my steel hard-tail and couldn’t work out why my leftside crank arm fell off 5 minutes into the first ride. put it back on, couldn’t see a problem, maybe loose bolts? rode on, crank arm came off 5 minutes later and at that point I realise that I’d forgotten to remove the two additional washers on the bottom bracket for a 73mm BB shell. Arse. Had to push the bike 5kms down a fire road to the car.

I usually buy gear cables and brake olives by the handful so I always just assume they’re there, which means about 1 time in 10, I don’t have one.

Similiarly brake hose, I’ve always got spares, and old hoses, so when I went to fit the brakes to my commuter and discovered that all I had was front hoses, I was wroth.

joshvegas – Member

I’m waiting for the photo from northwind when he forgot which way his frame should go.

I knew exactly which way it should go!

I built Spesh Camber up over a weekend a couple of years back. Halfway through my inaugural ride, I discovered that I’d forgotten to fit a front mech.

I was running a 11-32 9 speed cassette… 🙁

A new chain…….was great using the bike as a scooter for half a day before I got to the LBS 🙂

Turned up at a ride with my new ‘built by me’ wheelset on the bike.

Just no front disk.

Inline cable adjusters on the last road build.
£1 each and clean forgot them

Tubes, i always forget tubes

I forgot beer once… The shops were closed

It was a dark moment in my life

since the advent of External BBs, I’ve put the chain ring side of the chain-set on the NDS more than can be explained by chance….

idiot

cut the outer while the inner was still in ha ha ha ha. thankfully there was still plenty of outer left to trim and still have the inner

cut the outer while the inner was still in ha ha ha ha.

Gives a nice clean cut on the outer though doesn’t it 🙂

First time I went on holiday with the OH we went to the Alps and she suggested I take my MTB and that she would drive me to the top of the mountain for me to ride down. Result. 2hr drive to top of mountain only to realise I had left the Thrubolt on the driveway at the house when loading it in the car…

Most recent build – completed yesterday – I forgot to add gear cable ferrules. I discovered this after getting my 1 x 11 perfectly setup, once I’d taken the inner out of the outer, added some ferrules and re-threaded the inner it was all out of adjustment even though I clamped the cable in the same place! I guess the ferrules add a fraction to the gear outer which was enough to make it take another 15 mins!

Probably worst ever build cockup was forgetting to order brake adaptors so had brakes and discs but not way of using either!

Currently building up a couple of old road bikes.

Anyone who moans about new ‘standards’ clearly hasn’t tried this. You’ve more chance of finding the newest Trek-Intense-Cannondale BB6589.3 press fit with threaded bearing shells and expanding wedge lock rings standard BB in your LBS than buying a threaded headset and expecting it to fit onto any particular set of threaded forks and frame.

Less forgetting, more having to take it apart yet again because something doesn’t quite fit.

Torx. Torque is a turning force. Torq make energy products. Torx are the tools to fit the matching star-shaped fasteners. Sorry, riles me that one.

And ironically, rubbish at transferring torque. Good spanners are designed to transfer the torque on the flats, not the corners, torx keys do the opposite. The inside of a socket should actually look a bit like the head of a torx key with 6 semi circles.

I’ve a whole tray full of torx bits with twisted splines that are being reserved for the day I ever need to twist something really hard the other way.

A bit OT, but I did once drive to Scotland with three bikes…. and no pedals 🙁