Freeze the post with dry ice or liquid nitrogen.

I wonder how much a specialist carbon repairer would charge to x-ray or otherwise inspect the head tube.

How many spokes remain?

If the spoke broke at the nipple it may be that the spoke path was not properly set and/or the wheel was not properly stress relieved. Other spokes may also be fatigued and at risk of breaking.

In addition to servicing your wheels, you might keep an eye out for a new or used set of wheels that are in good condition. That means if you have any trouble with the service you can still get out on the bike. As already said, 4mm play in sandy conditions could have caused damage to the bearing surfaces. No problem at the rear as you replace the whole cartridge but in the front if the hub cup is pitted you might need a new hub and it will often be easier simply to replace the whole wheel

If it is correct that you have cup and cone bearings up front and cartridge bearings at the rear, for a service you will need.

Set of cone spanners, 3/16 bearings and grease for the front.

Ghetto cartridge removal using a large flat screw driver (used as lever and a drift), a socket and a mallet for installation, plus the right cartridge bearings, possibly 6903-2rs according to some online technical drawings. You can confirm by inspecting the bearing once the wheel is out, the code is usually marked on the seal.

I bought the 10x Chinese ones. Size is ok.

+1 for die drawn slick/polished stainless inners. I was impressed with lifeline compressionless outers too.

It may not be that easy. Left hand side is relatively normal but the wires exit on the right and so you risk damaging them if you mess with that side. Sometimes you can create enough gap in the right to squirt some grease in by loosening the left.

“Excuse me sir, can you stop non-verbally indicating your unease and sort your (total **** of a) wife out while I take care of my injured child?”

Lion bellworks, Birmingham.

I know, no critique intended. Been there and over the bars to avoid t-boning a twit who decided they could turn across me coming down a hill at speed. They did at least pay for a shirt and new helmet but the police said there hasn’t been an accident!

And he could wear the leathers on the road bike too.

Assuming I would not end up hurt more badly I would seriously consider hitting the car in this situation. No contact, not interested is too often the attitude from the police.

Life’s too short to ride a bike that doesn’t feel right for you or for the type of riding you’re doing.

Sell it or swap it for a shorter travel bike.

Blatant attempt to groom someone to sniff your barse. Disgusting.

What is the chainline? If you sight along the fifth sprocket is it aiming at the centreline of the crankset, is between the two rings if it is a double.

If you manually pull the cable does the chain shift well up the cassette?

Really? FEA shows that area at the foot and the crown both see high stresses whereas they’re less in the centre. It’ll be worse on the disc side obviously.

Not to say that particular chip is anything to worry about, but damage in that area certainly could be.

Struggling to understand how the area just above the dropout and right in front of the disc mount is not highly stressed.

There’s a lot of variation in the real width of tyres versus the stated width. Lots of “25s” come up at 26 or 27mm. You could measure the width of your current tyres and the clearance to the fork and try to find out the real width of the new tyres before purchase. Several sites and report this figure.

Is that the biggest tyre you can fit?

Sealed cartridge bearing don’t need greased.

That is pure nonsense. They come with some grease in them, but often there is not enough for bike purposes and the grease may not be sufficiently water and corrosion resistant for the wet conditions a lower headset race on a British bike will see.

Can’t you borrow a thread cutting die from a friendly local stwer?

https://rover.ebay.com/rover/0/0/0?mpre=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ebay.co.uk%2Fulk%2Fitm%2F263440292070

You might find one cheaper.

Actually bearing not pressed on that side would move the rotor away from the frame. It has to be missing something on that side or had something extra on the other side.

Bearing not fully pressed home on NDS?

Sorry, I confused the two rims and gave the erd for the 401 above.

Why not use the dt Swiss calculator? It lists the rim as 603mm.

If you have the rims you could measure the erd yourself to confirm.

In a forest it could be for someone who has killed themselves. A family member doing this leads to a particularly difficult grieving process.

https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/black-country/search-called-after-body-found-16005049

Mental Health

I’ve been thinking about using these on an old frame. Do they flex into tight areas like the BB chainstay bridge area ok?

If you go out dressed like that what do you expect?

I ride a day one singlespeed daily. It’s great in many ways and I’m by no means a weight weenie but I think I could be riding an older steel frame SS conversion that’s a good kilo or more lighter if I gave up the disc brakes!

That’s pretty good, they’re much cheaper and easier to find than I assumed they would be.

Outside edge of the disc hitting the caliper body, requiring your weight to compress everything very slightly? Should see some scratches to the inside of the caliper body if this is the case and maybe a shiny portion of the disc edge.

Would probably be more scrape or tinkle than tap though.

Is switching to a square taper BB as cranks an option? Probably the cheapest way of getting 165mm cranks. Eg sugino rd or one of the rebrands of the same like spa XD. Not sure how chainring compatibility would work with the eagle but I’d guess you can find a 34t chainring that will work.

Loctite is better for cleat bolts

I like a calcium sulfonate thickened grease for the water resistance, Shimano Dura ace grease is of this type. Extreme pressure solid lubricants and anti corrosion additives are useful too.

Some people say a bicycle hub or BB is relatively undemanding compared to other applications and therefore any lithium grease will do. These people are wrong.

Hubs and BBs are slow moving moving compared to other applications (like an electric motor or car wheel bearing) but rather than being simple, slow moving, highly loaded and relatively poorly sealed bearings operating in wet, and in winter salty environments are in fact a very demanding application for lubricants. Xhp 222 isn’t a bad choice, the 222 special would be even better with added molybdenum disulfide but it’s not easy to find.

TF2 is probably fine for the summer on a friend’s bike since you’re already doing them a favour. On the other hand, if that’s the best you’ve got you might as well get yourself and great them to a better grease. How about some motorex bike grease 2000? Water resistant and relatively easy to buy online.

The nipple head is approximately 2mm deep and would take about 5 turns to traverse (56tpi). Assuming the calculator aims to leave the nipple flush with the slot, 1mm short is still fairly well engaged in the head portion of the nipple imho. You’re in the zone of uncertainty though. If ERD is slightly off or some other assumption of the calculator is violated then maybe you will end up closer to the “no-go” pictured below than you’d like. I’ve used about 1mm short because it allowed me to get away with using the same length on each side.

Any more than 1mm short starts to run the risk of the nipple head cracking off because it is left unsupported. There are some great photos which illustrate this in cross section.

A good alternative is to use the longer spokes with nipple washers.

I wonder if you would really see much rub even without the seatstay fixture. If you are able to use double stays at the rear and the guard is fixed at the chain stay bb it should be fairly secure. If not, one or two p-clips or a adapted light bracket should allow you to securely fix it. If you are going to use a pannier rack you can also use various bought or bodged fixtures to support the mudguard from the rack rather than the frame.

I prefer the black plastic tortec guards to SKS.

I would get an old seatpost of the right diameter and cut a piece long enough to rest on the bottom one and extend an inch or two above the damaged one. Bond that into place, then drill and tap a new hole so you can attach a bottle cage. Fill the area around the hole and paint it or whack a sticker over it.

That’s a great idea and could be a very neat repair. You could drill the pilot holes to prevent the cracks spreading too. It would need some care toget the epoxy into the right spot without getting it where you don’t want it, further up the seat tube. I guess injecting, dripping or using a small brush to get glue through the hole would be the way to go. If you trued to put it on the insert then slide it down you might lose most of it. Good also need to try to clean and degrease the inside of the tube.

It’s a selection bias. Where do you need to put armour on a plane? Where you find no bullet holes on the planes that survived.

Selection bias and bombers

For the record, I’m also not dead yet 🙂

Let’s wait for the people who died to post about their threadlocker regrets ;)

I top up the thread lock on my calipers or rotors if I have it to hand. If there’s some left on the threads and I don’t have any to hand then I don’t worry too much, just wait til next time. I think it goes some way to preventing the bolt sticking due to corrosion, a bit like anti seize.

Buy two or three chains and use them in rotation. This also provides the opportunity to thoroughly clean and relubricate them.