What Have You Fettled Today?

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

After yesterday's interesting ride home with a very nearly snapped and totally jammed rear gear cable (bike only giving me 52/13 and 42/13 gear combinations and a set of hills lay between me and home as well as 20 miles), today was a 'fix it' day, rather than a ride it day.

So back to the bike shop for the inner & outer gear cable housing that I needed... home again, find I can't cut it because it is just to well shielded, off to my step-father's to borrow some tools... and back home again. Bike now has new inner & outer gear cable for the rear derailuer and I have managed to get the front derailer indexing sorted as well. As a 'life is going well' finale, I fitted the new bar tape we purchased yesterday. A quick test ride up & down our lane revealed that my left pedal was knocking/clunking so it has been removed and put back on (new chainset on Saturday) which seems to have resolved the problem for the time being. An early evening meal will hopefully mean that we can still get out for a ride today - fingers crossed.

 

[shouldbeinbed]

my Birdy is now almost in a usable state again,cables, chain, seatpost blocks all done. New grips to fit and I need a new dualdrive shifter rod, the one drawback is a missing cap nut for the rear hub. The old one was shredded & useless but the thread is very tight & non of my spares fit.

 

[J1780]

I've just been messing around with the saddle height on my mtb these 29ers feel huge. I'm picky about getting it right for me....not necessarily how it should be but how I like it to be. On road bikes this doesn't seem to be a problem but the mtb is 'different'

 

[I like Skol]

Over the last 6 months my road bike had developed an annoying rattle that I put down to the internally routed rear brake cable rattling inside the frame. On my last ride I discovered the noise stopped when I stood up so began to wonder if it was actually a seatpost/saddle related noise. Putting tension into the frame by twisting the handlebars against the saddle added weight to the theory by silencing the noise so this afternoon I stripped and greased the saddle clamp and seatpost. No change, so I then realised that by standing on the pedals I also took most of the weight off the handlebars. Bingo! Blissful silence. It was the stem/handlebar clamp. The noise had been getting steadily worse to the point it could be heard over my ipod on full blast, god knows what other cyclists thought as I rattled past?

 

[BAtoo]

Started fettling the old MBK hybrid to be my pop to the pub bike, just at the stage of getting the carp off the bike, replaced a tube, pumped the tyres, some general cleaning.
I used to have a child seat on the back to carry my now 32 year old son on.

OH keeps smiling at my new interest, or did she say obsession??

 

[Gravity Aided]

Put a longer stem on my Schwinn Passage Tourer, as I had a French stem available in the correct size. Once I have all of the fit parameters finished, then I can start more restoration.

 

[Spoked Wheels]

After yesterday's interesting ride home with a very nearly snapped and totally jammed rear gear cable (bike only giving me 52/13 and 42/13 gear combinations and a set of hills lay between me and home as well as 20 miles), today was a 'fix it' day, rather than a ride it day.

So back to the bike shop for the inner & outer gear cable housing that I needed... home again, find I can't cut it because it is just to well shielded, off to my step-father's to borrow some tools... and back home again. Bike now has new inner & outer gear cable for the rear derailuer and I have managed to get the front derailer indexing sorted as well. As a 'life is going well' finale, I fitted the new bar tape we purchased yesterday. A quick test ride up & down our lane revealed that my left pedal was knocking/clunking so it has been removed and put back on (new chainset on Saturday) which seems to have resolved the problem for the time being. An early evening meal will hopefully mean that we can still get out for a ride today - fingers crossed.

Emma, you should use cable cutters really but in an emergency fit a piece of unwanted cable inside the outer before using any non cable cutter. That would protect the inside of the outer and have a smooth cable action.

I'm glad you sorted the problem though

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

Emma, you should use cable cutters really but in an emergency fit a piece of unwanted cable inside the outer before using any non cable cutter. That would protect the inside of the outer and have a smooth cable action.

I'm glad you sorted the problem though

I tried 3 different sets of cable cutters on this stuff, not to mention 2 junior hacksaws and 2 full sized hacksaws... in the end I needed a small electric circular saw! I have no idea what it is made of but it is a lot tougher than the stuff that came off the bike (I just asked for road bike gear cable inner & outer....) my normal cable cutters manage the inner cable without issues - barely notice it, they manage my shimano brake cable outer without issue as well, but this stuff is unbelievably tough - we have a wonderful firework display going on in my step-father's garage... (put the old cable into the new housing so I could put it in the vice to hold it still...) next time I will get the bike shop to cut it to the sizes I want doing the damsel in distress act I think!

 

[Deleted member 23692]

An attempt to solve a creak in the crank/pedal ended up with the bike having a bubble bath and a full clean. It's didn't sort the creak, but boy is it clean Also gave the chain a through clean and got rid of all the dry lube I'd been using as I'm really not convinced by it.. I've gone back to wet lube now.

Oh and the source of the creak was the cleats - they both need a quick nipping up

 

[Saluki]

Moved my saddle 1/4 inch forward. Feels a bit better now.

 

[I like Skol]

My Commute machine has been making a quiet squeak on the left pedal stroke so I have swapped pedals and checked the cranks are tight as a first stab at curing the sound. I have also swapped both my fast growing sons onto bigger bikes. 7yr old has moved onto 10yr olds bike so from a 20" wheeled, 7spd MTB to a 24" wheeled MTB with a triple. 10yr old is now on a bike that was mine from 91-94 and then used by my wife until earlier this week, a 26" wheel MTB with 18" frame. My old MTB is truly the bike I honed my MTB skills on and while it is not quite the same bike, having had many, many upgrades and metamorphosis along the way, and if he can master the rigid, aluminium, non-suss bike then he will be ready to ride anything (like me ).

 

[musa]

As selling my bike included the wheelset

Removed cassette etx. Fitted a new oair of aksium wheels fitted a cassette. New chain which i found out was too small.

So new chain tomorrow and new hed wheels ii just bought off eBay

 

[derrick]

Pumped up the tyres ready for the morning ride, been away for a week so i have not ridden it, been riding a Cannondale hybrid while we have been away, looking forward to getting back on a proper road bike.

 

[Gravity Aided]

Too hot to ride here today 97f, so I rode the exercycle and got an old Cannondale C-30 ready for a friend, who would like to return to cycling . Hope he can handle it. Almost like a BMX with gears. I've customized it with Sram click shifters and linear brakes and a higher level set of derailleurs. It should be an interesting bicycle to ride.

 

[SpokesT]

Fitted a set of SPD cleats to my new shoes using a knife to remove the bit of the sole covering the cleat holes, a pair of antique pliers to tear the rubber off, and an Allen key to install the cleats. Job done.