What Have You Fettled Today?

[si_c]

Chainstay snapped on the Pug. It's salvageable, but currently unrideable. This left me without a decent commuter, so had to get my "new" Pug ready to ride. Nothing on the frame really, just a bottom bracket and chainset. Put an old pair of wheels on, along with the saddle and brake levers from the old pug. Cleaned the headset that came with it, and replaced it along with new bearings and a load of grease. The frame came without a stem or handlebars so I had to fit a spares, this was complicated by the 22mm internal diameter for the fork steerer tube (yay! old 70s french frames), so I had to sand down the diameter a touch to get it to fit.

Fitted cables (harder than I expected due to odd cable routing), the brakes and chain. I omitted fitting the mudguards for the moment, opting to keep the build as simple as possible (rear mudguards are integrated with the rear rack, and I'm not 100% certain I want that on).

Finishing touches were the simplex retrofriction gear levers to replace the awful plastic friction levers, along with new bar tape. The handlebars are a little narrower than I'd like (40cm c-c), but they have a nice flare to them on the side, which I quite like. All in all not too difficult a build.

Total cost including frame is under £100, but I had some parts lying around and salvaged from the other bike, taken it out for a short spin (~1mile), and it handles rather differently from the old one, I'm not as comfortable on it, but part of that will just be getting saddle height dialled in and getting used to the narrower bars.

 

[si_c]

Chainstay snapped on the Pug. It's salvageable, but currently unrideable. This left me without a decent commuter, so had to get my "new" Pug ready to ride. Nothing on the frame really, just a bottom bracket and chainset. Put an old pair of wheels on, along with the saddle and brake levers from the old pug. Cleaned the headset that came with it, and replaced it along with new bearings and a load of grease. The frame came without a stem or handlebars so I had to fit a spares, this was complicated by the 22mm internal diameter for the fork steerer tube (yay! old 70s french frames), so I had to sand down the diameter a touch to get it to fit.

Fitted cables (harder than I expected due to odd cable routing), the brakes and chain. I omitted fitting the mudguards for the moment, opting to keep the build as simple as possible (rear mudguards are integrated with the rear rack, and I'm not 100% certain I want that on).

Finishing touches were the simplex retrofriction gear levers to replace the awful plastic friction levers, along with new bar tape. The handlebars are a little narrower than I'd like (40cm c-c), but they have a nice flare to them on the side, which I quite like. All in all not too difficult a build.

Total cost including frame is under £100, but I had some parts lying around and salvaged from the other bike, taken it out for a short spin (~1mile), and it handles rather differently from the old one, I'm not as comfortable on it, but part of that will just be getting saddle height dialled in and getting used to the narrower bars.

Figured I'd add a photo. Gearing is a little high as I found on the way in. 13-21 at the back and 52-42 at the front. Need to replace the freewheel at the back too as the smallest sprocket skips.

 

[Dec66]

Knackered rear wheel off the B'Twin, along with non-knackered front wheel.

Gave the old girl a clean.

Cassette off, with new toolkit. That was a bugger, the locking ring was very well screwed in.

New Vredstein Fortezzas onto new Shimano R501's.

Cassette onto new rear wheel.

New wheels on, and a little test ride up and down the road in the freezing cold.

Ate the two little bags of Haribo which dropped out of the package with the toolkit, as a reward (thanks, Tredz).

I feel all manly, now.

 

[greekonabike]

Played around with the barrel adjuster on the shifter and managed to get rid of a very minor but irritating chain rub.

GOAB

 

[ColinJ]

I keep fiddling with the chain tensioner but I can't quite get it quiet enough! I really do need to just ride the bike and see what the noise is like then. It took me most of this year to quieten my CAAD5 to the point where it no longer bugged me and I like it now. I really don't want to go back to having a noisy bike again ...

I have been going on about the noise from the chain tensioner. I went out at 11 pm when there was not much traffic about. There was a stiff breeze blowing and the wind noise was masking any noise from the chain/tensioner combination. I could still hear a slight rumble from the tyres on the road though so I took that to mean that the tensioner noise is probably not going to be a big issue; we'll see!

I have now been out on the bike and ridden a 38 km loop with over 500 metres of climbing. I knew that I could do the Cragg Vale climb because I did a test ride up there in the equivalent gear on my CAAD5. Later in the ride I climbed up Lumbutts Road from Hollins Lane. That is much shorter but significantly steeper than the Cragg Vale climb. I managed ok - it was about as hard as I currently want to do in the 52/19 gear though. So - a good choice of gear for the routes I will be riding this winter. If I get fitter and lose more weight then there are a couple of stiffer climbs which will probably become tolerable too.

I was right about traffic noise and wind noise masking the noise from the chain. I can hear the chain though when the wind drops and there is no traffic about. The noise is just bearable; any more and I would get very irritated by it. I am hoping that as the chain wears, the noise will decrease rather than increase!

I double-checked everything and found that I hadn't tightened some important bolts enough, so I sorted those out.

I missed the bolts on the stem holding the bars on ... I felt that something odd was happening on the ride which turned out to be the bars slowly tipping forward when I hit bumps in the road! Now tightened.

Possible changes now: bigger tyres, mudguards, lock.

PS Headset loosened slightly on the bike's 3rd ride. That has now been tightened too.

 

[Deleted member 41544]

I've finished the Raleigh Pioneer with the front derailleur properly adjusted (no photo).

Also the Graham Weigh's been finished: the forks were cut down earlier, cables adjusted and the bar tape is on. The parts came from @rugbyleaguebiker and it now looks like this:

It did look like this originally plus a pile of bits and blue parts but I took the green off the seatpost as a colour base:

Turned out to be a tidy little bike. How does it ride?

 

[DCLane]

Turned out to be a tidy little bike. How does it ride?

Surprisingly well - it's gone to the son of one of my club-mates to get him riding. We'll see it back at some point ...

 

[Elybazza61]

No fettling as such but had to do a speedy tube change as the rear had a puncture and I only noticed it as I was about to leave work to catch a train;10 minute swap a dash to the station and the train was leaving just as I got there,first time it had been on time all week.

Double checked it at home later but really must re-install it tubeless again this week-end.

 

[I like Skol]

Small jobs always turn into big ones!

Dropped the chain checker onto the commuter chain last week and the 0.75% side fell into place but the 1.0% didn't. Time for a new chain I thought and might as well change the cassette as I'm pretty sure this one is on its 2nd and maybe the 3rd chain. Checked my records and cassette with chain was fitted in Aug 2015 although for some reason I haven't made a note of any subsequent chain replacements. THIS post suggests a new chain some time in early-mid 2016 which kind of fits.
Anyway, while I was at it I decided to service the rear hub as that was long overdue. Shimano XT hub still in great shape. I also noticed what looked like a crack developing in the brake disc. This is original to the bike and is a Tektro item that has done over 15,000 miles.

The close up pictures I have taken make me wonder if it isn't actually just a scratch or gouge. I do seem to remember taking a pair of grips to one of the discs some time ago to correct a slight wobble....

There is also some damage on the other side that doesn't quite line up further discrediting the crack theory...

I shall run the disc for the time being and now need to service the front hub and headset at some point. Chain and cassette fitted so the back end is all good for winter.

 

[Jenkins]

New dérailleur, cassette & chain fitted to the Boardman and a new Avid BB7 disc brake to the Whyte.

New computers fitted to both.

 

[Elybazza61]

Cleaned the Icarus after a few weeks neglect and repaired the rear S-One tyre on the Planet X and re-fitted tubeless again.

 

[si_c]

Gearing was really really high on the new pug, with a 52-42 chainset and 13-21 6 speed freewheel giving me a low gear of 53", so I bought a new Shimano 14-28 freewheel to give me closer to 40" which is probably just about bearable.

Took the bike up to my Dad's on saturday to change the freewheel as I couldn't get it off with a long handled wrench and he has a bench vise. Started unscrewing the freewheel and it was rather stiffer than I had anticipated, then really easy, then hard again. Bloody thing was cross threaded and removing it completely stripped the threads off the rather nice vintage Exage hub I was using.

After a brew to steady my rage, I bought a new rear wheel online for £30 including delivery, Quando hub and Weinmann rim, but I didn't want to spend any significant money at this time of year. Arrived today, freewheel threaded on nicely, tires swapped, tube inflated. Hiss. Removed the tube, checked, filed down a slight burr, new tube, inflated. Hiss. Checked the rim tape, pretty shite, so swapped over the conti rim tape from another wheel. Third tube, inflated to 120psi all good, will give it a test run tomorrow.

 

[PeteXXX]

Full Sus washed down properly from a mucky ride a few days ago. Couldn't do it before due to the hosepipe being frozen up (and I didn't want to put the bike away wet).
When I took the light bracket off, I dropped a small nut. I had to use a magnet to find it in the gravel.. Before the nut was found, a JC clip from my old Marin Hope brakes that I lost last year attached itself to the magnet!! Shame I don't still have that bike or those brakes. It's in the spares tin now though

 

[13 rider]

After last nights abandon commute due to puncture bike was recovery from friends garage . Rear wheel removed tube out . Inflated and it seems to be ok .Tried locating leak in a bowl of water and nothing finally by pressing the tyre really hard located the leak right where the value meets the tube so tube binned new one fitted all ready to go .
Things I learned removing the rear wheel with the topeak pannier rack is a bit of a pain as the rack fouls the quick realease and my cheap halfords tyre levers are cheap because there made of cheese would really have struggled by the side of the road with them . Thankfully I have some metal ones in my bike workshop (shed) . So I need a new tube and some better trye levers

 

[gbb]

Day off today, using a lieu day while I feel sluggish with a cold, so time maybe to have a play on the bike.

Cassette off, Fulcrum feehub out (pitifully easy on the Racing 5s), clean, apply oil to the pawls, clean sprockets (why I don't know, they don't look that much cleaner when they've got some age to them), re-assemble and refit.
Rear caliper off, (no reason, just because) good clean, check the freeness of it all, apply antisieze to appropriate nuts etc, re-assemble.
Good wipe of chain and RD.
General clean but TBH, it doesn't look that much different.
Seatpost out (carbon seatpost, carbon frame), clean and refit (amazing how sludgy and gritty it was down there)

Good to give everything a once over though, for safety reasons if nothing else.

Out for 6 miles just to make sure everythings ok. No problems found.