I'm a champion bike mechanic...

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ldrcycles
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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby ldrcycles » Thu Oct 31, 2013 10:39 am

WestcoastPete wrote:Heading out with friends the other evening, in a bit of a rush. Realized I hadn't changed my pedals back to platforms after a long ride using spd's the day before. No worries, easy to swap. I'm usually pretty specific about this process after slipping and punching the chainrings once before; I usually set it up so I push the tool downwards to crack the thread, away from the chainrings.

But I was in a hurry. I can catch it when it goes and not punch the chainrings.
Actually, no I can't. Big, well lubed teeth marks across my knuckles.
Been there more times than I should have lol. Copped a similar injury yesterday when pulling a broken vacuum cleaner apart to strip the copper from the motor, the spring that reels in the power cord is seriously strong and when I just yanked that unit out thinking the tension was already released a toothed cog spun up like a jet turbine, came off the shaft and hit the wall 4 metres away after debarking a finger :) .

ZepinAtor wrote:So I was welding a cartridge bottom bracket in place with an arc welder.
I've got to ask, why were you wanting to weld the BB in?
"I must be rather keen on cycling"- Sir Hubert Opperman.

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g-boaf
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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby g-boaf » Thu Oct 31, 2013 10:46 am

I've done that with pedals once. Now I use a a bit of metal pipe to provide extra leverage and importantly, distance from the chainring teeth.

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biker jk
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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby biker jk » Thu Oct 31, 2013 12:58 pm

g-boaf wrote:I've done that with pedals once. Now I use a a bit of metal pipe to provide extra leverage and importantly, distance from the chainring teeth.
Put the chain on the large chainring first. That way, if you hand comes flying off and hits the chainring you won't get teeth but the chain instead.

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ldrcycles
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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby ldrcycles » Thu Oct 31, 2013 1:14 pm

biker jk wrote:
g-boaf wrote:I've done that with pedals once. Now I use a a bit of metal pipe to provide extra leverage and importantly, distance from the chainring teeth.
Put the chain on the large chainring first. That way, if you hand comes flying off and hits the chainring you won't get teeth but the chain instead.
Not that punching a chain is all that comfortable either :lol: .
"I must be rather keen on cycling"- Sir Hubert Opperman.

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rjk
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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby rjk » Thu Oct 31, 2013 1:56 pm

ldrcycles wrote:
biker jk wrote:
g-boaf wrote:I've done that with pedals once. Now I use a a bit of metal pipe to provide extra leverage and importantly, distance from the chainring teeth.
Put the chain on the large chainring first. That way, if you hand comes flying off and hits the chainring you won't get teeth but the chain instead.
Not that punching a chain is all that comfortable either :lol: .

i put the spanner on the pedal then push the pedal down towards the ground and stand on the spanner whilst standing at the back of the bike, fingers are well out of the road and i always undo the pedals instead of tightening them up :)
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Mulger bill
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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby Mulger bill » Thu Oct 31, 2013 2:38 pm

Last time I had to use a pedal spanner with anything more than gentle force (I'm big on preventative thread greasing here) I barked me knuckles on the chainstay :oops:
...whatever the road rules, self-preservation is the absolute priority for a cyclist when mixing it with motorised traffic.
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TonyMax
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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby TonyMax » Thu Oct 31, 2013 2:42 pm

Stand to the back of the bike and pull the spanner back towards you (away from everything sharp and toothed)?

That's how I've done the two pedal changes I've managed recently and my hands still have all their skin intact.

Although I admit this doesn't sound as adventurous as the methods others are using :).
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Jean
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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby Jean » Thu Oct 31, 2013 2:44 pm

I'm pretty careful with removing pedals these days after too many bloody knuckles, but I also break out the leather rigger's gloves - just in case.

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g-boaf
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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby g-boaf » Thu Oct 31, 2013 3:06 pm

Mulger bill wrote:Last time I had to use a pedal spanner with anything more than gentle force (I'm big on preventative thread greasing here) I barked me knuckles on the chainstay :oops:
Ouch. Last time I did it, the world (in the immediate vicinity) knew about it. I wasn't pleased... I quickly washed it up and cleaned up the damage. Not nice. I'm now very careful when dealing with pedals.

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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby WestcoastPete » Thu Oct 31, 2013 4:39 pm

rjk wrote: i put the spanner on the pedal then push the pedal down towards the ground and stand on the spanner whilst standing at the back of the bike, fingers are well out of the road and i always undo the pedals instead of tightening them up :)
This is my usual practice, but I was all flustered and rushed through it. My hope is to never do it again, but I said that last time too...

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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby ZepinAtor » Thu Oct 31, 2013 7:03 pm

ldrcycles wrote:
ZepinAtor wrote:So I was welding a cartridge bottom bracket in place with an arc welder.
I've got to ask, why were you wanting to weld the BB in?
There's nothing worse than a noisy creaking BB :evil: No chance of that now is there :x Grease is gone for good though.

I'll post up a photo for you a little later tonight.
Gas propulsion.......it's natural don't fight it.

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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby ironhanglider » Thu Oct 31, 2013 8:31 pm

ZepinAtor wrote:
ldrcycles wrote:
ZepinAtor wrote:So I was welding a cartridge bottom bracket in place with an arc welder.
I've got to ask, why were you wanting to weld the BB in?
There's nothing worse than a noisy creaking BB :evil: No chance of that now is there :x Grease is gone for good though.

I'll post up a photo for you a little later tonight.
Except, as appears so often in this forum, when the creaking noise is not from the BB!

Cheers,

Cameron

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g-boaf
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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby g-boaf » Thu Oct 31, 2013 9:48 pm

Xplora wrote:
g-boaf wrote: (image for Xplora). :mrgreen:
Son of a b.... :evil: Don't tempt me, tempter! :lol:
Riding the bike like that, you feel like you are taking an F16 to the local shopping centre.
Except that you couldn't commute with the F16 without a runway
Except that you couldn't park with the F16 without burning the other cars
Except that you need 20/20 vision to be allowed to drive the F16
Except that an F16 is worth more than half your house as scrap

No, it's like taking a Bentley to the local shopping centre. You can't help having a vehicle that RAWKS, it's not your fault 8)

Hiplok to ensure it's still there when you come back? :shock:
Okay, someone was punishing me today for being so smart. :oops: With those wheels on, I seemed to spend more time trying to keep myself pointed straight and stay upright. Absolutely the wrong wheels for the crosswinds tonight.

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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby ZepinAtor » Thu Oct 31, 2013 11:46 pm

ironhanglider wrote:
Except, as appears so often in this forum, when the creaking noise is not from the BB!

Cheers,

Cameron
Well thanks for the heads up, but as per usual a little too late. After the BB was well secured I then took to the bars/seat post/pedals..........

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Gas propulsion.......it's natural don't fight it.

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ldrcycles
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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby ldrcycles » Fri Nov 01, 2013 7:30 am

Ahhhhhh I see! Nice work zep :) .
"I must be rather keen on cycling"- Sir Hubert Opperman.

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find_bruce
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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby find_bruce » Fri Nov 01, 2013 3:40 pm

It's very judgemental of me, but when I saw this bike today, I felt better about my own shoddy skills
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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby bychosis » Sun Nov 03, 2013 8:47 am

find_bruce wrote:It's very judgemental of me, but when I saw this bike today, I felt better about my own shoddy skills
At least the forks are on the right way!

Yesterday I figured I would patch a tube to use as a spare. Inflated it a little and found two holes opposite each other, the offending metal fibre had pierced the outside, then when it went flat, the inside too. OK I'll use a big patch and cover both. Rubbed back the tube, applied the rubber cement, waited for it to tack off then stuck the patch on. Quick inflate to make sure I'd covered both holes... Nope, missed both, completely, not even any adhesive over them. Quickly pulled the patch off applied more adhesive, actually over the holes this time, tack off, install patch and hold in place for a while happy that I now had a tube with a patch ON the holes. Later in the afternoon put at little air in the tube to check again.... Patch didn't seal properly.

On a better note managed to remove a somewhat stubborn cassette that would t come off using the chain whip. Old chain in vice, wound the chain around the wheel and wound it up under the bench, skewer to hold the locking tool and a long spanner with a lot of down force while the wheel was trying to wind up under the bench. voila. Lock ring off.
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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby The Fixer » Sun Nov 03, 2013 9:40 am

bychosis wrote:
find_bruce wrote:It's very judgemental of me, but when I saw this bike today, I felt better about my own shoddy skills
At least the forks are on the right way!
<snip>
And at least they are riding... :)
I don't care if it's a $20 Huffy or a $20k Colnago, as long as you're riding, and you're happy.

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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby ldrcycles » Mon Nov 04, 2013 9:12 pm

A very disappointing afternoon for me, first up was trying to remove a set of pedals, started with WD40 and snapped a 15mm spanner. So I applied heat, cooled them then heated and cooled again, still no luck. Even applied some hydrochloric acid to dissolve the aluminium oxide and no luck, the damn things are virtually welded in there :( .

Then I had a nice steel frame with some suspicious rust around the rear dropouts, into the sandblaster to see what lay beneath and yep, 2 massive holes in the seatstays (that wasn't actually my fault, but it sucked anyway).

And last but not least, after I don't even know how long I found the first time ever a frame with a 58cm seat tube and 56 top, my perfect measurements! Even a reasonable bit of gear too. But, the seatpost was stuck and after a bit of persuasion (seriously I wasn't even trying that hard) the seat tube cracked :cry: .
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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby toolonglegs » Mon Nov 04, 2013 10:59 pm

ZepinAtor wrote:
ironhanglider wrote:
Except, as appears so often in this forum, when the creaking noise is not from the BB!

Cheers,

Cameron
Well thanks for the heads up, but as per usual a little too late. After the BB was well secured I then took to the bars/seat post/pedals..........

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:lol: nice... BUT :wink: even from this distance I can see your welding skills need some work! :P

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winstonw
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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby winstonw » Mon Nov 04, 2013 11:15 pm

bugger zep...where are your dogs supposed to cr#p?

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ZepinAtor
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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby ZepinAtor » Tue Nov 05, 2013 12:25 am

toolonglegs wrote: :lol: nice... BUT :wink: even from this distance I can see your welding skills need some work! :P
You're not kidding :lol: I blame the fact that my eyebrows were almost burnt off from the exploding grease out of the BB.
winstonw wrote:bugger zep...where are your dogs supposed to cr#p?
Labradoodles are sophisticated intelligent dogs & either go number 2's in the toilet or wait until we reach the prize winning lawn around the corner & halve their body weight right in the middle.
Gas propulsion.......it's natural don't fight it.

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OnTrackZeD
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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby OnTrackZeD » Tue Nov 05, 2013 12:06 pm

I had a noise coming from the adjustable stem so I pulled it apart and greased it. When I was putting it back together the bolt wouldn't go all the way in. I thought something fell in, no I couldn't find anything so I decided to grind the bolt a little.
I ground the bolt to half size till I realized I had grabbed the wrong bolt, it went from 40mm to 20mm now I had two 20mm bolts.

What a champ I am, luckily I found another 40mm hex bolt off another stem.

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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby simmo71 » Tue Nov 05, 2013 9:11 pm

My GF is a champion bike mechanic because.....

We had a run where we couldn't afford new tyres and were constantly getting flats. Fixing tubes was a weekly chore we had both gotten used to. The GF was doing laps of Mt Lofty daily so a fresh supply of repaired tubes was essential.

I came home from work to find a partially used tube of Super Glue on the kitchen bench. "what have you been fixing" I asked.

GF replies " We have run out of rubber cement, you can use Super Glue can't you ? It's the same stuff?"

She was not impressed with me dropping to the floor in fits of laughter while I tried to explain Super Glue does not flex, between gasps of breath.

I get the job now to fix all the tubes.

Cheers
Simmo;)

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Re: I'm a champion bike mechanic...

Postby rjk » Wed Nov 06, 2013 12:56 pm

simmo71 wrote:My GF is a champion bike mechanic because.....

We had a run where we couldn't afford new tyres and were constantly getting flats. Fixing tubes was a weekly chore we had both gotten used to. The GF was doing laps of Mt Lofty daily so a fresh supply of repaired tubes was essential.

I came home from work to find a partially used tube of Super Glue on the kitchen bench. "what have you been fixing" I asked.

GF replies " We have run out of rubber cement, you can use Super Glue can't you ? It's the same stuff?"

She was not impressed with me dropping to the floor in fits of laughter while I tried to explain Super Glue does not flex, between gasps of breath.

I get the job now to fix all the tubes.

Cheers
Simmo;)

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that was just a ploy by her so that you would do all the tube repairs from now on
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