Australian Cycling Forums - Bicycles Network Australia

So I was out riding yesterday evening and went to shift up a chainring at the start of a nice, flowing downhill trail, only to find I couldn't. I thought my $649 cycling deal had finally given up the ghost after too much abuse and hopped off to inspect the damage in despair. It seemed as though the cable had slipped, which was odd considering I had just given the bike a thorough once over and clean. Anyway, I went to pull out my multi tool, glanced back down to the troublesome derailleur (secretly wishing I had taken my SS out)and saw...

a ROCK!!!!

a small sized bugger of a rock, sitting right in the middle of the derailleur! It must have flicked up off the rear tyre, ricocheted off the seat tube and somehow landed in there. So i started trying to get it out and couldn't! I turned the bike upside down and everything and it wouldn't budge! It was actually too big to pull out and I had to manually move the derailleur to pull it out. So maybe a kilometer earlier when I had been in a higher gear, this travelling bugger of a rock jumped in there and then jumped for joy when I shifted down, knowing full well that it wasn't getting out of its cool little spot anytime soon!

Just thought I'd share, between my mate and myself we couldn't think of a time where anything even remotely similar had happened to either of us! Sure, a busted rear derailleur from a stick or a broken spoke or broken chainring on a rock, but never a no-damage situation! Once I got the rock out, all was fine and shifting perfectly! Amazing!

Not while out riding, this happened in the workshop.

Was changing my RD cable and housing, as it had died after a year's flogging in all weather commuting. Just enough time to get it done before hitting the hay to try and catch up on some sleep

Pulled out the cable stops, cut the new sections of outer and threaded through the teflon sealing sleeve, and was just about to put it all together and realised I was short one cable stop. After uttering several cuss-words and searching everywhere for 20 minutes with my trail lights to provide extra illumination, I resigned myself to fudging up a new one out of an old biro tube with one end melted closed and the other flared out. Took about 20 minutes to get it right.

Wasn't a perfect fit, but good enough to get me back on the road the follwoing day.

Bumped the frame trying to push it into place.

The old one dropped on the floor.

I once had a tennis ball sized rock flick up, and end up wedging itself in between my front tyre and the forks, right at the top.

I was going at a considerable pace, and needless to say, ended up going ass over tit.

No idea how it got there in the first place!

On tour in NZ a couple of years ago, I had just crossed the neck from Lake Hawea to the windy Lake Wanaka side when I pulled off the road to meet and greet a fellow tourist. Continuing, a few pieces of gravel flicked up as I pulled back onto the road. A morale-sapping struggle against the wind ensued as I fought to reach my overnight stop. I was so exhausted I contemplated taking a rest day. But next morning, with bad weather approaching I decided to continue. As I wheeled the bike out ready to leave, something didn't feel right - the bike was hard to push. Then I noticed that there was a stone wedged hard between the fork leg and brake pad. It took pliers to get it out. And then I understood why the previous afternoon had been such a struggle.

RonK wrote:On tour in NZ a couple of years ago, I had just crossed the neck from Lake Hawea to the windy Lake Wanaka side when I pulled off the road to meet and greet a fellow tourist. Continuing, a few pieces of gravel flicked up as I pulled back onto the road. A moral-sapping struggle against the wind ensued as I fought to reach my overnight stop. I was so exhausted I contemplated taking a rest day. But next morning, with bad weather approaching I decided to continue. As I wheeled the bike out ready to leave, something didn't feel right - the bike was hard to push. Then I noticed that there was a stone wedged hard between the fork leg and brake pad. It took pliers to get it out. And then I understood why the previous afternoon had been such a struggle.

Bwahaa haaaha haaa!

And there you were, cursing the head winds!