Boomers on Bicycles

Maintain, maintain, maintain

In a recent post (Chains, Shifting, and so on ) I mentioned that measuring your chain would tell you if you needed a new one.  When you put the ruler on your chain to measure, put the ruler on the chain at the top, that is, the part that is closest to the top of the bike.  This is where the chain is tightest.  In case you missed the post, you can scroll down and read it. If you’d rather not scroll, here it is again: put your ruler on the chain so that it starts in the middle of a link.  The 12inch mark should be in the middle of another link.  If it’s not, your chain is ready to be replaced. Maintaining your bike, especially at today’s prices, is pretty important.  There are quite a few things that you can just do yourself, using some common sense.  Keeping the bike clean isn’t very difficult. Wipe it down with a damp cloth. Be very careful if you hose it down.  High pressure could drive water into places where it doesn’t need to be. Dry your bike when it gets wet. If there is something that you don’t understand, either get a good bike repair book and read it, or head to your local bike shop. If you have doubts about the safety of your bike, stay off of it. Head to your local shop, and make sure that it’s safe before you ride it. Watch what the repair tech is doing. You might have to produce a donut or two, but mostly they’ll share their expertise. I have just put two older, ignored bikes back into shape. I read what I needed to, and went to my local bike shop for help when I needed it. Both bikes are safe, and ride well. Fixing an old one up is a good way to learn the basics about keeping your bike in good shape. Other blogs and bloggers have excellent advice on how to keep your bike riding well.  Look around the web, visit Velonews, Bicycling, and other sites to build your knowledge base.  When your done, get out and ride!

Ride

We are now connected to technorati.  Is this important? Should be, as I’m hoping to generate more readers and Technorati is a pretty cool place to find a lot things pretaining to the internet and all things on it.  Next thing today is this: did you tune up your bike? Look at my last post for 10 things to do to make your ride more rideable.  Have fun. More to come later.

10 Things To Do

Long ago we just rode our bikes.  They were great old tanks and took an enormous amount of abuse and we didn’t spend much time “maintaining” them.  We were just kids and maintenance generally meant spraying the Schwinn Springerfork with the hose.  Now and again the chain would fall off or we’d blow a tire.  Probably we fiddled with the handle bars, and used clothes pins to attach old playing cards onto the frame so they’d make a motor noise as we terrorized the neighborhood.  Well, things have changed Boomerite.  The old tank is now a newer, tad more expensive riding machine.  Here are some things to do after the winter doldroms, whether you rode a bunch or not, but especially if you rode a lot in the muck and grime, if there is muck and grime in your area.  What the heck, even if you didn’t ride in the muck and grime.

1. Generally just look the bike over.  Is there anything that looks wonkajawed, out of place, bent, or broken?  If there is, pay close attention to it.  This is where you start with the maintenance.
2. Now, look closely at the frame.  If you see any obvious cracks in it you need to go to your local bike shop (LBS) to have it looked at.  Stay off the bike if you suspect a cracked frame.  You don’t bounce like you used to.  Use the car, drive to the shop. Get it fixed. If there are no concerns, dust it off a bit, make it look good.
3. Take a look at you tires.  They should be intact, that is, no cracks, bulges, or cuts.  If you have a mountain bike and knobby tires, are the knobs still there, or have you worn them off?  If your knobby tire looks more like a slick tire, change it for a new one.  If you ride a road bike, look for the same cracks, splits, cuts.  If the tread looks worn, or you see any defects, get new ones.  Tire failure is a real drag, literally.
4. Let some air out of your tires, then take the tires off the wheels, look at the tubes. If you have any doubts about your tubes, replace them. Flats are a nuisance, blown tubes are not fixable.
5. Look at your wheels: are they straight and true? Put the bike on the rack, or whatever you have when you want the wheels off the ground, and give them a good spin.  Do they wobble, or do they just spin very nicely?  If they wobble, off to the shop, unless you know how to true them.  Out of whack wheels can collapse.  That can be catastrophic, for you and your bike. If they are good, wipe them down, clean them up.
6. Riding your bike requires that sooner or later you stop.  Check your brakes. Again, put the bike on the rack (whatever that may be), spin the wheels, apply the brakes.  The wheels should stop. Look at your brake pads if you have cantilever brakes.  If they are worn, replace them.  If they are overly hard, replace them.  Adjust them so that the wheel spins without touching them, and applying the brake lever doesn’t take every once of strength you have to make the brakes contact the wheel rim.  If you have hydraulic brakes, look for leaks at the lever, all along the line, and at the rotor housing. If you  see anything to concern you here, it’s best to go to your LBS and let them make the adjustment.  They’ll probably show you how to do it.  Ask nicely.
7. Believe it or not, check your seat post.  Lube it lightly.  Use the right lube, as it’s a different product for steel and aluminum than for carbon.  You don’t want the post to permanently attach it self to the tube.
8. Look at your chain.  Have you cleaned it lately?  Brush it off, degrease it, lube it.  If it sags too much, replace it.  Take a ruler, put one end on the middle of one link, and look at the 12″ mark–it should be in the middle of another link.  If not, your chain is stretched.  Replace it.  It makes a difference when you are shifting.
9. How is the shifting going?  It should be going smoothly, and you should be able to shift through all your gears, without skipping or hanging up on any of them.  If this is not the case, you will need to adjust the derailleurs. Best thing to do is check this link out to find out what you should be doing, or go to your LBS and watch them as they do it.
10. Last things to do? Make sure that your helmet is in good shape. Any questions about it, or if you crashed and the helmet hit anything, get a new one. If you clip into your pedals make sure that you can still clip in, and just as important, clip out. Then, with the checklist complete, climb on and ride. If everything works well, you’re done. If not, revisit whatever it is that still needs adjusting. Make it right.

It’s a good idea to take this kind of look at your bike on a regular basis. You may want to buy a good book on bike maintenance.  Either Google bike maintenance, or go to Amazon and look up what’s there.  You’ll have to make your best guess on what’s best for you, as there are many to choose from. Your local bike shop and other riders may prove to be the best resource you have. Take a look at other bike blogs and see what they recommend.  Google is a good place to start your expanded search. Remember to share whatever skills you have with others. You may need their help one day.

I live in a area that has four seasons, with the wet, cold, snowy time running about 5 months long, depending on the year.  There are times when I can’t get out to ride: the roads are icy, snowy, or both, or the rain is a bit much for safe riding.  When I really can’t get out, I go upstairs and ride the bike bolted to the trainer.  Today was wet, cold, but the weather people said that down in the valley it was clearing.  Quite often, the weather down in the valley has nothing to do with what is going on up here, at 4,000 feet elevation in the Sierra.  It can be snowing sideways up here, and sunny down there.  Down to the valley I went.  It was raining.  Rats.  I’ve been around here long enough to know that the valley clears long before the mountains, so I stuck around.  The rain became a slight drizzle, and off I went.  The American River Bike Trail is a great place to ride, and we use it year round.  The drizzle stopped, and I didn’t get too wet, and was pretty dry an hour later when I finished my ride.  It was a great ride.  The point here is you can ride when you want to, and a little rain won’t melt you.  Use common sense though: downpours aren’t anything you will ever find me riding in, at least not on purpose. Lots of people live in areas that have more rain, snow, heat and so on, than here.  Learn to ride in it.  Ted McRae does.  So does Mark Ewers.  So do lots of other people.  Be one of them.  Ride for the health of it.

I was riding my Trek mountain bike and started having some shifting issues.  When I shifted I would have to shift twice to get to get the chain to move one gear.  I adjusted the deraileur a bit but couldn’t seem to get one gear for one shift.  Off to my local bike shop for some help and advice.  I thought that once they fixed it, I’d have a better idea of what to do next time this shifting issue arose.  Now, I keep the gears pretty clean, clean and oil the chain on a regular basis, and generally maintain the bike well.  I’m also a pretty light type of rider.  I don’t stomp on the pedals, ride anything extreme, hop on or over jumps, bumps, or stumps.  I just ride.  So, into the shop, bike in tow.  After explaining to the tech what was happening, he thought perhaps it was the chain.  When I went down to pick the bike up, sure enough, the major villan was the chain.  He cleaned everything up, adjusted the deraileur, and put a better chain on it.  How, I asked, could it be the chain?  I’ve never had to replace a chain on any bike that I have owned.  Of course, most of them had one gear—me.  What has changed is that with the advent of more gears (triple chain rings up front, 8,9, 10 gears in the cassete) the chains have had to change as well.  Strange but true.  How do you stretch a chain?  They aren’t made of aluminum foil, so how does this happen?  Today’s chains are simply thinner to accomodate the multiple gears they have to engage.  Even I, not an engineer, understand this.  The tech said that  sometimes it’s just the luck of the draw.  He’s had chains tank in three months.  He’s a pretty young, mostly extreme rider though.  He’s also had them last quite a long time.  Looks like it might be good to buy a spare chain, and know how to replace it when the time comes. Bicycling has some good tech advice online.  Good luck.  Let me know if you’ve had any chain issues with your trusty steed.   To leave a comment, just click the tab on the upper left of this post.  That will take you to the comments section.  Ride well!