Thread To Tell Everyone What Fettling You've Just Done

beverick

Sometimes your own I suspect.......

veronese68

Reg Prescott? Kenny Everett's hapless television DIY expert, prone to severing his own limbs.

willy b

Just spent my lunch time fitting full mudguards to the commuter (SKS) . "Shutting the satble door, after the horse has bolted spirngs to mind", but ah well.

An easy enough task, however they tell you to put these plastic lugs over the top of each pole that fixes the guard to the frame/forks. However when you do this the mudguard sits really high, even at the lowest point. So I took them off and just have metal bits sticking through, but now have a nice low mudgaurd Much better!

iPete

willy b wrote:

Just spent my lunch time fitting full mudguards to the commuter (SKS) . "Shutting the satble door, after the horse has bolted spirngs to mind", but ah well.

Add some kind of frame protection under the mounts, my SKS have chipped away at the frame and watch out for kicking off the front one when track standing!

bails87

itboffin wrote:

Here's a top fettling injury avoidance tip, wear a pair of quite thick old full finger cycling gloves when doing tasks like BB or pedal removals, slipped tools and sharp chainring cuts will be a thing of the past.

And position the bike/tool so that you're applying pressure away from the chainrings. And put the chain on the big ring.

beverick

willy b wrote:

Just spent my lunch time fitting full mudguards to the commuter (SKS) . "Shutting the satble door, after the horse has bolted spirngs to mind", but ah well.

An easy enough task, however they tell you to put these plastic lugs over the top of each pole that fixes the guard to the frame/forks. However when you do this the mudguard sits really high, even at the lowest point. So I took them off and just have metal bits sticking through, but now have a nice low mudgaurd Much better!

Don't the lugs make the guard sit lower? They also stop you from impaling yourself on the end of the stay and ripping lumps out of your shin when the chain snaps and you fall off.....

...I know from experience!

Bob

UndercoverElephant

bails87 wrote:

itboffin wrote:

Here's a top fettling injury avoidance tip, wear a pair of quite thick old full finger cycling gloves when doing tasks like BB or pedal removals, slipped tools and sharp chainring cuts will be a thing of the past.

And position the bike/tool so that you're applying pressure away from the chainrings. And put the chain on the big ring.

Well quite, these injuries don't happen if you stay in the big-ring.

mudcow007

just removed the chainset an pedals off my Royal Enfield

sounds a simple job, but the bike is from 1963 an looks totally original

lots of swear words

heat, BFH an extension bars

willy b

beverick wrote:

Don't the lugs make the guard sit lower? They also stop you from impaling yourself on the end of the stay and ripping lumps out of your shin when the chain snaps and you fall off.....

...I know from experience!

Bob

From following the instructions they didn't seem too. I was getting to annoyed, so just took them off, i'll saw the extra bits of metal off, and put some little covers on top.

DrLex

Not really fettling, but why one should check one's bike over frequently:


I recall a skid stop on Friday morning, so lucky to have made the return journey without issue.
Lacking a spare, it's back to the Pompetamine on Monday.

Koncordski

Replaced the rear mech shift cable for the first time last night as the original was badly frayed. Tightened everything back up and she's shifting perfectly, well chuffed.

rubertoe

Flipped the stem last night, been suffering from some neck pain. So will see if that helps.

Hopefully a new cassette arraives today so it may be a chain and cassette change when i get home.

cyclingprop

Two clean steeds and a new cassette on the posh bike given that I bent the old one this afternoon pulling away.
Hmmm

mattcroad

Whole new groupset (except shifters) on the road bike this morning, re-tuned gears, and a clean in under 2 hours .

Proud of myself as I'd never changed out the cranks or bb, I think I'll quit my day job and become a pro mechanic (unless it all falls apart next week).

Initialised

My kid's bike was squealing under load, so I took off the cranks and popped the bearings out. Somehow a tiny pebble had gotten inside and eaten one of the bearings. So cleaned it out and fitted a more modern bottom bracket.

Replaced the seat on my bike with a Selle Itallia X2, seems to have stopped the knumb knob

redvee

Two PF visits, 8 miles apart Luckily the last one was slow enough for a pump/ride cure. Now have four choobs to repair sometime when I buy myself a round tuit.

optimisticbiker

Cleaned the commuter in preparation for some fettling. Finally got round to fitting the Gatorskins after finding, on Friday, that the rear tyre had two large gashes in it (each about 3cm long exposing the canvas inside). The front Kenda tyre still had a Kenda tube in it with one patch so clearly thats only been off the bike once since I bought it new in 2007, the PF only visits the rear it seems. Also fitted new Koolstop rear pads since the old ones were well below the marker line (did the front a few weeks back).

Was getting too hot so cleared up, went inside, had a beer, watched some TV... had to go back to garage a couple of hours laterto get something for Mrs OB and while admiring my handiwork noticed the front is flat so tomorrow I'll strip it off and do it again with a new tube... must have trapped it when fitting. Never fitted a folding tyre before, it sort of seems easier in some ways, harder in others.

Must go shopping tomorrow for some new tubes too...

optimisticbiker

So went to Evans after my 40mile ride today and got four tubes, then settled down with a beer or two to watch the GP and the Giro time trial. Then got back to fettling, and quickly completed the first job, two new tubes fitted...

Then decided I really couldn't stand the rattling over rough roads anymore nor the clonking noise from the headset so stripped that all down, found it full of gunky rust and at least one ball missing (ooh err, well actually it was there, just in two halves). By this time Evans were closed so no chance of gettng new ball races. So just cleaned it all up, derusted the ballraces in some concentrated citrus cleaner, regreased it all and reassembled and adjusted. There's some slight roughness but nothing I can't live with for now and no clonking or movement. Suddenly my commuter has become a silent runner again...

Twostage

OptimisticBiker wrote:

So went to Evans after my 40mile ride today and got four tubes, then settled down with a beer or two to watch the GP and the Giro time trial. Then got back to fettling, and quickly completed the first job, two new tubes fitted...

Then decided I really couldn't stand the rattling over rough roads anymore nor the clonking noise from the headset so stripped that all down, found it full of gunky rust and at least one ball missing (ooh err, well actually it was there, just in two halves). By this time Evans were closed so no chance of gettng new ball races. So just cleaned it all up, derusted the ballraces in some concentrated citrus cleaner, regreased it all and reassembled and adjusted. There's some slight roughness but nothing I can't live with for now and no clonking or movement. Suddenly my commuter has become a silent runner again...

There's a certain satisfaction from doing your headset bearings. One lesson I've learned from doing mine (which are loose bearings) is taping a plastic bag to the bottom of the head tube (or top if you are doing the bottom set and have the bike upside down) to catch the inevitable bearing that decides to make a run for it.
Second lesson is to have spare bearings.

Paul E

Just replaced the tired bar tape with some light white fizik stuff, can't remember the name but it has a "wipe
clean" type feel

Ian.B

Just replaced the old original Ksyrium Elites that came with the bike (and which I've never done any maintenance on) with new Fulcrum 3s, bought over a year ago when I spotted them at a bargain price, and the bike's rolling along dreamily smoothly and much more quietly.

mudcow007

just removed cotter pins from my "old skool" road bike an removed the chainset



i also polished up my head badge

willy b

Spent Saturday taking apart one bike and building another. few more little parts I need and then it's ready to race Can't wait!

optimisticbiker

willy b wrote:

Spent Saturday taking apart one bike and building another. few more little parts I need and then it's ready to race Can't wait!

This pic made me smile... apart from a different frame I could have taken a very similar picture when I did my headset last weekend... with a near identical wooden mallet (although mine was my grandfathers and at least 70y old)

willy b

I always makes me laugh how much you still need a hammer when doing any bike fixing or building task.

suzyb

willy b wrote:

Spent Saturday taking apart one bike and building another. few more little parts I need and then it's ready to race Can't wait!

This makes it look a bit like a lego kit all laid out waiting to be put togther

itboffin

willy b wrote:

I always makes me laugh how much you still need a hammer when doing any bike fixing or building task.

:shock:

willy b

itboffin wrote:

willy b wrote:

I always makes me laugh how much you still need a hammer when doing any bike fixing or building task.

:shock:

Maybe not on a nice plastic road bike, but on the mountain bike a hammer will be used (headset, cranks, Crownrace, mech hanger straighten )

dondare

Put on a new 700/28 Schwalbe Marathon Plus a couple of weeks ago. Anyone who's done (or given up trying) this knows that it's just about the hardest bike job that there is.

mtb-idle

finally settled down to fit new brake pads to my road bike this week only to find that I had bought the wrong ones and that they don't have the cut out groove in them for the retaining screw.

As they came mail order and I couldn't be arsed to send them back i got out my Stanley knife and round file and made a groove myself; jobs a good:un!

cleaned the bike too and it's looking and stopping a lot better. Just need to sort out the creaking bottom bracket and adjust the rear mech which isn't tuned properly and all will be good.

Also had a nice new set of schooper-wide bars turn up for my DH MTB this week and fitted those.

780mm wide in white baby; Boom!



and measured up against the previous 680mil bars