Forum Replies Created
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Fings in your list not needed
Fings in your list not needed at all:
A cyling helmet or special socks.
“Electronics” of any kind except perhaps some lights if its going to get dark.
You won’t need CO2 cartriges if you’ve got a pump. You will need a couple more tools, perhaps, besides allen keys.
Energy drinks and bars are for dafties with too much money who haven’t heard of real fud & drank; and are prepared to risk mysterious powders and goos that may well lay them low with badgut well before the finish.
Life isn’t entirely about buying stuff, that knows. (Well, maybe it is now we all live in Toryspivland, which has replaced civilisation with a market place full of hucksters and guls).
Di2 is preset to various
Di2 is preset to various limits that can’t easily be changed. One such limit is the distance the front cage can move outwards in pushing the chain on to the larger chainring. If the bike frame front derailleur mounting is too in-board on the frame, the front Di2 mech can’t quite push out far enough to keep the chain on the big ring, especially when the chainline is not very straight because a larger rear cog is selected.
A similar problem can occur if the chainset centre line is unusually far out from the frame centre line.
If the chain does actually get on to the big ring, this is because the Di2 front mech auto-operation pushes the front mech cage out further than it’s eventual resting position. The chain will go on to the big ring but then the front mech “trims” by moving the front mech cage back a little bit towards the bike frame.
If you have a frame with this problem of a poor front mech mounting placement, the front mech trimming motion can sometimes push the chain back off the front ring again. The first thing to try is to use the wee screw to allow the Di2 front mech to go as far out as it can – but it may still not be enough. And you may also get chain-rub issues if it is.
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I bought a bike with Di2 (it was 42% off in the sale, man!) last year and had various problems with the Di2 shifting. It’s fernickity and, because automatic, can’t be hand-trimmed by the rider pushing a bit on a mechnical lever connecting the mechs with bowden cables.
When the Di2 is perfectly set up, it works very well indeed. This means doing the process mentioned by Mr 1a but also making sure the gear hanger (for the rear mech) is perfetly vertical and the B screw set right.
I’ve also discovered that Di2 doesn’t like non-Shimano cassettes very much, or those that are franken-cassettes made up by the rider from various Shimano cogs into non-standard cassettes. Di2 is very sensitive to everything it’s expected to work with, even the alignment (and definitely the non-presence) of the wee ramps moulded into the rear cogs to help lift the chain from one cog to the next.
Yes, I expect a lip on the pad is worse than on the rotor. As well as the shuddering, if they protruded enough, they could touch and reduce braking performance.I think all things considered, I’m better off having a lip on the rotor and the alignment is probably not too much of an issue. The post mounts are square and look to have been ‘faced’ for a tight fit with the caliper mount, so sticking a washer in there is probably not a great idea as it could cause the caliper to be off centre or could damage the face of the post mount.
Another solution might be to try brake pads that fit but are not quite so long. However, I don’t really understand exactly how the pads are kept in place within the callipers, so even if shorter (lengthwise) pads fit the retaining pin and have the same “drop” there might be some other other fit-issue that means it’s not a good idea.
One of the disc braked bikes
One of the disc braked bikes I have has the older non-series Shimano road bike calipers that take a brake pad rather longer than the more recent callipers of 105 and Ultegra. These pads develop the syndrome you describe – a lip of unworn pad forms on one corner, over time, where the pad projects slightly outside the track of the disk as it rotates.
As long as you don’t change wheels to a set with discs that are slightly larger in circumference (even by just a teeny bit) the pad-lip doesn’t usually seem to affect braking. As another mentions, such a lip is an easy way to judge pad wear.
I did, though, notice an additional squeal and shudder after braking for a long time down very long steep hills, typically in winter when one is more wary of hooning down the long and bendy steep back roads, as they are muddy, wet and otherwise inclined to slide a fellow into the dry stone wall if he hoons and leans mightily.
Presumably the discs heat up with a lot more or continuous braking, so expanding their circumference by a teeny amount, causing the unworn section of pad lip to be hit by the disc outside edge …. ?
Have these been mentioned?
Have these been mentioned?
Copper-based anti-seize stuff (spray or grease).
A spoke tension measuring device
A wheel bearing extraction & instalation kit.
I use a copper anti-seize spray on things like pedal threads or anything else that might see spontaneous metal-gluing i’ the threads but haven’t got a spoke tension measurer or the wheel bearing tools. However ….
I do true wheels (without anything but a spoke key and a temporary summick stuck to the fork or seat stay as a guide) if they show a wobble or if I ever snap a spoke (only three snaps in 64 years cycling, mind – yet all relatively recently). Would a spoke tension measuring device help to avoid flop-wheel or a potential snapper-spoke? I have a suspicion that one pair of inexpensive wheels I have (came with the bike) are not really tight enough in their spoke tensions.
All the wheels I have now use press-fit bearings of various sizes. I even have some spare bearing sets (for Hunt wheels, as they came with one of their “offers”). But so far there seems no sign of wobble, drag or graunch to justify changing any wheel bearings. Surely, though, the time will come?
Has anyone found a wheel bearing kit (for both extraction and press-in) that doesn’t cost well north of ÂŁ100? I often wish I had a metal-working lathe as it can’t be hard to turn the pressing parts to use for bearing extraction & installation with a length of standard M8 threaded rod and a few M8 nuts.
I can change one bearing (you don’t usually need to do both at one time)By the time I’ve got the tools out and the cranks off, I might as well do both, rather than have to do 3/4 of the job again in 6 months time
That makes sense if the bearing wear rate and/or mileage is such that both bearings need swapping at more or less the same time.
In practice I ride four bikes and my mileage is only around 5-6000km in a year, these days. So, after changing the one obviously graunchy bearing in one side (the non-drive side) of the BB of a Trek Domane, the other side bearing (drive side) is still completely smooth probably about 1500km/a year later.
The same syndrome appears to be happening with the other Trek Domane. It’s the non-drive side bearing that’s recently gone and been replaced yet the drive side bearing is still completely smooth. You’d think it would be the other way ’round, eh?
End of summer the selant will need a refresh, so that could mak sense, Are they OK to use with Stan’s Race Sealant though? It has pretty obvious fibres in it which generally makes it unsuitable for injecting through a valve.To go off somewhat orthoganally …. the temptation to try some of the more exotic goos used with bicycles has been nagging at my wallet. I’ve been trying that expensive Silca stuff for the chain (the slippery molecules suspended in oil) which has so far proved very successful at meeting it’s advert claims for being not just kind to the chain but long lasting and a frugal buy because of the teeny amounts used.
So now there are the tyre milks with various suspended particles in them to coagulate a big scab on larger tyre wounds. That Silca do one that’s so claggy it can’t be put in via the valve sleeve, like the Stan’s you mention …. but you can then top it up with a thinner goo that does go in the valve to revive the initial thick & clarty injection via a dismounted tyre.
Are the advert claims troo, though? Anyone used the Silca stuff or a similar tyre milk with added scabbing bits floating about in it?
Actually we were in Aberystwyth last week – by golly it’s just one hill after another! And the roads are so windy as well. I was going to hire a bike but didn’t get round to it. Don’t know if I could have coped with those hills, so much respect to anyone who does.Before moving to West Wales, I cycled all about the lovely landscapes around Lancaster – Lakes, Dales, Bowland Fells, Howgills, Pennines ….. But despite the many and often savage hills of that district there was also the pan-flat Fylde as well as many routes going up essentially flat roads following river valleys.
In West Wales there is never any respite from hills. Even the river valley roads undulate constantly with some serious pitches. In our now many wanderings down every back road in a 25km radius from the Welsh abode, we’ve only discovered one truly flat stretch of road in the Cothi valley going NE out of Llansawel …. for a whole 2km before it begins to rear up & doon again.
After three years of grovelling & suffering on the ladywife’s e-bike back wheel, I sucumbed and got one meself. I tries reet-hard not to switch the motor on but when she sails off up a black arrow, I can have a bit of e to avoid death-by-brain-blott in attempting to keep up with the rascal.
Out by myself, it’s the un-e’d bike still. …. Unless I fancy a seriously hilly route. (There are many possibilities of 1000M ascent per 50km). Having an e-bike means no road-hill is forbidden me, even at 3/4 of a century old.
That cake sounds niceThe ladywife is a cake-pusher. She also grows her own. I yam not the only addict hereabouts, neever.
The cakes are good post-bikeride. However, if they’re regarded as pre- the next bike ride, they are not good as I am not as svelte, narrow or gossamer-like as I might otherwise be. And this in the land of West Wales, where there is only 500 yards of flat road (the sum of all the little bits at the top of hills and at the bottoms between the hills).
Fifteen minutes grinding up a hill, say; what seems like 30 seconds to go down to the bottom of the next ‘un.
I would carry cake with me on the bike but there’s no point as I’d only get it out and eat it after about 50 yards cycling. Why waste time wrapping it up and stowing it away just to unwrap it a minute later?
Did mention press fit BB…but keep thinking easier to leave to a professional (says a CEng FIMechE).Them bike shop fitters are of variable quality. You might get a competant one but you might …. not. Also, the rascals give you a Geet Big Bill for doing something you could do better yoursen in a lot less time. Oh yes they do!
I have two Trek Domane with BB90 press fit bearings. I can change one bearing (you don’t usually need to do both at one time) in less than 30 minutes although there is a time-gap in the middle when one must await the setting of the loctite stuffs used to ensure there’ll be no creaking or tic after the installation.
It takes about 5 minutes to remove the chain and crankset then another five-ten minutes to remove the bearing to be changed, clean off any murk from the BB shell with denatured alcohol then apply the loctite hardener followed by the loctite itself.
Go away and have a coffee.
Once the loctite is ready, a press is used to install the new bearing. Another ten minutes to put the crankset back, clean everything up then put on the chain.
Leave it for 48 hours without riding to make sure the loctite is fully cured.
This tool is very well made, costs far less than big-name equivalents but does need two extra nuts locked together and held with a second spanner to ensure the pulling grapple doesn’t just turn with the pulling-nut when used.
You don’t need the version with the butterfly nut as an ordinary nut turned with a spanner gives more pulling force for bearings that are very stuck-in (perhaps with too much loctite).
The next-cheapest version of such a tool is ÂŁ50! Then the next one about ÂŁ90!! The latter does have a nice colour anodizing on it, mind.
I wouldn’t consider a torque wrench “necessary” for things like cassettes that specify 40-50Nm – just do it up about as hard as you can manage easily. Though I do own a large beam style torque wrench for larger torques, I can rarely be bothered to use it. For things like headset and seatpost bolts, I always use a torque wrench as I wouldn’t want to damage a CF frame.Well, like you, I did used to do the “hard as you can” method for various bike bits …. but these days stuff is more delicate although more precisely made. The cassette lockring has but a few threads into the body the cassette is mounted on and cassette bodies now come in a very large variety, some of which are less resilient than others, being light alloy rather than a chunky steel item.
Suffice it to say that I’ve managed to strip one by doing the tight-as-I-can thing. I yam a big strong lad, see? Both the lock ring and the body had to be replaced as the threads on both got mangled.
Incidentally, this is a problem now recognised by that Hambini chap, who is selling over-engineered lock rings with a greater thread penetration. He offers an additional reason for this greater thread penetration: a tightening of greater than 40 Nm will do more to keep all the individual cogs of the cassette locked as one block so that the notches act together on the freehub splines, reducing the pressure points producing single-cog notching often seen on the alloy versions of a freehub body.
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Cassette freeehubs can be relatively easily replaced if damaged and aren’t ridiculously expensive unless they’re a proprietary design used by a-one o’ them ÂŁ3000-a-set wheel purveyors. But imagine that you strip the threads on a centre-lock disc wheel hub ……
”Your talk is surely the handiwork of wisdom because not one word of it do I understand”Well think on, lad.
Good lunch was it?Yis. I had kedgereeee with fresh tumeric and coriander in it; and a piece of pear & ginger cake just out the ladywife’s oven. Also a large cup of freshly ground and filtered Pensivito coffee.
The grog-supping you imply is not required as I’m already drunk on the sound of me own typing. 🙂
Ultimately, it’s down to the consumer to decide if they are prepared to pay for the goods at the price specified. Competition is often broken in markets as there’s nearly always a benefit to being the biggest player and information is often hidden from customers, so the idea of a “free market” is somewhat of a myth.We consumers do, in a fashion, decide to buy or not to. However, the nature of this decision doesn’t seem to be the “acting in my best & rational interests” sort of decision that neolibs love to imagine but rather an impulse from the deep unconscious serving some inchoate lust induced in us by the psycho-tricks of advertsing, fashion, peer-pressure and all those other things affecting buys that tend to the irrational.
People will pay the most ridiculous prices for things they momentarily lust for, even when their other usual habit of sticking it in a cupboard with the other 67 examples of a near identical thing revolves them rapidly from “satisfied consumer” to “once more avid seeker of the next consuming thrill”.
As to the notion of “a free market”, this is indeed a complete myth, as you say. Markets are highly refined and very particular sets of law and enforcements that tend to favour one small class over all the others. Sometimes “the others” are duped into thinking they’re free in these markets by the minimal dollops of goods and services allowed them by the aristocracy who own everything, including the law-makers. …….
Often, the dollops of good and services are shrunk, as the aristocrats wax greedy and tweak the market to award themselves more whilst forcing the market to a zero-sum game as a punishment upon “the undeserving poor” who the aristos like to employ as a fine excuse for being greedy themselves. (“I deserve more because I’m successful and I’m successful because I can ‘earn’ more” – The Protestant Ethic for capitalists).
One torque wrench is no
One torque wrench is no longer sufficient – unless you’ve found one that goes from 0.5Nm to 50Nm. Teeny bolts such as the bleed bolt on the hydraulic brake levers or the front mech push-plate bolt now come with recommended torques settings; the biggest torque needed on a bike is generally 40-50Nm for things like the chainset retension bolt, cassette retainer and disc lockrings.
Do you have any press-fit bearings (e.g. in the BB, headset or wheel hubs)? If so, various pullers and presses are essential if you’re going to replace the press fit bearings yourself. Bolt & cup pullers, by the way, are far better than those drifts you hit with a hammer to free press fit bearings.
A slot tool for straightening bent discs could be useful. I have one – but haven’t yet bent a disk, mind.
A wire stripper and electrical connector-squisher tool is good for putting on and taking off the caps used on the ends of bare cables, to stop them unravelling.