The Face of Jesus in Matt’s Saddle Bag

Look!  I think I see the face of Jesus.  Like the shroud of Turin, inside his saddle bag, the spare tube and Allen wrenches were wrapped in a tie-dye-esque aged rust stained cloth.  I unraveled the wrenches and held out the cloth.  Behold!  That might fetch a few bucks on eBay.  They’ve been in the seat bag a long time, not quite B.C. old, but maybe before Bieber.  25 miles from home, I was helping Matt from Smitty’s Cyclery in Cincinnati replace a broken shift cable.  Yes.  He carries a spare.

Wrapping your tube and tools are just one of the lessons I learned from Big Matt’s saddle bag.  A former racer on the track and on the road, I’m sure Matt’s no stranger to weight weenie tendencies.  Matt proved you can pack a lot and still pack light.  The bag was packed with the expertise of an Everest climber, the necessities of survival in a few cubic inches.  I’ve had a day to think about it, and there’s not a mechanical incident that would’ve had Matt calling for a ride home.  Inside Matt’s saddle bag: tube, mini-tool with chain breaker, select 4-5-6 Allen wrenches, patch kit, brake and shifter cable, a five spot, a zip tie, and a chain pin.  I wouldn’t doubt there were a spare cleat and/or bottle cage bolt in there somewhere.  He kept the mini pump in his jersey pocket.

The black thing is the free hub body.

Matt explained the zip tie was in case your free hub body dies.  The free hub body is the thing your cassette rides on.  Its ratcheting pawls allow you to coast and engage the gears.  When it dies, and they do occasionally, you’re left…coasting home.  To fix on the fly, you can zip-tie the cassette to the spokes and get yourself home in a fixed-gear sort of way.  A zip tie can also fix a broken bottle cage, keep a busted derailleur out of your spokes or can be traded to the locals for corn and beads.

Wrapping your spare tube and tools in cloth accomplishes two, three, maybe four things.  For one, it prevents you from being the annoying Mr. Jangly Bag on group rides.  Two, it keeps sharp edge tools from serrating your spare tube.  Three, I would hedge a bet that it keeps spare tubes from drying out and/or prevents the valve-tube junction from becoming oxidized.  Lastly, it never hurts to have a rag for sweaty hands or keeping gooey chain greased hands from messing up white bar tape.

The black thing is a zip tie.

While Matt worked to get the broken cable end out of his shifter, I reached over his bike and undid the fixing bolt on his Dura Ace rear derailleur.  Matt’s got many miles in his legs, no stranger to being 2 hours from home with a mechanical.  He’s a mechanic at Smitty’s Cyclery in Cincinnati.  Yet even he packs a spare derailleur cable and a spare brake cable in his seat bag.  I scratched my head.  His Land Shark bike was impeccably clean and well maintained.  Having worked at a shop myself, I take pride wrenching on my own bikes and used to have a relative comfort in thinking that my cables are new and all bolts are properly fixed.  I don’t need to bring a multi-tool or anything beyond a tube, cartridge, mini-pump and five-dollar bill.  There on a flat road, 2 hours from home, Matt snapped a cable, fixed it with a spare in the span of 5 minutes and left me questioning my minimalist logic.

Home Mechanic: Magic Juice May Outlast Patience

"Magic Juice" Should Be On Every Bike Workbench

Riddle me this.  You have a good sized credit card limit, a new brake cable, a u-shaped thingy, a brake spring, a 3-month gym membership including unlimited spin classes, and a bottle of penetrating oil that the mechanic at your local bike shop refers to affectionately as magic juice.  In what order do you use these tools to fix a 2004 Campagnolo Record front brake two weeks before Christmas when the high temperature is in the single digits?

Answer: Not in the order I did it.

Two weeks ago Blue Legs and her gorgeous, intelligent, super fit teammate, who looks like she’s in her mid 20’s set out for a Saturday ride.  It was a quick but hilly loop on a Northern Kentucky rolling favorite, Amsterdam Road.  Prior to bombing Amsterdam’s descent back down to the Ohio River, non-Blue Leg's front brake broke. 

Blue Legs

They pulled over.  The lever was in need of Viagra, limp and lifeless.  A broken cable, she reasoned.  Being the super velo-genius that she is, she opened the brakes so the pads wouldn’t rub the rim and continued the ride sans front brake.  She deftly navigated the tight dropping curves of the Amsterdam descent scrubbing just enough speed to keep her safe but fast enough to stay with her teammate.  When my wife arrived home, she gave me the news.

MISTAKE #1:

See That Spring Behind The Brake?

I checked it out.  The lever felt dead, but still moved the brake a bit.  Maybe there’s a thread hanging on, but I agreed with her diagnosis.  She asked what she needed from the shop and the next day picked up a new front brake cable, a new front derailleur cable, and enough housing to complete the job.  My reasoning, always replace the housing with the cable.  Since you have to pull back the bar tape to replace housing, you may as well replace both cables and housing.  It’s a cheap fix.  Both she and I were bursting with pride about her mechanical prowess. 

What was my mistake?  Yes!  I did not pull the old cable out to see if in fact it was broken till after we spent $20 on new cables and housing.  To my amazement, when I pulled the old cable, it was in perfect shape, not even corroded or frayed in any way.  Son of a…

MISTAKE #2:

So, why doesn’t the brake work?  Squeezing the lever and watching the brake, I discovered the horror.  Oh.  Oh no.  The tension spring broke!  In fact it was missing all together, ‘cept for the little piece still pressed into the brake itself.  The little “u” shaped thing that holds the spring against the tension adjustment screw was gone as well.  Being the best husband in the world and reasoning that I could still ride my cross or mountain bike, I put the Sram Red brake from my road bike on hers and went to work on a permanent fix that didn’t involve our credit limit.

I pulled up diagrams of 2004 Record Brakes on the Campy website, found the part numbers and ordered a new spring and “u” shaped thingy from BioWheels in Madeira via email.  She bowed to my superior mechanical prowess, made me a fantastic Indian dinner and fetched my slippers. 

In 2-3 days she picked the new parts up at the shop.  I installed them, but the spring still wasn’t functioning correctly.  I spun around in circles and screamed like a frustrated George Costanza on Seinfeld.  The pads would close, but not spring back open.  Something was seized in there. 

What was mistake #2?  I never stopped to think of why a tension spring would break.  As strong as she is I doubt she grabbed a mitt full of front brake and snapped the spring.  Things on bikes usually break for one of the following reasons: a crash, neglect, misuse, neglect, they are the weakest link in larger problem, neglect, fatigue over time or neglect.  But seriously, who takes their road brakes apart and relubes the moving parts?  Crazy Italian mechanics far superior than I, that’s who.  I got down on my knees, told her I was sorry for neglecting her bike, made her a fabulous salad dinner and fetched her slippers.

MISTAKES #3, 4 and 5

By now, nearly two weeks had passed since the incident with Blue Legs.  We had a few errands to run, so we stopped in to see our favorite Campy mechanic, John Wood at Reser Bikes in Newport.  Surely he could help.  He’s like a Campagnolo savant.

John wasn’t in, but the mechanic on duty confirmed my thought.  The brake was seized and wouldn’t move on the main pivot.  He suggested hitting the pivot points with penetrating oil that Mr. Wood called magic juice over a day or two and see if it breaks free.

With Dexter serial killer-like determination to put this beast to death, I bought a bottle of the magic juice and bathed the brake Saturday night, Sunday morning, Sunday night, Monday morning, Monday night.  Each time I tried to turn the allen screw, nothing.  However, on Tuesday morning, now two days past two weeks into the ordeal, it broke free.  Harps played.  Animated blue Disney birdies flew and whistled over my head.  An evil laugh echoed throughout the man-cave.

Finally Fixed

While excited, I realized my third, fourth and fifth mistakes. 

3) I inadvertently left three little parts on the counter at the bike shop.  So I have another trip to make before I can say for sure that the brake is fixed.

4) The day prior, Monday afternoon, after reasoning that the six year old components were going to start nickel and diming us, I pulled the trigger on the Howitzer and ordered Record 11 Levers, brakes, derailleurs, a chain, a cassette and chainrings.  I used the credit limit to fix what the new parts and magic juice accomplished for $26.50. 

5) I should’ve read the label on the Magic Juice.  I’m sure it says, “Warning: Magic Juice may take longer to work than your patience will allow.”

Being The Office Bike Bitch Ain't Bad

I’m the token bike bitch.  Wherever you work, I’m sure you’re the go-to person for bike related advice and services.  I’ve adjusted more Huffy headsets and Diamond Back flats than I can count.  Every spring there’s no shortage of coworkers who ask me to give their kids’ bikes a little once over.  I’ve earned stripes at BioWheels Bike Shop for extra referral business which now and then add up to wink-wink nod-nod privileges with shop supplies.  Once, I even dispelled cycling dating advice.  A colleague wanted to go for a short bike ride with his athletic date, so I sent him up to Loveland where you can ride the path along the Little Miami River and finish it off with a good sandwich and coffee.  Never heard how that turned out, but I’m glad I can help.    Not only does it build good rapport with coworkers, it’s the fringe benefits that I like best.  There’s a handy guy in our building that’s into riding Harley Davidson motorcycles.  We struck up a conversation about “bikes” and I ended up trading him a leather anniversary edition Harley jacket I had won in a raffle for a bench top vice.  Best trade I ever made.  Free lunch is always a favorite, and I take advantage of these situations to get yummy goodies from some of my favorite Cincinnati haunts like Giminetti’s and Izzy’s.  Some coworkers even swag me with gift cards for Speedway, Target and Kroger.  Being the office bike bitch also bestows little treasures upon me, like this broken 400 pound Suntour 7 speed cassette, which makes for great office décor and a nifty pen holder.

Snowicane: Winter Bike Repairs

Over the past few winters, I’ve discovered there’s always a few snowicane days where the degree of winter nastiness overrides my motivation to go outside over even stay inside and do something active.  I reserve certain bike related repair and maintenance projects, listed below, for those days.  There are a few hard core riders I know that have the clothes and equipment to ride or run in even a Hors Category Snowicane.  For the rest of us there’s some combination of cold, wet, and snow that steals our motivation to even exercise indoors.  These are the days where we shrug our shoulders and gaze out the window remembering when the trees across the street were blooming and we rolled out of the driveway bare handed.  Today, I find it hard to picture a day when my short fingered gloves were hanging from the drying rack and I had no idea where in the hell my shoe covers were.  It’s mindboggling fuzzy.  We’ve had too many snowicane days over the past week.  Last night, after getting let out of work early, I stood and gazed out the window as the thick snow rushed sideways under the streetlight.  No thoughts of wedding ring sunburns came to mind.  Instead, I remembered what snowicane days like this are for.  I headed downstairs to the Best Bike Man Cave Workshop and got crackin’ on some winter bike repairs.  Based on the category of snowicane, here’s what I do.

They Let Us Out Of Work Early

Patch Inner Tubes

Reorganize and clean up workshop

Check air pressure on suspension & tires

Pull out, clean and relube seat tube

Clean and lube drive train while it’s on the bike

Check and adjust wheel bearings

Check tires for wear and inflate to proper pressure

Snow Emergency

Put new sealant in tubeless tires

Pull apart and clean and lube rear derailleur pulleys

Take off, clean and lube cassette

True Wheels

Take the good stuff off your cross bike and put it back on your road/mtn bike

Check for chain stretch and replace if necessary

Put on new bar tape (with patience, care, karma and style) 

The National Guard Should Be Here Anytime

Pull out, clean, check, and lube bottom bracket and headset

Remove, clean & lube bolts on brakes, saddle, derailleur’s, seat post clamp, and stem

Replace oil and fluid in hydraulic brakes and suspension

Check and replace slow performing cables & housing