(Amateur) Home Mechanics

When it comes to spending money on servicing these days, I’m tighter than a camel’s arse in a sandstorm. Sure, I understand that bikes require maintenance and new parts now and again but I’m trying hard in these economically difficult times to save a bit of cash in the DKNWHY household and figure, “How hard can bike mechanics be?”

With a chain hanging limper than that bracelet on your Grandma’s wrist and a cassette where the teeth are as worn as the ones in her mouth, I needed to set to work.

Obviously, my first port of call was the internet. I typed in the word, “amateur, handy work, bike and video” into the search engine and well, what I got back would not have helped me in the slightest. You people out there in internet world are truly sick.
Anyway, I added Kleenex to my shopping list……

As the internet was no help, I ordered a copy of Zinn and the Art of Road Bike Maintenance instead along with a new cassette and chain.

When these arrived (after several days), I realised I needed some extra tools and so put in another order with Wiggle.

A few days later, I’ve got all the bits I need but I’ve put on some extra weight through not training and eating free sweets from Wiggle. It’s a shame that they don’t sell knuckle skin too as I lost a fair bit of this in removing the cassette.

I feel at this point I should also point out that this kind of work does involve a fair bit of dirt and grease so the best place to do it is in a garage or workshop and not in your living room or you could end up with grease on the carpet like I may have…..

So, after spending an hour cleaning grease off the carpet with the only thing I had to hand (Kleenex and Swarfega – which is slightly abrasive and not as lubricating as you’d expect), I set to work fitting my new chain and cassette. I then set to work taking the chain off again and shortening it to the correct length.

I was then in the position where I had something that resembled a bike and my next point of action was to test ride the little beauty. It rode like a bag of nails so I went to a local bike shop and was told that I needed a new front chain ring. So I bought one and took it home to fit myself as I’m becoming an expert at these things.

New chain ring fitted I went out for another test ride only for the left shifter to give up on me.

I went back to the bike shop where they kindly (for the bike) took the bike away from me and fitted a new one under warranty. I like to think of them as the bicycle equivalent of social services. They could see that the bike was mistreated and took it into care.

I’ve now got custody again and am a happy little soldier. I guess the moral of the story is that if you’re like me and contemplating home mechanics, do the right think and don’t bother. Your local bike shop is there for a reason. Deliver the bike to them and spend your time more wisely, like surfing the internet for videos……