What have you fettled today?

[Feline]

Tesco value car shampoo.  As the name suggests, it's a basic salt-free detergent that's just right for this sort of thing,  and a lot cheaper than Pantene.

Awesome 

Is there any reason other than cost not to use shampoo? It seemed to do a very good job of getting all the random gunge-mixed-with-vegetation out of my jockey wheel 

[Kim]

Not that I can think of.  It's pretty good for getting oily grime off your hands/legs, too.

That said, at risk of crossing the threads, bikes seem to be able to go a lot longer between shampooings than I do

[Dibdib]

I was naughty and washed mine with fairy liquid today 

The worst thing is that I have all of the potions, gummins and apparatus to wash, wax, polish and generally fettle a bicycle, because I also own a motorbike. Unfortunately the above-mentioned stuff is 80 miles away at my mum's house, while the motorbike hibernates for the winter. Down here, the bike lives in my living room and all I have is a bucket and an old washing-up brush!

My penance will have to be to get up early in the morning and get myself to the shops for suitable supplies, so I can wash it properly in future...

[Ashaman42]

Fettled the oil level and washer jets on the car today pending my mot tomorrow. Thinks it's going to fail anyway as boot hinge area is rather rusty 

Aaaand coming home from the cinema this evening (Tron 2 is rather good btw) I remembered one of my number plate lamps doesn't work. So will be up early to fit that before I go for test but have the horrible feeling it's a problem with the wiring coming through the boot hinge that I mean to sort a while ago and forgot about.

Feeling quite annoyed at forgetting about it as I'll have just wasted the mot fee.

[rogerzilla]

Cleaned the chain and sprockets on the Inbred, fitted new brake pads, pumped up the tyres and tightened the headset slightly.

Tomorrow is my first time on the bike after 3.5 weeks off (one week of snow, the rest with flu).  I am afraid.

[jogler]

I have removed the aero bars from the Langster.It was less than comfortable using them due to toomuchjoglerinthemiddle & not using them made them a nuisance

[Basil]

Three bikes now have freshly lubed chains.  That's it really.  I was going to do some proper bike cleaning, but as the roads seem to have been gritted again, I'll leave it.
I like to build up a protective patina over the winter months.

Well, that's my excuse, and I'm sticking to it. 

Yes, I know.  I'm a dirty bugger. 

[andygates]

Drilled out my old cleats.  Filed down the stubs, turned the plates around and fitted new cleats (generously greased, but they always are at first).   Top tip, that forum. 

[toekneep]

Just fitted Crud Roadracer guards to GillP's bike. Came to attach the last extension tip to the rear guard and found I was missing one nut. They now sport one bright shiny silver nut where there should be a black plastic one. I've e-mailed them to ask why they include some spare parts but no spares of the smallest, most easily lost bits. (I didn't lose the nut, it wasn't in the packet). They also offer any spare part just for the cost of a first class stamp which is pretty good but makes it even more baffling that they don't pop a couple of spare nuts and bolts in there.

[MattH]

That is irritating. When fitting mine, one of the nuts stripped (and I'm pretty sure it was just poorly made rather than me being ham fisted). A spare would have been welcome; as it was, I just roughened the mating faces of the guards and glued them, then a bit of glue to hold the nut in place.

[toekneep]

Actually that's a really good tip Matt. I might glue all the extension bits in place as I'm a bit suspicious of those nuts working lose. I can't see why the guards can't be fitted as one piece apart from maybe the centre join on the back guard.

[hulver]

Actually that's a really good tip Matt. I might glue all the extension bits in place as I'm a bit suspicious of those nuts working lose. I can't see why the guards can't be fitted as one piece apart from maybe the centre join on the back guard.

My first set, I was sure I'd tightened all the nuts up. However the first ride I did I got home to find both stick on bits missing from the rear guard. The nuts had come loose and they'd fallen off with me noticing.

[perpetual dan]

Adjusted Mrs Dan's front mech. Not sure what had happened before I got there, but I had to rotate the whole thing as it was interfering with the big ring in top gear.

[Gattopardo]

Fitted bar tape to the fixie, some old school black benotto style tape

Going to attack the Raleigh rear derailleur and figure out why its sticking and generally put it back together.

[rdaviesb]

Laced up 20+ year old Mavic rims to an Shimano Ultegra (c 1987) front hub, and a new Deore LX rear hub. Roughly round, and I'll true them later this week.

[Woofage]

Tesco value car shampoo.  As the name suggests, it's a basic salt-free detergent that's just right for this sort of thing,  and a lot cheaper than Pantene.

As reported elsewhere by me, a cleaner/degreaser I bought from Screwfix has more than a passing resemblance to Muck-Off. When my current bottle of MO is empty (soon) I will fill with a 50% diluted solution of aforementioned cleaner and give it a proper test.

[Woofage]

New gear cables on the Ridgeback. The old ones were well past their best and my gear shifting had been sluggish to say the least.

[interzen]

Fitting a GPS mount to one of the bikes - Garmin mount says it'll only fit 'standard' handlebars (up to 25.4mm diameter) but the fixed has oversized bars, so what to do? Dig an old handlebar extension out of the bits box and fit the bracket to that instead. Job's a good'un.

However, the fact that it took me three attempts to correctly fit something that only has two 'valid' orientations(!) is indicative of the kind of day I've had  (start at chaotic, work up from there)

[CrinklyLion]

The server backup, the AV setup for assembly, and some lastminute youtube keepvid-ing for said assembly.  On my day off.  And answered questions about interactive whiteboards and visualisers.

It's a good job I like my end users.

[gordon taylor]

Tyres and tube check after a puncture today. Again, I can't find whatever caused it.   

[Kim]

It's a good job I like my end users.

-50 BOFH points.

[interzen]

It's a good job I like my end users.

-50 BOFH points.

Sacking offence, IMO  
I'm not allowed to talk to clients, even the techie ones - I just sit behind my bank of screens and glower at people

To paraphrase Dogbert: "These people are trying to use your network - they should be punished for their arrogance!"

[CrinklyLion]

Oh dear - so the fact that I quite often take them cake is probably a bad thing too?

In fairness, I'm not (and never have been) a BOFH.  I'm just a french and theatre studies graduate (and bar maid, and part time voluntary shepherdess) who accidentally ended up being a helpdesk monkey, somehow got put in charge of quite a large project and let loose on quite a big network then a left IT via call centres and parenthood and PGCEs before accidentally ending up out of my depth back in IT(ish)  again.  Or something...

[interzen]

Oh dear - so the fact that I quite often take them cake is probably a bad thing too?

Not necessarily - given that both the guys I share the office with are about 7 stone lighter than me, I often take Forbidden Foodstuffs[tm] into work. To quote Homer Simpson: "The sphere is the most perfect shape in the universe, strive to attain it"

Matters were made worse today by a large box of Christmas and New Year comestibles arriving from our German office. Said box contained a lot of lebkuchen. Yum! Shudder to think what my blood sugar level is now, though ...

Simon (BSc, PhD, BOFH)

EDIT: I'm also fettling one of my iPhone apps and wondering why Apple hate their developers so much.

[Kim]

I'm just a french and theatre studies graduate (and bar maid, and part time voluntary shepherdess) who accidentally ended up being a helpdesk monkey, somehow got put in charge of quite a large project and let loose on quite a big network then a left IT via call centres and parenthood and PGCEs before accidentally ending up out of my depth back in IT(ish)  again.  Or something...

That's how it happens, though.  It's all going perfectly well until one day you're the only person in the building with shepherding skills^[1] and knowledge of how to make some godforsaken windows box suck slightly less hard...  


_{[1] Sheep, goats, SCSI, they're all basically the same thing.}