What have you fettled today?

[JT]

I still think I'd struggle to bend one of Lidl's finest allen keys.

Not tried WD40 yet. The pedal threads had grease applied to them when they were fitted a couple of years ago. I used to swap them willy nilly with SPDs so I'm surprised they're so stuck.

[Wowbagger]

I've just done a bit of fine-truing to the wheel I built on Monday. Test ride now.

[CommuteTooFar]

Tonight I did some more spoking.  I removed the too short spokes mentioned above and added them to another new wheel that wanted that size.  So I now have two one sided spoked wheels awaiting the arrival of 284mm spokes to do the other side.  My bedroom now contains three incomplete wheels.  The third requires a little more truing. It is laterally perfect and centred but it is not round oops.

[Bledlow]

Fixed Mrs B's road bike lighting, for the moment, with bits from the remnants box. Replaced the knackered back of the Lumotec Halogen headlight with the spare back (front was stolen) I had sitting around. Pieced together a new cable from  spare dynamo cabling, a jack plug & some heatshrink sleeving to link the light to a Smart BL201H battery, & weatherproofed the plug with more sleeving & a bit of old inner tube.

I'm toying with buying a drop-in LED to replace the 6W halogen bulb. It'd give slightly more light, & the battery would last all night. I could rejuvenate the old Smart lights the same way. But I have spare halogen bulbs, including a couple of 6W ones which have never been used. 

[Feanor]

I did a major drivetrain / brakes / wheel-bearings re-fettle last Sunday.

On my ride home tonight, the headset bearings indicated in strong terms that they were disappointed at not geting an invite to the party.  What started as a difficult-to-pinpoint clickety-creak which was neither at crank-rate nor wheel-rate turned into a full-on choral works by the time I got home.   Holding the bike up in the air and turning the 'bars creates a sound no-one with an ounce of mechanical sympathy can bear to hear.   Like a crying child, only worse.

Looks like tomorrow is another fettling day.

[Feline]

We fettled roof bars onto the car, installed the tandem rack, then put the tandem up there. It wasn't much fun getting it there so the plan to take it down again changed into leaving it there for tomorrow. I then had to climb onto the roof of the car to put Brooks covers onto the saddles and Simon had to retrieve his Garmin from the bars with it up there. Not very well planned really 
God knows how we are going to get it down again when we get there tomorrow, or how we are going to get it back up there for the return journey!

[jogler]

^^^^^
keep one of these


http://www.towsure.com/product/Fiamma_Caravan_Step

in the car.Makes a world of difference
hth

[jogler]

The Cannondale atb has recieved some attention in readiness for cycle camping duty.

Fitted a Klik Fix barbag bracket to the bars.This brkt will accommodate the Altura barbag it came with or an Ortlieb Ultimate 5 barbag 

Made a T bracket comprising a stem (the vertical part) & 120mm x 28mm dia wooden dowel (the horizontal bit;part of a broom handle).Fiited this as an inverted T from the indigenous stem to carry lights below the level of the underside of the bar bag.

Fitted an SQR bracket to the seat post.
Fettled a bracket to the rear pannier to accommodate a rear light.

[essexian]

Put the new crankset on Boris the Boardman without a problem....... then tried to index the front derailer and discovered that I needed three hands to do so.

As I wasn't born with a third paw, Boris is now in the capable hands of my local LBS who no doubt have a tech monkey who will fix it in no time.

Worrying isn't it when the LBS know you by first name! (It would be even more worrying if they knew your credit card number without you taking it out of your wallet!!!)

[Dibdib]

Does washing the bike count as "fettling"?

Embarrassed at how much crud I had to scrape from the rear mech. I'm a terrible fettler. Oh the shame of it all...

[jogler]

Worrying isn't it when the LBS know you by first name!

I was once told by the owner of my lbs that I was a specific item on the business plan that he had submitted to his bank manager

[PaulR]

Fitted new stem, bars and brake cables on the Cougar, new bar tape, changed the saddle over and took it for a spin to Sydenham.  All running very nicely.

[CrinklyLion]

Came out of the pub in naburn to find a completely flat back tyre.  The large metal staple straight through the puncture protection band on the fairly decrepit bontrager racelite tyre may well explain this.  Fortunately the rain had stopped and the sun was shining and it gave me an opportunity to show CA how to change a tube in a somewhat leisurely manner. For the first time ever I got the tyre back on with thumbs alone... which probably means that I really need a new tyre tbh.  And getting completely filthy in the process is simply karmic justice for having STILL not cleaned half of shark lane off my bike, a fortnight after that ride....

[phantasmagoriana]

Came out of the pub in naburn to find a completely flat back tyre.

Just like I did on Wednesday...

Perhaps there's something nasty by the bike parking area!

[Kim]

I blame the asteroid belt...

[Tim Hall]

Earlier in the week I noticed the house was cold. Hm. Central heating was U/S.

Check pressure. OK.

Hm.

Check wireless room stat. Possible flat batteries (although no flat battery icon). Change batteries. Still not going.

Hm.

Demand hot water. Boiler fires. Good.

Pull off actuator on CH flow valve and turn by hand. House gets hot. Good.

Replace actuator and use wee lever to move valve.  Jibble room stat some more. House gets hot. Good.

Turn stat down and BANG valve actuator closes v v quickly.  Hm.

Call plumber friend who says he'll pop in Friday night.  He forgets.

Heating can be jury rigged using wee lever on actuator.

Just now: Take actuator off, jibble stat. Actuator works better when lying in my hand. Hm. Suggest motor isn't frobbing the gnurly thing.

Take cover off actuator. Scratch head. I'm going to have to switch off and disconnect it to disect it.

But what's this?  The two screws that hold the motor firm in the body are loose. Half a turn each and lo! motor frobs gnurly thing with joy and precision.  Valves goes back and forth like a good 'un when I jibble the room stat.


The heating, she lives!

[Arch]

We fettled roof bars onto the car, installed the tandem rack, then put the tandem up there. It wasn't much fun getting it there so the plan to take it down again changed into leaving it there for tomorrow. I then had to climb onto the roof of the car to put Brooks covers onto the saddles and Simon had to retrieve his Garmin from the bars with it up there. Not very well planned really 
God knows how we are going to get it down again when we get there tomorrow, or how we are going to get it back up there for the return journey!

Don't bother. Get someone to make a backdrop of your planned ride on a long strip of paper, and wind it from one roller to another behind you, as you sit on the tandem atop the car, and pedal in a carefree manner.

[CAMRAMan]

The pollarded elder at the bottom of our garden had a severe haircut. The electric chainsaw made light work of it, but I now have to call in the council's shredding bloke to get rid of the waste wood.

[Mr Arch]

Fettled Arch's trailer coupling.

She tried it today and the clamp part wouldn't grip the chain stay.  The handle part had run out of threads and wouldn't close the clamp any further.  Also the clamp had lost its rubber facing and so it was metal on paint.
We added a bit of tyre rubber and set off to deliver a vice (metal clamping gripping thing, not alternative source of income).

I then added some washers under the handle to extend the useful threads and it gripped better for the return ride.

Back at base I dismantled the clamp and added some inner tube to the jaws to soften the faces and then greased the moving parts.
On reassembly I found the safety strap had a twist in it.  Took it apart and refitted without the twist.
Then noticed the attachment bolt looked upside down, nut on top.  Dismantled and reversed the bolt and reassembled.
Then noticed the whole clamp was upside down and the bolt was right the first time! Dismantled again and turned the clamp over so the handle was now back on the top and reassembled.
The dismantled again to replace the grease that got wiped off from the previous refettling and reassembled.

'tis done now and looks good.

Must make note of orientation of folded draw bar and trailer chassis, when next working on it crouched in the corner of the hall floor, before dismantling.

I miss working in my own workshop!

[Arch]

 

I did think as I looked into the hall* that you looked like you were having fun in your playpen...

*well, tiny area between main room door and flat front door.

The trailer is great, and will make collecting junk tyres and inner tubes and stuff much easier.

[drossall]

The pollarded elder at the bottom of our garden had a severe haircut. The electric chainsaw made light work of it, but I now have to call in the council's shredding bloke to get rid of the waste wood.

If you have a local Scout camp site, they may be grateful for it. It's not so easy these days to find enough wood for camp fires.

[JT]

Been mainly website fettling today but just nipped into the garage and swapped the free hub on my Ksyrium wheel to the Campy version, then fitted the Campy cassette. I also fitted the new brakes and the front derailleur. Then tried fitting the new ergo levers but have probably borked the clamp nut as I didn't realise that the stupid Italians had switched to using Torx bolts instead of Allen bolts. I'll have another crack at that tomorrow.

Yesterday I removed the pedals from my old cranks! 

[Juan Martín]

Spent an hour cleaning the mud off the Royal after this morning's run and then searched through my tool box to see if I had a suitable easy-out to remove sheared crank bolt from Witcomb and was chuffed to find I had a brand new set (with dinky little rack) still sealed in polythene from years back - it's always worth looking - but a job for next weekend. And then...started fettling the Campag GT derailleur kindly provided by Giraffe OTP - a happy hour at the kitchen table with a pile of rags, WD40 and Autosol, listening to The Smiths. Life really doesn't get any better that this!

[LittleWheelsandBig]

Replaced a rear light on my Brommie and fitted a replacement rear mudflap to HK's Brommie (and cleaned the jockey pulleys and dug glass out of the tyres). Fitted a bigger sprocket and longer chain to a friend's Dahon. Currently fitting replacement cones to a Sovus fixed hub before refurbing an Ergolever.

[jimbhoy]

Fitted a new rear mech, new cassette, new rear wheel, new BB, 2 new Chainrings, new chain, 2 new tyres and new rear brake blocks all to my Van Nic last night, looks all lovely and shiny again, if only it would stay that way.