What have you fettled today?

[Dibdib]

That's a bit bostin', Nikki. 

[nikki]

That's a bit bostin', Nikki. 

Isn't it! 

Kim had a rummage in her component tray and The Cupboard last time I was over. I went away with that rather lovely badge, 2 mudguard stay nubbins and a litre of concentrated screenwash.

I'm still pondering the design for the spoke reflectors...


Thanks Kim!

[phantasmagoriana]

Attempted to remove the cranks from the not-Tifosi. Only got one off - the other seems rather reluctant.

Tried again. Still no joy. The tool won't come off, either, so now I have a useless bike with one crank. Gah. I wanted to ride it tomorrow, too.

[Kim]

Attempted to remove the cranks from the not-Tifosi. Only got one off - the other seems rather reluctant.

Tried again. Still no joy. The tool won't come off, either, so now I have a useless bike with one crank. Gah. I wanted to ride it tomorrow, too.

On the basis that crank bolts are a lot like car wheelnuts, "take the bolt out and go for a ride round the block" would seem like a good approach.

Unless you've only got one crank and it's got a remover stuck in it, of course...

[phantasmagoriana]

Unless you've only got one crank and it's got a remover stuck in it, of course...

Exactly. Not much I can do with it (it's the left hand crank, too, so I wouldn't get very far even if I tried to ride it!). Might be LBS time..

[T42]

Waiting for a goddamned headache to shift so that I can get out. Sun's shining, no wind and it's Sunday, and I feel like crap.

[CAMRAMan]

I got together the pedals, bottle cage, front & rear mechs, brakes and headset that will go back on the Harry Quinn and gave them a jolly good polishing with Autosol and elbow grease. Putting alloy bits through the dishwasher made life harder, but there's a decent shine now. The stem will need to wait until it's in situ, as I think it'll be easier that way. I hope the powder coaters pull their finger out, so I can get assembling soon.

[interzen]

De-fettled the singlespeed in preparation for its journey up north.

Plans to go out for a ride have been stymied by a throat infection - I think it was lying in wait, waiting for me to gasp down huge lungfuls of air on yesterday's fast (for me) ride before making its presence felt. The net result is an authentic 'swallowing razor blades' feeling 

[citoyen]

Fitted a new screen to my son's Samsung Galaxy Fame. I've done this for several different types of phone now and I have to say that this one was the easiest yet - nice modular design.

Haven't tried an iphone 4 or 5 yet and frankly don't want to - the 3 is bad enough.

[Kim]

Firewall, firmware, VLANs, cables, that sort of thing.

I think the internet still works.

[Tim Hall]

Cheap, 2 lever lock. The sprung latch was jammed solid, so the door couldn't close and therefore couldn't be locked.

Removed the lock from the door and dissected it. Greased the metal on metal bits, but to no avail.

The sprung latch is mounted on a bit of pressed steel which, upon closer examination, was as bent as a nine bob note exhibited a lack of lateral truth.  Held it tight in a pair of Mole grips and pressed the end against a handy garage floor. Much straighter.

Reassembled the lock. All good, no bits left over.

[CrinklyUncle]

I made these during the week and wore them yesterday at a wedding celebration we went to.



The backs are from ebay, some sugru to fix them together and the links are from the chain I used on LEL.

[Dibdib]

Oooh I might have to copy that, CU.

Not that I've had an excuse to wear cufflinks in a while, but one could be invented...

[marcusjb]

Better half's daily driver (giant hybrid). I had a new chain and cassette ready for fitting, but her gear cable snapped on Thursday (she took a different bike on Friday), so that needed fixing.

Getting a snapped cable out of 8 speed alvivio rapid fire shifters is a bit of a testing job. Much prodding and poking got me nowhere, so there was nothing for it but to dismantle the shifter with all of it's massive pingfuckit potential. It was pretty tough to put back together with a spirally spring that needed some patience to get in it's intended location.

That and incoming rain meant my audax bike didn't get cleaned and the fixed still has a flat back tyre. So some fettling to squeeze in today.

[Moultonaught]

Not today but yesterday I finished replacing the head gasket on our Skoda felicia.  For those familiar with such things it's remarkably similar to an A series engine...

[tiermat]

Not today but yesterday I finished replacing the head gasket on our Skoda felicia.  For those familiar with such things it's remarkably similar to an A series engine...

So you sheared several of the studs, gouged great chunks out of your hands and it still leaks oil and water into the cylinders?

[Moultonaught]

^ So true! I was a bit worried as on restarting it, it still had lots of moisture in the exhaust fumes but it was residual from the failure, and cleared after a few embarrassing 'steamy' miles... 

[Mrs Pingu]

Sadly this morning I spent 30-40 mins turning my rusted solid chain in to something flexible enough to get me to work.
Yes, I know I've only got myself to blame

[David Martin]

I have a new frame, forks and headset to put together because the retailer is obviously too lazy to do so.
And they sent the wrong seat post. I don't believe they have much of a reputation for customer service. Into the garage I go.

[Dibdib]

Just some flat pedals onto the Tricross - going to give this whole "commuting" lark another go.

The worst thing will be getting up earlier 

[Ruth]

Dried the tent out on the washing line.  And caught up on some of the sleep I didn't catch up on at the weekend.

One step at a time!

[David Martin]

Swapped the brakes onto the new frame. Put the headset in, cut the fork steerer to length and fitted the forks with a rather overlong stem. Swapped handlebars and removed the old cables, swapping the RH lever for 10 speed.  Discovered that Dolan really don't care about finishing their frames. Paint not as good as one might hope for, and all the threads and dropouts painted over. Had to scrape out the rear dropout to fit a wheel in. Swapped the derraileur over - all needs cabling now.

Added one bottle cage. Tried to (unsuccessfully) remove the old crank from the old bike. Looks like a new crankset will be happening. And new pedals as I couldn't shift those either.

[jhob]

Fitted new compact chainset.  And then ensued an extended period of front mech fettling including use of mole grips and washering out the cage. All seems to work pretty well. Looking forward to trying out the new low gears on some of the local hills.

[CAMRAMan]

I picked up the Harry Quinn frame from the powder coaters. I then spent a while dremmeling bits of overspray. After cleaning the frame with meths, I applied the HQ & Reynolds 531 decals. I then gave them a few coats of clear laquer, which looks good now.

Taking advantage of the weather, I then decided to refit the forks. Some percussive persuasion got the cups into place and the rest was fairly straightforward, especially with my shiny, new headset spanner. Replaced the brake cable with nice, slippery teflon ones. Much, much better now.

Saturday will be my next chance to put more bits on. The bars are taped, the brakes and mechs are ready and I have a chainset, chain and new cassette to get fitted. By accident, I found out the the Exage set up offers front indexed shifting. I may well see if it works. All I need to get now is a decent sealed BB and that should be it.

[mcshroom]

Fettle fail this morning. Went to tighten the cable on my tourer's front brake and proceeded to damage the cable so it splayed out and now won't go through the retaining hole on the top of the straddle.

Looking at the cable I'm starting to think that it may actually be the bike's original cable, so 4 years and over 10,000 miles old. Probably due replacing anyway then