Something's eating my handlebars

I must admit to being somewhat bemused by this statement, utterred by Mrs P, on return from her ride. My mind pictured some terrible chemical accident that resulted in some corrosive potion getting on her bike and, more frightfully, herself. The damage, it turned out, was not done on the ride but was evident before she departed, it was just the way it was disclosed that caused my alarm.

Sure enough when I looked, the right-hand side of her butterfly bar's foam has small gouges all the way round. Our shed obviously has rodent visitors who like nibbling on rubber and plastic. The little blighters! They also destroyed some roof-bar covers. We need to nip this problem in the neck before any more expensive damage is done.

Local Bike Store Quality - Do it yourself?

My daughter went into a well known Lake District cycle store with her rather dilapidated old bike that had two perished tyres, one of which was flat. It had been stored for a long time and she was needing it now for regular short commutes. She wanted to be sure the bike would be reliable and wanted to practice riding before needing to go to work on it.

She organised with the staff at the counter to have two new tyres and tubes fitted. After a coffee she returned to see her steed looking much better with its new rubber installed and went for a short ride.

The next day I offered to go on a ride with her only to find when we got the bike out, the same wheel was flat again. Before we could go on our ride, I had to repair it. The tube was the original tube with the original hole in it. I know because it also had another patch on. This particular store gets a lot of passing trade from the many day trippers to the Lake District, which is what my daughter had done. Consequently, it was not easy to just pop back to the shop and get the mistake rectified.

She checked the receipt and hadn't been charged for tubes, so somewhere between the counter and the service guy, there must have been a communication breakdown. I still find it strange that a large bike shop, like the one she used, would not have staff experienced enough to ensure all cycles leaving their store are roadworthy and reliable. My daughter paid top price for the tyres and £10 for the labour. It's unfortunate that large stores such as this force the smaller shops offering better service out of business. Net result: my 'avoid' list of cycle shops is growing faster than my 'support' list. It also means those prepared to 'do-it-yourself' rely on Internet resellers, which would have been around £14 cheaper. In this instance, it was not about the cost but about the inconvenience.

This is another example I've encountered of inadequate service from a 'reputable' cycle shop. I don't want to dis' the shop in question but this experience does beg the question how a growing bike industry with a supposed bright future is going to gain mass acceptance by the general public when it seems odds-on that they'll be let down by their suppliers? The solution is to build a relationship with a local supplier you can trust, if you can find one, and hope when you're out of town, you find one that's equally as good.

Another spoke

I rebuilt the back wheel of my commuting bike in its partial restoration at the end of last year. When I say rebuilt, I didn't replace all the spokes, just the ones that were broken, damaged or with seized nipples. That was about twelve, still leaving 24 old tired spokes in the wheel. I followed the excellent wheel building article by the late Sheldon Brown. I was surprised to find that although the lacing pattern was 3-cross, the spokes did not go over or under each other, shown in the picture above, before the wheel was cleaned up and re-laced. Sheldon's article explains what happens to spokes under tension and explains the possibility of the derailleur cage getting caught in spokes due to incorrect lacing and crossing. I stripped all the spokes out and laced them correctly before truing and tensioning it. After the exercise of truing it, I was pleased with myself for being able to get the wheel into better shape than it had been before I started.

Although the wheel is old, it gave it a new lease of life. Until Friday that was. That's 600 miles of shoddy roads, steep climbs and 5 months of daily commuting that it survived. I'd decided to pop into town after work and, after crashing into pothole after pothole along Whalley Old Road (another road in need of a complete resurface), I straightened out my eyeballs back on smooth tarmac at Larkhill to discover the bike shimmying around. I looked down to see the back wheel wobbling. Another drive side spoke had broken. It wasn't bad enough that I couldn't get home on it and I had it repaired in just over an hour. With hindsight, I should have bought 36 spokes and done a complete restoration. If only I'd known I could rebuild it successfully, but I wasn't that confident at the time.

Strangely that very morning there had been a piece on the radio about the state of the local roads and the amount the council spends paying out claims due to damage from potholes. It did cross my mind that maybe I should claim. Maybe I will. Time and materials and all that.

Replacing Tyres

The weather earlier this week was getting invitingly warm in the afternoon. Looking out of the window at work, it made me want to go further afield on the route home. I set off riding thinking I'd take the road to Rishton and go through Great Harwood to Whalley to make the journey about 15 miles. Before I got to the Rishton road, I was looking at blossoming trees and hearing birds chirping their spring song and thought a trip down the canal towpath would be nicer. I hadn't gone more than a few hundred yards before my rear tyre punctured.


I'd run over an old bramble despite trying to avoid them on the path. I was surprised how quickly my tyre went down. I soon had it fixed and was on my way again but the experience was interesting for a couple of reasons. One was that three other kind cyclists stopped to ask if I needed help. It was very heartening and reminded me of tales my grandfather used to tell me about the halcyon days of motoring when motorists used to stop and help others. Thanks to the cyclists for asking. The other was, that although a tyre has tread, it doesn't mean it isn't worn out. I did know this one needed replacing because the casing was cracked. Winter cycling has taken its toll on quite a few bits of my bike and my intention was to swap bikes to allow my commuter some time in dry dock but I hadn't realised the tyre's internal carcass had deteriorated. Inflated to the maximum pressure this would have created a gap in the tread and exposing the inner tube enough to allow it to be easily punctured.


When inspecting tyres it's worth looking for cracks and exposed threads and internally for any discoloration of the internal rubber which could indicate ingress of water and dirt through the outer tread -all signs the tyre is on its last legs and worth replacing to avoid an untimely repair stop. I replaced mine with a Schwalbe (27in) tyre with integral puncture protection.