Come winter boredom ensues...

[Tricycle Rider]

... but we still need to take stuff apart, and with any luck, we can still put it back together!

So here's my mom's old cookie maker... it's at least 30 years old. I just took it apart (have no idea about the internal motor seeing as I don't do electrical), but what the hell, I just had to take it apart.

Merry holidays to you all, fellow tinkerers!

 

[Tricycle Rider]

Right, so I may have totally fecked up what was left of mom's old... well, whatever that was.

Winter has just begun, though, so next up - it may be something one would call a cheap fender/ mud shield.

Had no issues with the back shield on my 26", the front took a little but more work, however, simply because it didn't fit.

As usual it took a whole lot of tools, and a whole lot of improvising! (Not sure how long this thing will hold up, we can only hope for the best.)

Merry holidays to all you fellow tinkerers, STILL!

 

[Tricycle Rider]

And once you get really, really bored you start shaving the pills off your acrylic sweaters, or in my case, hats that I wear under my helmet ...

Don't think you'll be more aero, but at least you'll look better!

 

[King Boonen]

I need to do this with my duffle coat!

Noticed some rust at the headset above the crown on my fixed wheel today... Guess it's time for a full break down (the bike is 9 years old and all original so I'm hoping it comes apart ok!).

 

[ray j willings]

Re:

I need to do this with my duffle coat!

Noticed some rust at the headset above the crown on my fixed wheel today... Guess it's time for a full break down (the bike is 9 years old and all original so I'm hoping it comes apart ok!).

It starts with a bit of rust and before you know it your whole bike will be in bits and a mechanical nightmare staring right at you. Just get a bit of wet and dry and sand the rust away.
Don't do it

 

[King Boonen]

Re: Re:

I need to do this with my duffle coat!

Noticed some rust at the headset above the crown on my fixed wheel today... Guess it's time for a full break down (the bike is 9 years old and all original so I'm hoping it comes apart ok!).

It starts with a bit of rust and before you know it your whole bike will be in bits and a mechanical nightmare staring right at you. Just get a bit of wet and dry and sand the rust away.
Don't do it

But it could be a good excuse for a new frame...

It needs breaking down and checking over anyway and it's the fixed so not a lot of it to check over.

 

[James-Cole]

Most likely surface rust rather than anything terminal. Takes a long time to rust through good steel tubing. Reynolds? That said I've had a Batavus and a Venom rust through and crack on the seat stays

 

[King Boonen]

Most likely surface rust rather than anything terminal. Takes a long time to rust through good steel tubing. Reynolds? That said I've had a Batavus and a Venom rust through and crack on the seat stays

Hi James, it was surface rust, I was just a bit worried about the bearings above it but they all seem in good shape. The bike gets used and abused, combine that with Scottish weather and grit on the roads and I've got the the point where leaving a bit of rust on some of the bolts probably protects the bike better than cleaning it every day!

It's not Reynolds, my geared bike is, just some bog standard 4130 chromo. Better than gas pipe and will last a long time but if I had the money it'd probably get replaced with something built in 853.

 

[Tricycle Rider]

Nothing to do with winter seeing as spring is here, but you know you've been at this bike tinkering for too long when you start turning stuff (such as basic plumbing) counter-clockwise rather than clockwise.

Might just be here in the US, but I am so freaking confused by now... which way is the right way to turn a wrench - clockwise or counter-clockwise?

Btw., whatever you do, do NOT strip the thread!

 

[Tricycle Rider]

And once you start riding again something much more unfortunate may happen. again. (Such as the cars.)

 

[Tricycle Rider]

Apologies for not mentioning what the fix is for my latest post up-thread...

1. Even if you do have the right-of-way do not assume cars will stop for you. Establish eye contact with the drivers first, and if they acknowledge you and let you know they're letting you go, well then, by all means - go! (This is where I failed, there was a communication break-down between me and the driver.)

2. If you do happen to crash and it's not serious it's nothing that some ice and duct tape can't fix. (Just kidding about the duct tape... while usually a cure-all it's really hard to get it off of skin. Regular band-aids will work just fine.)


Anyhoo, now that the weather is hopefully getting a bit better in your parts - happy and safe riding, everyone!

 

[King Boonen]

Cars. Roads would be so much better without them. Upkeep would be less, there'd be less noise, pollution, kids could safely ride to school without having to go on paths. Hope you're healing up ok TR. I'd join a campaign to bad privately owned cars in a second

 

[Tricycle Rider]

Not really winter maintenance stuff, but a most embarrassing event just occurred...

I've been working on my neighbor's old Motobecane "Nomade" forever now (need the perfect weather for that, naturally), but being I think he wants all his parts back I tried to put some reflectors on the wheels back. Well, I totally forgot which way they're supposed to go...

I swear, I'm so good at taking them off (I personally don't like them), but trying to remember how to put them back on is a different story.

 

[Tricycle Rider]

Right, so once again it's winter time, which means we have to take *** apart, and then (hopefully) put it back together again without doing too much harm to ourselves, or to those around us.

So this year I've decided to take my old hairdryer apart (it was up in the attic, it's at least 20 years old) ... I was actually amazed that it even still worked to begin with!

Still, I thought it needed a little bit of cleaning, and as terrified as I am of electrical things, I naturally had to take it apart.

Much to my amazement it still works after I had put it back together, but it's not something I think should be donated to anyone at this particular junction.

Anyhoo, Happy Holidays ya'll, and here's a handy dandy flow chart that I had found on the web which you may (or may not) find useful.

 

[Tricycle Rider]

Re:

Right, so I may have totally fecked up what was left of mom's old... well, whatever that was.

Winter has just begun, though, so next up - it may be something one would call a cheap fender/ mud shield.

Had no issues with the back shield on my 26", the front took a little but more work, however, simply because it didn't fit.

As usual it took a whole lot of tools, and a whole lot of improvising! (Not sure how long this thing will hold up, we can only hope for the best.)

Of all the moronic things...

After seeing these types of mud guards on other bikes this very fine winter I realized there wasn't anything wrong with my front one, it's just that I was installing it the wrong way. (In my defense the guards didn't come with instructions, but if I had given it some thought it would have made some sense.)

So after all my careful adjustments and improvising all I had to do was just flip the guard the right way, and voila, it fits! (Took me only two years to figure this out, and I'm glad I didn't throw the guards out out of sheer frustration.) It looks like a rodent had chewed on it, but at least it's still functional and should stay on.

K, I'll just go and see what else I can screw up, that way I'll have something to fix a couple of years from now.