Kai Winters

To all the Triathletes out there...rinse your f'ing bikes...
Worked on a customer's beautiful Spesh Shiv yesterday. Main complaint was no rear brake. Additionally wanted it tuned. Checked the rear brake by engaging the aero mounted brake lever...it didn't move, didn't budge a millimeter...hmmm wonder what is wrong...this is an odd one. I squeeze the caliper, mounted under the chain stay, and it works but is stiff...ok I sayz to meself...must be in the cable/housing somewhere.

I pull off the wheels, spin the frame perp to the ground and take a look. Yikes what a mess. Grime coating everything...oh well that's easily cleaned...now on to the brake. I remove the cable, which is not rusty hooray, and holding it engage the brake lever...nada...nothing is moving. There is a metal noodle with a barrel adjuster for quick brake adjustment...it is similar to a V brake noodle but a tad fancier. When I try to pull off the noodle it won't budge. I wound up using two pair of pliers and a co-worker to hold one end of the housing while I pull on the noodle. It eventually comes free but the housing is trashed. It turns out the inside of the noodle the cable housing end cap sits in was completely frozen with corrosion...that icky white corrosion dust...ick. Fortunately it is an easy task to pull a length of new housing through then a new brake cable.

While I was removing all the parts for the 'super tune'...we remove all parts and they go in the MucOff bath for a good scrubbing...I notice the headset is 'self centering'...I pop off the stem/bars and try to remove the spacers...nope nope nopety nope they are not coming off...aluminum spacers and aluminum steerer tube is a bad mix for corrosion. Sure enough it is fused solid and not coming off. My co-worker says he thinks we've worked on the bike before and checks its history and sure enough I worked on it two years ago and noted in the work order that the spacers were fused to the steerer tube and I couldn't do anything with the head set without risking the fork...the customer said ok.

The frame was covered in dried on energy drink, I didn't notice anything more objectionable lol, and it took some time to scrub it all off. The parts showed signs of never being cleaned...at least since I serviced it two years ago, basically the same service sans the frozen brake, covered in grime, etc.

The cleaning and reassembly went well and once back together and everything adjusted it ran like new.
It's a beautiful bike but once that headset bites the dust it is going to be interesting to see what the customer wants to do. Were it me I'd be looking at a new fork in case the removal attempt of the spacers goes horribly badly.

Save yourself a butt load of money by rinsing your bike or suffer the consequences when the above happens to you.

Other than that I've been servicing the usual bike shop fare...Huffy's, Schwinns of varied decades, a very nice Bianchi in full Celeste, and a variety of bikes of all kinds.
It can be exciting to see a badly cared for bike come back from the near dead and not too expensively...but not cheaply...
Ciao everyone ! Ride On !