Allez Refurb: Components

I spent allot of time on Saturday using the sonic cleaner to clean up components and then hanging them on the bike.  My goal was to get to the end of the weekend with just the wheels/hubs left to do.

Dirty

Cleaned up

One thing about stripping the bike down to the frame and cleaning up parts individually is that you notice things.

This bolt is missing a nut

Had one

functional

Like the fact that one brake was missing a nut on the pivot bolt, I had one in my stash that worked, not perfect but functional and it may solve an odd sound I was getting from the brakes I thought was the too big tires.

New pads on the left

Since I was putting the brakes back on the bike I took the opportunity to replace the pads, and because they went in the sonic bath the pivot points all got some 3 in One oil.

I discovered  I am not a fan of anodized aluminum which was a popular look in the 90s.  The pictures above are where I started before doing any real cleaning.  They just look dirty and dull to me, its revealing that in most searches for cleaning anodized aluminum you come across ways to remove the anodizing so you can actually polish the aluminum.

My next step was to first wipe down the crank with some clorox wipes to remove any surface dirt, and then warm soapy water with a blue scrubber sponge, what I read is that anodized aluminum needs a bit of an abrasive surface for cleaning.

Which got me to here, a bit cleaner but the drive side crank still had some spots I didn't like.

 A bit of wet sanding with some 220 grit sand paper got me here, not perfect but much better.In retrospect I would have used something like 400 grit or higher.

My final step as Mother aluminum polish, its better but I would still rather have polished rather than anodized aluminum.

The pedals on the left are what came on the bike although they aren't stock, but I like them and I'm saving them for when I find a vintage MTB I really like.  The pedals on the right I got from bike works for $5 to replace them.

They are MKS road pedal knock offs and look the part for this bike.

Another thing I noticed in cleaning the parts is that while everything else is Shimano RX100 the FD is 105, so it got replaced at some point.

I noticed after running the FD through the sonic bath that there was some rust spotting on the rear of the cage, a little time with the dremel and brass wire brush got it cleaned up.

RD cleaned up and back on the bike, since both derailleurs went through the sonic bath, all the pivot points got a does of 3 in One oil before going back on the bike.

The last thing I did Saturday was to finally get the remnants of bar tape off the bars, since I am going to put on new bar tape  don't see much point in cleaning the gunk off the bars.  I did clean he stem and logo part of the bars with Mothers after I took this shot.

Today I cleaned the shifters and shot them with tri-flow lubricant and then after they dried out I got them back on the bike.

And the bottle cage and bolts got cleaned up and installed

I think I am going to try to set up the shifters as indexed first and if it doesn't work I can switch back to friction mode.  The wheel-set is where I have been stalling out lately on refurbs so I am going to try and tackle the hub this week and get to mostly done by the end of July.

Allez Refurb - Frame done

I have been puttering along on the Allez frame and this morning I got the headset cleaned up via the sonic cleaner.  My goal for the weekend was to reunite the frame and fork so I could clean components and hang them back on the bike.  In the last few weeks I have frame saved the tubes, and dealt with rust.

before

After

I also did some detailed cleaning of the frame so I could wax it.  I really love the look of lugs but they also give lots of nooks an crannies for dirt and grime to collect.

I thought I had found a decent match for the paint at True Value or at least close.

Turns out not as close as I thought, one of these days I will have to get a collecting of Testors colors and try my hand at mixing up paint to more closely match a frame.  In this case the point was really to cover up bare medal before applying the wax but a closer match would have been nice, oh well, metal protected.

I would never put a Free Wheel in the sonic cleaner because it has bearings and grease, but a Cassette is jut a collection of gears, the bearings and grease being in the cassette hub on the wheel, so it can go right in the Sonic bath.

After sonic bath

After Dremel and brass wire brush

The sonic bath got the headset mostly clean and then I finished off the top cup with a brass wire brush to clean it up a bit more.

The newly cleaned bearings were ready for fresh grease (its mostly on the underside) and to be installed on the cone races.

An step 1 of bearing rebuild is done with the frame and fork reunited.

Since I had purchased a brand new Shimano BB, step 2 was pretty straight forward, grease the threads and install the bottom bracket.

Now I have a lot of components to clean up and hang off the frame before I tackle the hubs.

Ride. Smile. Repeat.

Ride me out to the ball game -Year 3

For the third consecutive year I have ridden my bike to a baseball game.  It was a chance to try and regain some of the fitness I had before I was sick for 10 days and to rack up some clunker challenge miles on the Rock Hopper.

There was even some gravel to ride along the way, just a pull out but still gravel.

There weren't a ton of bikes in the lock up at the stadium but I did notice this newish Salsa adventure bike with a milk crate on the rear rack that created an interesting juxtaposition of sleek and fast with  utilitarian grocery getter.

I tend to go to games when the local Boeing credit union sponsors half price nights, I can get the experience of a beer and a dog and the crack of the bat without spending a ton and then I don't feel too bad for leaving early to take advantage of the fading daylight on the ride back.

I had fully intended to take the bus for the last couple hilly miles home but due to road work it wasn't stopping at its normal place so I ended up slogging the whole way and made it without walking.  Much like the first Clunker challenge bike the saddle on the Rock Hopper is not my friend.  I also noticed I was getting some hand numbness on my right hand towards the end of the ride. Not sure if it was the flat bars, the lack of cushion in the grips or the feedback from the knobbie tires on pavement but if I change things up on this bike eventually it will be interesting to see if the numbness goes away.  I am also interested to see if the pavement tires improve the forward momentum of the bike.  I have noticed that even after booming down a long hill my momentum quickly dissipated on a small rise.  I don't expect the RH to behave like a road bike but since it has no suspension fork I was surprised by how quickly I lost momentum. 

I was going to get a picture of the bike at the top of the bridge with the city behind but as I stopped to take the picture they started sounding the alarm that the bridge was going to open for boat traffic and I thought better of my plan and quickly scurried off the bridge.

Ride to ball game. Drink beer. Smile. Repeat.

Holiday Puttering

I figured out the 100 days of the Clunker challenge expires on July 12th and that might afford me time to use the Rock Hopper as my second challenge bike of 2019.  To that end I have been trying to ride it regularly since the 30th of June and have thus far gone over 26 kilometers.  A minor theme is to find gravel on my rides.

Lincoln park

Hiawatha Play field

Alley about a block from my Apartment

Fortunately gravel isn't that hard to find even in my urban neighborhood.   On Friday I am going to ride to a ball game and I think there is some gravel near the railroad tracks and then next week I am going to ride a portion of a trail near where I work that connects lake Washington and lake Sammamish that is mostly gravel.

One nice thing about the clunker challenge is it forces you to ride the bike as is before you make any changes.  Since I am Mr. Fill a cart on Amazon before the first pedal stroke that is a good thing. 

Ok, I did order a pair of Schwable city Jet tires for the RH but only because they were under $40 for the pair including shipping from the UK (chain reaction cycles) and although the Performance knobbies on the bike are fine I do find myself wondering how it would ride with a smoother tread.

I have found I only really have about 2 gears in back that work so I am riding 3x2 and it reminds of the 6 months I spent riding a single speed to work, you are never in quite the right gear but it gets you there.  I found a bikemanforu  video that I think will help me fix the gear issue but I want to get through 30-50% of the challenge first.  After all I had two bikes with basically zero issues on the challenge so this is kind of like penance lol.

The other bike that has been occupying my time is the Allez Sport, there seems to be an early 90s Specialized theme going on here.  I have all the parts I need for the the rebuild, I think, including a new BB.  If I was keeping the bike I would use the stock BB which spins fine but since I am selling it on I want to be sure its bullet proof for the next owner and the stock BB will go in the parts bin.

I am addressing the frame on the Allez before I do anything else.  I shot some frame saver into the tubes since the bike is stripped down to the frame.  I noticed the under TT cable guides had rust so I have hit them with two sessions of Naval jelly for 15 minutes a shot and then brass wire brushed them.  I am going to see if I can find a decent paint match and do some touch up to at least protect the metal.

I also used two tools that have been collecting dust in my tool box, a chain whip and a cassette removal tool, they allowed me to get the 7 speed cassette off the rear wheel of the Allez so i can clean them up and take a look at the hub.

My friend Annie over at Anniebikes was discussing the experience of maintaining a fleet of  (5) bikes and I find my self thinking, yep there is always something.  I noticed the Cresta didn't want to smoothly drop into the small ring up front and after fiddling with limit screws it finally occured to me look at the FD alignment to the chain rings and indeed it was just a bit off so I will address that this weekend.  The Rock Hopper has the gear issue I mentioned, the Handsome Devil could use some new bar tape and maybe a brake adjustment and the Moto_GT has a FD cable I think is loose, and so it goes.  Not sure I would know what to do with just one totally functional bike lol.

Thankful my ancestors were ungrateful colonists on this day.

Ride. Tinker on independence day. Smile. Repeat.