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.