Gianni really took it in the shorts after trying to sneak his way along with a stealth EPMS. Like an alcoholic falling off the wagon, the poor fellow can’t quite come to grips with the comfort of his old friend, the saddle bag. The solution lies in finding a light toolkit to carry along with him on his rides, one that fits in one pocket in totality.
There is an elegance in minimalism; a small multi tool with just the right combination of appliances is a beautiful thing. Latex inner tubes are a nice way to keep the spare tube package small and light. As are some compact tire levers. Certainly luck favors the prepared, but if you follow that to its logical conclusion, you will need something more than a saddle bag to carry your workstand, grease gun, and headset press. The Velominatus maintains their bike, and takes every reasonable precaution to replace those parts that might fail during a ride. It is what we do; the bicycle is our lifeblood – care for it, and it will care for you.
An equipment failure is, however, always surprising – in particular to the rider. Take, for example, my pedal which unwound itself from the spindle this week. Normally, when you push, the pedal follows a nice arch and the bicycle goes forward. Not so, should the body no longer be affixed to the axel.Should this occur, the pedal will move outwardly rudly and inflect an unpredictable union of top tube and groin. It is remarkable how little forward momentum is associated with pushing on a pedal which is no longer attached to the bicycle. It is also, I surmise, not a particularly elegant thing to watch.
Speaking of inelegance and no momentum, I also once broke a chain link climbing a steep grade in the rain, while carrying with a heavy back pack. Should you encounter such an incident yourself, you will take note of the remarkably short amount of time it takes to stop moving forward and fall in a confused and cursing heap at the roadside.
The point is, accidents happen, and no matter how much care you take of your equipment. They will happen while out on the road, possibly while far from home. We learn from them, and we take the necessary measures to reduce the likelihood of it happening again. Take my pedal failure; I don’t plan to carry a pedal wrench in reaction to this incident; I instead have now added the pedal to my list of items to periodically check over. As for the chain, it had incurred some corrosion because I was experimenting with a lighter oil. I now take care to check for (and take seriously) signs of rust on a chain.
Be sensible, be careful. Take care of your machine. Kneel and flash the sign of the Merckx in your V-Kit before submitting to the road, and get a nice light toolkit with the right tools for the incidents that are most likely to happen. Maybe you’ll have a ride ruined through an unlucky event, but learn from it and improve your maintenance program rather than endeavoring to carry every tool known to the Velominatus.*
Vive La Vie Velominatus.
[dmalbum path=”/velominati.com/content/Photo Galleries/frank@velominati.com/Failures/”/]
*This does not apply to cases where an incident can be life threatening such as in remote mountain regions or New York City.
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View Comments
@Nate
This guy is a mountain goat. Not sure how many miles he had on this set.but th crank looked corroded, like he had never serviced it.
He is re thinking his set up.
@Nate
@DerHoggz
@Rob C
It's not BB30 that failed in this instance. From recollection, those Spesh cranks are fixed in the middle of the spindle similar to Campag Ultratorque. Suspect the bolt failed.
@strathlubnaig
Jesus Christ man. Don't you ever wash that thing?
@DerHoggz
Creaky, smaller actual bearings than modern external BBs, wear out quickly in the wet, require a bunch of expensive (but cool looking) tools to service.
@mouse gimme a break, this is Scotland, in summer, after 80km.
@strathlubnaig
I know. I'm being an arse as is my wont.
Carry on.
@Puffy
Considering the chain breaker is such a small and light addition to an already small mulititool its inclusion is hardly a disruption to the jersey pocket and the fact that i have used it at least twice....the other occasion was to break a chain jammed on anothers bike means we will have to agree to diasgree. However should we ever ride together and you break your chain rest assured i will happily lend you mine! (cue semi colon, close brackets!)
@G'rilla
Also a lower manufacturing tolerance for frames - they're easier to manufacture and aren't produced to the same requirements that Shimano and Campag cranks need to work. I don't really like it, and now that Shimano has 11 speed cranks where you can swap between 50 tooth and 53 tooth chainrings, it's only another reason not to get it.
@Deakus I'm with you on the usefulness of a multi tool with a chain tool. I've snapped a rear dérailleur and used it to convert the bike to a single speed to get me home.
I'm not sure this is something that I want to talk about in too much detail, though, as the dérailleur snap incident occurred in the middle of a discussion about the essential functions required in a multi tool. I may be tempting fate talking about it again although I suspect with the shit I endured on holiday last week I'm due for an incident free period.
First I managed to strip the thread on both of the removable valve stems on my Vittoria tubulars (closer inspection shows the thread on the inside of my Lezyne flip chuck thingy looks a bit fucked - the flip chuck has always struck me as being the weak link in an otherwise excellent pump). None of the other pumps available would get the tyres up to pressure.
Happily, I'd taken a spare set of wheels with me so that things could get worse rather than accepting that it wasn't my week and kicking back on the beach with a cold beer or ten.
The camp site that we were staying at organised a few group rides each week. On the first of these I punctured the front tyre on a section of road where there was a tractor cutting back the hedge rows, thorns everywhere. There was a gash on the edge of the tread and sidewall but it didn't look like it had gone right through. By the time regrouped at the next junction (the Dutch and Belgians had gone mental at the first sign of hills a few km earlier and ripped the group apart) the tube was bulging out through a decent sized hole.
Not wanting to slow everyone down and thinking it would be best to start heading back down hill slowly, I waved the group off thinking that I had a boot in my kit somewhere. Nope, that was in my puncture repair kit. I managed to fashion one out of a couple of energy bar wrappers and the foil backing from a disposable contact lens pack (it's good thick foil that had the strength to stop the tube pushing through, I'm not sure the wrappers would have done that).
I punctured again, the rear this time, trying to find my way out of Perpignan, using up my last CO2 cannister but the booted repair held up until I got back. Five minutes after getting off the bike the front was flat. That night I joked about having to call for the sag wagon if it had gone earlier.
The next day I only punctured once, a nice big thorn through my brand spanking new front tyre whilst out with the kids. A useful pedalwan lesson in puncture repair for them. I also found out that my daughter can do a shade under 30kph sprinting into a strong headwind.
That front tyre waited until I was doing almost 50kph before letting go again, the first of four punctures that ended up with the joked about call for rescue.
How many of those punctures I would have suffered if I'd been on the tubulars, I'm not sure but if the higher thread count would have prevented the gash in the first one, I'd have been relying on a spare tub and then pit stop to close any holes.
Stunning countryside though.
@minion
BBs are doing my head in at the moment. I have a new Giant TCR arriving this week, but because my other race bike, and crucially my wheels and powertap, are set up with Campag I have to forsake the offer of at-cost Shimano and get my own gruppo.
So, there's a little adapter made by Campag to go between their cranks and the bottom bracket (BB86). And I think it would be easier to find weapons-grade plutonium and get it shipped to a Pyongyang address.
I think I have one, and I think it is on the way - I've paid more for shipping than the cost of the actual piece - but I'll believe it when I see it. Online sites are not great at small details. My greatest fear is that the mechanic is going to look at it and sorrowfully tell me it is Wrong, so I'll have several thousands worth of components waiting to go on several thousands worth of bike, all for the sake of a $50 piece of aluminium.