One Bicycle Booby Trap After Another

First the left crank arm went south. It somehow got cross threaded and goofed itself up. Crumby, lacking a fully functional crank, had to take it to a local bike shop (lbs). Not surprising, the experience was not entirely satisfactory or up to Crumby’s standards. Then, once Crumby got home with his non-matching crank arms, more evil happened. Yes. A spoke turned up mysteriously sheered off and two more were incredibly loose. Back tire of course. So Crumby was forced to purchase his first bike specific tool, a free hub socket that allowed Crumby to remove the free hub so he could then thread in the new spoke.

OK. Crumby, based on his mediocre experience with the lbs decided to do all his own bike maintenance and repair from now on. Turns out, thanks to the www, a frugal plus alert individual can acquire the few tools for all that after considerable research. Like Crumby was able to figure out that the first tool required is a repair stand. Yes. Crumby needed to get that first, and immediately found one, a Park 9, on Craigslist for $75. Indispensable!

After that, Crumby only needed a very few specific tools for his and Rayetta’s Trek bikes. Figuring out which tools for your actual bicycle is not easy on the www, but it can be done. Like after awhile and much noggin sweat, Crumby was able to figure out that the bikes Crumby is the responsible party for, needed these bike specific Park tools: CWP-7 universal crank puller, the BBT-22 bottom bracket retainer ring socket, and the CT-3 chain tool.

Crumby purchased all these tools, plus a not exactly necessary luxury tool, the CCW-5 crank wrench from Buildyourbike, an ebay vendor, for $63, a super good deal. Goodness! Many bike tools, like the CCW-5, duplicate the function of tools you may already possess or cuddle. But the bicycle specific tools may work better than a tool designed for VW Beetles. Like the CCW-5 works better than Crumby’s old hex wrench. Way better.

Oh! Crumby is also considering a dedicated bicycle pedal wrench versus a 15mm box end and breaker bar. Mercy! But mostly, if you have general type tools, they are good enough for your bike. Like hex wrenches, screwdrivers, sockets, analgesics are all good to go. They also may be good for your watch. Not the analgesics probably.

So anyway, once Crumby got the spoke fixed, the rear wheel back on, and the wheel trued between the brake pads, Crumby noticed while riding along later on, that the dang bike was making a funny noise. Dang it! This particular bicycle is making a noise when I attempt to pedal hard on a slightly inclined grade.

All righty then. There is this dead or deceased bicycle expert who was named or called Sheldon Brown. On his posthumous web site, you may encounter a bicycle noise program or key. It works similarly to a dichotomous key. Employing Sheldon’s program, Crumby easily determined that the bottom bracket retainer rings on his bike were most likely out of whack. Sure enough, Sheldon’s simple-minded test indicated play in the crank. Further effort by Crumby showed that the left side retainer ring had to be breaker barred, while the right drive side was handy. Mercy! I bet these need to be about the same tightnees. Jeez Louise! Crumby surmised.

Happily, once Crumby greased and tightened all the various parts, the noise disappeared (actually determined a while later). Praise the Goddess! Yes. That particular annoying noise or pollution is gone from the human environment.

But then there was the problem with the chain. Crumby forgot to put the chain back on properly before he put the crank back on. So Crumby decided, Hey, I have a chain cutter. I’ll just cut the chain then thread it through. Ooops! But that’s another story.