El Cóndor Pasa

When I heaved my bike out of the rack last Monday morning I noticed it seemed a lot more wobbly than normal.

I broke a seat rail!  Looks like metal fatigue.  It is a shame; I really liked the "Condor" (which is, sadly, rare now).

I replaced it with a garish black-and-yellow saddle that I would regret putting on a resale bike.

Bici II Hub Failure

After taking a few weeks off riding to work, I pushed a little too hard and broke my hub.  Luckily I still had the old wheel and hadn't yet switched to the STI shifters, so it was a quick fix to put the old one back on.

Today I pulled apart the 7 speed wheel and I assessed the damage.  It was incredibly hard to get the axle out - when the hub broke, it must have forced the bearings to really tighten.  So much so that it smashed the bearing race:

It's hard to see from the photo but there are also imprints from the ball bearings themselves.  Yikes.

This hub is toast - I've replaced it with an old Deore one and will avoid using nutted axles on this bike in the future.

Back to the 90s

The Tech Wild Thing is done! It's got better chainrings now, and I've gone over the drivetrain and tuned it up. It's a fast, light bike and will make a perfect commuter.

I decided to buy new chainrings for the Kona bike as the steel cranks I was using are bent and don't give much clearance between crank arm and frame. Also, the replacement rings cost about $30 after shipping, much better than the $80-90 it was going to cost for locally sourced (albeit high quality) parts.

Nunu Bibike

One of my longer-running projects is a 2000 Kona Nunu that I got for a song. The previous owner described it as "rode hard and put away wet" and he was very right.

It was basically a frame and wheels; everything else was broken or worn out. I finally hung a new old (repainted, heavy) steel crankset on it and it's now ready-ish.

I would have like to have got new chainwheels but that would add $100 to a $200 bike. I might still try to get a set of Alivio or entry-level Truvativ cranks, but if these ones work then we're good.

I also spent some quality time with Bici II, building up a new 7-speed solid axle rear wheel and swapping out the tiny SPDs for combo platform-SPD pedals. Now I can ride with boots, which will be nice for the cold weather.