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Wednesday afternoon while prepping for my commute home, I noticed that I had a broken spoke. My back wheel has been making some noise for a few days and I decided to finally figure out the source. I was disappointed to find this:

I’ve never replaced a spoke before and the first one I get is in the worst spot, just behind the freewheel. This means I have to remove the wheel and take off the freewheel again. Thursday I slept in and had a lot on the schedule, so I went to the shop to get some spare spokes on Friday after my son’s dentist appointment. I can’t believe they wanted $2 a spoke! I bought four thinking I’ll probably replace more than one and I’d want some spares.

Friday night it was time to break out the freewheel remover again and start fighting to get it off. I thought it would be easy because it’s only been on for a couple of weeks and I greased the threads to keep them from seizing. Boy was I wrong! It wouldn’t move! I searched around for a pipe to slip over the wrench to get some leverage, but I had nothing… Then it came to me. The indoor trainer! The leg was about the right diameter and looked like it could be removed. I pulled the bolt out and slipped an end over the wrench… One hard push and the freewheel was loose. I quickly spun it off by hand and saw the broken spoke clearly:

Replacing the spoke turned out to be super easy. I pulled out the head of the spoke and tried to remove the body. To get that out, I had to bend it and use a nipple wrench to undo it. Putting the new spoke in and weaving through the other spokes was easy, but I was nervous bending it so much to get it into the nipple. Now I had a very bowed spoke, but it was intact. A little bit of work with the spoke wrench and it was straight. I replaced 1 other spoke, and tightened a few on the non drive side that had no tension in them. I spun the freewheel back on and mounted it in the bike.

I’ve never trued the wheels on this bike since I bought it. Putting a couple of cable ties on the chainstays worked as feelers so I adjusted them to find the worst part of the wheel and started in on the spokes. Those nipples were tight! I could turn some of them a half turn and they were still seized to the spoke. A little bit of patience got them all moving again and slowly I got the wheel straight again. I repeated this with the front wheel and then put the bike away for Monday’s commute.

This morning I took the bike out and everything felt good! No loud pings, no repetitive ping from a broken spoke, and the bike rode true. Not bad for a first time.

I’ve been riding an older bike to work since my Specialized was stolen. When I first bought the bike it had some old platform pedals that I shunned because I wanted cleats. I’ve ridden in clipless pedals for years and am totally used to the locked in feeling I got from them. This time, I’d decided to try to build the bike so I could hop on and ride with my son without having to dig out the dorky bike shoes just to ride to the park. That kind of thinking led me to some Wellgo pedals that use cleats on one side and are flat on the other:

Because this pedal takes SPD cleats, and I have road shoes, I couldn’t set up my old shoes to ride this pedal. Even more frustrating, it’s not weighted. That means most of the time, the cleat side comes up when pulling away from traffic lights! This started to get on my nerves. I decided to see what I could do about reviving the old MKS platforms.

I pulled the dust cap off and took a look. Turns out that these are really straight forward pedals, just a lock nut and a cone nut on one end. 11 little ball bearings on each end of the pedal. The grease was a mess though! This stuff had been in there for years and really needed replacing. It took twenty minutes to scrub out each pedal and then my son put in some new grease for me. After placing all the bearings and setting the cone nuts properly, I had nice smooth pedals!

These are nice. Every time I pull away from a stop, it’s the right way round! The platform is huge, and the little knobs are perfect to keep my foot from slipping. I like these, and I can’t believe how easy it was to overhaul them. I’ve been riding them for a week, and it’s a very nice ride. Not as solid as clipless, but very nice for commuting or riding around.

This past week was bike to work week in Metro Vancouver. I thought this would be a snap for me, having biked to work consistently last summer and started early this spring. Boy was I wrong.

Monday started out great even though it was wet. Including myself, there’s four regular bicycle commuters in my office. All four of us showed up. That was awesome! Then lunchtime comes around and one of them tells me he’s come down with a cold. Some cold, he didn’t make it in the rest of the week! He ended up staying home because he’d lost his voice.

Tuesday rolled around and it was drier. The ride into work was straightforward. Coming home was a different story. As I’m rushing home to meet my wife so she can go to dinner, my chain starts to slip. This is really annoying. It started off in the smallest cog but over the ride, it progressed and had me reduced to only using the large cog and pedalling gently. This was a real problem… I took a quick look and didn’t see any stiff links in the chain, but as I rode it continued. By the time I got home I had it figured out, the freewheel was slipping. Great. Where am I going to get a 5-speed freewheel on a Tuesday evening?!? I quickly looked up MEC and saw they had 2 listed. It was a long drive to get there and they closed at 6pm. I swore I could make it, but it would be tight. As I thought about it, I figured out that Cap’s Bikes in New Westminster was a better choice as it was closer and tended to service older bikes. I quickly turned around and headed to Cap’s.

Cap’s turned out to be a good choice. They had a Sun Race 14-24T 5 speed freewheel. It didn’t have the nice 28T cog in my bad freewheel, but it wouldn’t slip. I asked the guy behind the counter for the removal tool and headed home. After feeding my son, I pulled the wheel and attempted to remove the freewheel. I knew this would be tough as the bike had been neglected for a few years before I got it. Unfortunately, the tool was the wrong size. It wouldn’t fit even with the axle removed! The mechanic had given me a cassette lockring tool, not a Shimano freewheel tool! Great, and the shop was closed so I couldn’t exchange it today. What’s worse, I found out the rear axle was bent.

Now Wednesday was a bust for me but I packed the wheel so I could stop by the shop and exchange the tool, pick up a replacement axle and have the freewheel removed while I was at it. After putting my son to bed, I got the freewheel off and started to change the axle but found that the spacers were seized to the old axle. The bend was in a bad place.

Thursday I’d planned to drive in because I was picking my son up from school so I brought the bent axle in to work and thought I’d stop by Cap’s again on the way home. I managed to get the spacers free in a vice at work, but one of the locknuts cross threaded when coming off the bent axle. Luckily Cap’s had a locknut and pair of washers for me. That night, I greased the hub, installed new bearing and the new axle and mounted the new freewheel. I was set.

Friday, I made it in. Everything worked! In total, I biked to work for three days when I expected to bike four. Not bad but I know I could do better. 79 km this week.