Tuesday 22 December 2009

Life in the Deep Freeze

Well, OK, so it's not really *that* cold, but it is still only just hovering above zero in my workshop, so it is making it difficult to do quality work, it has to be said.

The last few days have seen still more frenetic running up and down the M1 to and from the workshops in Chesterton, with a Campagnolo two-day training course delivered, a bevy of bicycles serviced at Longstaffs, as well as some promised deliveries from Campagnolo actually arriving so we are now ploughing through a huge backlog of Ergo levers and other parts for servicing.

We've just successfully accredited at least one Wholesalers' warranty guy, and anothers' has just been to Campagnolo to go through training there, so the bulk of the warranty work will be a burden lifted from me / us soon - which I'll be happy about - it's been a very rough last 6 months or so.

Yesterday was spent working with the guys from Clarks Products Ltd, makers of hydraulic & cable-operated disc brake systems (amongst other things), to make videos for their shiny new website. We've worked with them before, doing the video for their old site, but the new podcasts are designed to be shorter, punchier & more bite-sized.

Also on the upside, we are still seeing strong interest in the Weldtech Training courses that we are running to accredit mechanics to National Standards ... although we have two or three places on the January "general", entry - to - Platinum course open 11th - 15th inclusive), one place on the hydraulics course, and one place on the Campagnolo course (trade only).

End of January though, I am in Aberdeen for three days then Lerwick for six, delivering training, before returning to the UK to drop back into the groove of training at Chesterton until March 11th when I disappear on the 1500km L2C relay ride as a lead mechanic, for a 10-day "race to the sun", London to Cannes in 6 days, a day off, then a two-day return drive.

Apologies to any and all tht ahave been trying to get me by phone, I am working through voicemails now!

Thursday 3 December 2009

Mechanics view - New Shimano 6700

This week was the first time I've had to play with new Shimano 6700 and really look at it as I was doing a build from scratch on a Merida frame. First impressions on getting especially the chainset out of the box were not good - it looked a bit low-rent & plasticky. That feeling disappeared as soon as I got the shifters and mechs out, though ... very competent execution as far as the aesthetics go. The big news, of course, is the hidden cables (it's only taken them 15 years .... though to be fair, Dura Ace had concealed cables last year). The STIs themselves have had a hefty revamp and you can see the influence of SRAM in some of the aesthetics, and of Campag in the slightly heavier, more positive shift. From a mechanics point of view, the levers have a couple of irritating design features, though. First is the way that you have to take the plastic covers off the top-front of the shifter / brake lever unit to get the brake cable in (or to inspect the nipple end) - I can see a lot of those timy wee grub screws going missing on hotel forecourts where mechanics are working late at night & in a hurry, next season - I reckon we'll see quite a lot of the plastic caps they retain going walkabout, too :-( The other irritation is in fitting the gear cables - again, I guess it's no better, no worse than the new Campag Ultrashift, but the SRAM system is easier for sure. The brake hoods are quite stiff (especially in a cold workshop) & peeling the hoods far enough forward to get at the access ports for the gear cables was a pain. Come to that, peeling them back far enough to get at the fixing bolts to mount the levers on the bars was also a pain, though at least they have stuck with 5mm allen keys for that, so you can use a ball-end to get in there for the initial tightening, unlike some other manufacturers we can name, who have used Torx (why, oh why, Campag?). Getting the LH cable in is not a mirror of doing the RH either, which was unexpected. The STIs once set up worked nicely, felt solid and the increased leverage over the brakes (which benefit from a small mechanical re-design to improve cable routeing and a more linear response) was noticeable on assembly. The mechs do what mechs do without any drama, and the finish on the rear gear especially looks good and durable, so score another plus for the mechanical aspects in tandem with the aesthetics. The rear gear gets an alloy jockey cage which shaves a bit of weight of Ultegra SL. Chainset ... hmm, those of you who know me will know how much I loathe and abhor external BBs, and Shimano's version is the one I dislike most, only because it makes no more sense to me now than it did when HTII was introduced, to have a spline that you deliberately side-load with two pinch bolts as a way of retaining the crank & holding it at 180 deg. to it's pair. I'm not going to bang on about this, but it is bad design - there are better ways to do it, as Campag proved conclusively with the UltraTorque system ... if you must have an external BB system (not that I am wholly convinced by UT either, but that's more about the original bearings, now thankfully superceded) than it is about the idea). On the upside, a redesign on the rings makes for less chain rub on the outer ring when using the inner ring at the top of the cassette. We are also told that the new outer ring is stiffer. Last, the chain - beware here, it has a right & a wrong way to fit as Shimano have engineered the inside and outside link plates to give better shifting especially between the rings. I fitted a third party chain (just as an experiment - I forsook my usual favourite SRAM alternative choice for an FSA-branded unit) & found that very noisy in comparison the the Shimano chain. A point to note if you, like me, are one of the Shimano chain non-apprecation society! I'll update this in a few weeks when the bike has returned for it's 6-week check, but for now I can't see that there will be much that needs doing - the feel all the way through was one of solidity and competence ...

Sunday 8 November 2009

A Humdinger of a Fortnight

Once upon a time, I thought it would be waaaaaay cooooool to be self employed.

All my pals said "you'll be working from home, no commute time, you can take on work when you want, long holidays, blah, blah" and so it seems from the outside.

So here's the last two weeks ...

Monday, Tuesday - teach Weldtech / Velotech Silver Plus course to young lady from Sustrans. This entailed driving from home to the training centre early Monday (Monday mornings on the motorways hereabouts are impossible) so a 4.30am start ... finished to 17.00, off to pal's house which he had very, very graciously lent me in his absence on holiday (thanks, Lance!), catch up on emails and a few phone calls, started re-write of Bottom Brackets section of our master course manual, bed about 23.45, absolutely cooked.

Wednesday - workshop all day, having started crack of dawn with invoicing & paperwork.

Thur & Fri both workshop days, early starts and late finishes ... lots of phone calls, big struggles with a supplier regarding parts that have been outstanding from early Sept. and are still not in. Works piling up as a result, which of course we don't get paid for until we can do it - bad kharma!
Friday PM also a quick trip to York & back (450 miles round trip) to finish closing up our old premises.

Saturday - various admin issues, a couple of wheelbuilds, one tricky, 2 hrs 40 on the fixie around the lanes.
Sunday - can just squeeze in a bike build, a couple of hours on the bike in the gale force winds and the rain & a trip down to the big smoke to pick up a review bike from a journo to sort out a damaged frame issue.

Monday - off to the training workshops (you guessed it, 04.30 start) for a 1 to 1 Cycle Maintenance and Repair course to our Weldtech / Velotech "Gold" standard. Actually, the lad I'm looking after is very good and we get through everything well on Monday - then disaster - I have to whizz home to try & sort out an internet banking issue (haven't got all the info I need with me), so a crazy-o'clock discussion with my "business relationship manager" in India, nil resolution, 4 hours sleep then in the car back up North for day 2 of the course.

Tue and Wed - minimum disaster region - all according to plan. I am shocked!

Thur - full workshop day "up North", bit of admin in the evening, but frankly I am cooked and a lot of the stuff I am doing admin-wise leaves a bit to be desired.

Fri - the plan is to be home by 12.30 to sort an assortment of issues including that whole banks thing - in practice, doesn't happen quite like that, get home 21.00 BUT OH JOY! a really bright spot - my very good friend & all round sound guy, Brian Palmer of www.thewashingmachinepost.net has sent me a copy of Tim Patereks "Handbook for Framebuilders" to peruse ... so curl up with the Mrs and the cat and indulge my wierd passion for bits of measuring equipment, hot metal and dynafiling ...

Saturday - a bit of wheelbuilding, a bit of sorting out in the workshop (domestic duties too long delayed) and catch up on the dreaded email. 2 h 30 on the fixie, 50 miles (somehow!), really, really pretty leaves on the trees and in the hedgerows, fantastic sunset.

The wheels come off the cart a bit on Sunday cos I was up til 05.30 doing a big sort out on software on the business PCs, so staggered out of bed at 10.30 to find my team-mate on the doorstep with a new carbon track frame needing headset & BB installing and assorted other stuff to do - ended up just doing an hour flat out on the fixie in the dark this evening and thence into the office for the dreaded admin ...

And so passes two typical weeks!

Review of the Paterek book coming soon!

Sunday 18 October 2009

New Training Workshops Now Up and Running

Friday was a humdinger of a day with non-stop telephone action from 08.30 on ... but by a bit after 13.30 (I had intended to leave the office by no later than 10.00), I managed to get out and on the way up to our new Training Workshop space next door to Longstaff Cycles in Staffs.

By the time we left on Friday night (around 20.30 I think) the new space was fully organised, benches in place, toolboards hung and materials at least mostly sorted & in place ready to start the first course at the new premises on Monday.

Huge thanks to Lance of Longstaffs for his help in the whole operation ... couldn't have done it without you, bello!

As soon as we are really grooving later this week, I'll post some images of the space & a schedule of upcoming courses for your perusal, dear readers!

Thursday 15 October 2009

My First Online Rant

OK, everyone tells me that I have to be contraversial. So here goes.

OK, I am opinionated and there will be those who read what I have to say here who think I am the epitome of everything that is wrong with cyclists on the road, but I guess there will be people who read this that agree with me.

There will of course be a huge number of people, probably something close to six billion (and counting), who don't care either way, but there are things that I want to say, and if you can't say them in a blog, where can you say them?

Cyclists, other road users, the Highway Code ... Grrrr

Actually, this is all my wife's fault - she bought to my attention that cyclists, pedestrians and horseriders are all described in the Highway Code as "hazards". Who the hell writes this drivel, I ask myself?

Cyclists, pedestrians and horseriders are the only classes of road user who don't pay a licence fee to use the Queen's Highway. We are granted by society the free use of the roads, whereas cars, trucks, trams, charabancs and coaches aren't.

So how is it that cyclists, pedestrians and horse riders are the ones described as hazards? If anything, those licence-paying purveyors of motorised mayhem (and yes, I am one of them, covering 60,000km a year on average in a car, so I am not being holier-than-thou) are the hazard.

Lets get this straight. The language is wrong - it's perjorative, for one thing, but also, how can a cyclist or a pedestrian (soft, squishy and likely to die in considerable pain if struck by a motor vehicle driving at even 20 mph) ever be considered a hazard to a road user encased in crumple-zone enhanced metal, surrounded by air bags and strapped securely into a seat designed to prevent everything from whiplash injury to a broken fingernail?

This is indicative of the mindset that we have to overcome. The motorist has been pampered by successive governments and government agencies to believe that they have some inbuilt superiority on the road.

I regularly talk to non-cyclists who say that it makes no sense for cyclists to share the road with 44-ton artics, becasue "it's dangerous" ... so the solution is clearly in their eyes, to get cyclists off the road where they can be "safe" (the poor little dears ...).

No-one ever comments that actually the concept of a 44-ton artic on the road is completely batty for anyone except the road transport lobby.

The cyclist is a hazard that might cause the driver of one of these bohemoths to do something other than drive in a straight line and so the hazard should be removed & never mind the fact that the hazard wouldn't be a hazard if he or she were treated with the same degree of respect by the driver of the truck as another truck would be.

OK, first rant over - now "discuss" as they say in exam question papers!

So What's it All About

Well, that's a very good question.

I'm a bike mechanic, cyclist, commercial agent in the cycle trade and run a business training cycle mechanics as well. In consequence, I know a lot of people "in the trade" and on the periphery - as well as cyclists of all persuasions, their friends, partners, families, cats and dogs ...

And whilst I know that the cats and dogs won't be reading this, lots of people that I know have asked me to write a bit of a blog about what it is that I do, the highs, the lows, the fun bits and the serious, hints and tips, memories and stories, anecdotes and one-liners ... so I thought, well, why not?

Why Pimp My Toolbox, I hear you ask - well, ever since watching Pimp My Ride on MTV, I've thought that every Spanner Monkey's toolbox is a bit like those folks' ride - personal, unique to them, an insight, maybe, into what matters to them, and a bit like peering into a house through the letterbox.

My toolbox is like that - except that you won't get arrested for peering into it at strange hours of the day and night, unlike my letterbox :-)