Bicycling

It is fucking shocking to me how expensive bike parts and service are. And there's really no reason for it, other than I guess the market seems willing to bear it. A new mid-range rim/wheel for my downhill bike is basically the same price as the TSW rims on my car. Yet one weighs what, 30 lbs vs the other at a pound or two. That just makes no fucking sense. I mean shit, even compare pedal bikes to motorcycles! A pretty nice downhill bike can go for upwards of 10k. For that same price you can buy a hand built in Italy Moto Guzzi V7 that has ABS, traction control, and you know, a fucking engine.

It's just madness. When I was at Whistler and kept losing spokes on my rear (it's five years old, but only maybe 20 days on it, bike techs figure the spokes are just done from fatigue over time) my friends were trying to talk me in to buying carbon wheels at $1,200 a pop. On what fucking planet does that make any sense? Same thing goes for labor rates at bike shops. Most here charge $90-100/hr, for a kid who is probably being paid $10-15/hr. Actual car and motorcycle mechanics at independent shops barely charge any more for that, for guys who are making at least double that. Getting a minor spring tune-up on my downhill and XC bikes has actually been MORE expensive than an annual oil change on my R6 or Multistrada. Fucking madness.

But one of these evenings I'll find myself spending a grand on parts for my bike, because I'm stupid like everyone else I guess. It'll look pretty though! I did pick up a service and maintenance book (Zinn the Art of Mountain Bike Maintenance: Lennard Zinn, Todd Telander: 9781934030592: Books - Amazon.ca) to start doing more of the work myself.

They charge it because people still pay, especially in the road market. There is always going to be some pudgy investment banker who buys a 5 grand aero wheelse instead of just training to be faster.

They don't charge that much for labor around here. Probably because bike riding is not a huge deal like other parts of the country and the market won't support it.

$2400 or so. A little cheaper than my current wheelsets which are Enve.


edit: Fifey / Seventh, I think I asked this before...what do you guys think of aerobars? In long rides (50-120 miles), I am for a major part, in the drop down of the handlebar. Just trying to think of ways in saving my back. lol

Eomer_sl said:

But one of these evenings I'll find myself spending a grand on parts for my bike, because I'm stupid like everyone else I guess. It'll look pretty though! I did pick up a service and maintenance book (Zinn the Art of Mountain Bike Maintenance: Lennard Zinn, Todd Telander: 9781934030592: Books - Amazon.ca) to start doing more of the work myself.

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That's a "cool" book, I have a copy, but really all you need to learn to work on your bike is YouTube and the tools for the jobs.

Friend gave me that book when I first got into mountain biking and bought a bike. Still have it 10+ years later.

Haven't even cracked the book yet, and yes I'm aware there's lots of good YouTube vids out there. I'm very much a book guy, though, and the illustrations of how everything goes together I find really interesting. I'll likely end up using a combination of the book and the YouTube to learn.

Just ordered a few parts from Chain Reaction for my downhill bike (2013 Norco Aurum). When I was in Whistler a few weeks ago, my rear wheel kept blowing spokes. Even prior to going to Whistler I had the bike serviced and I guess there were a couple spokes needing replacing from last fall or something that I hadn't noticed. In any case, first run through A-Line I lost 4-5 spokes. I fully admit that my fat, tentative ass was casing the big jumps something fierce, but that's how I've always rode and I've never lost that many on a single run. Come to think of it, I don't think I'd ever even lost a single spoke in the 20-30 days I've put on the bike prior to this year. Took it in to a shop to get those replaced, and in two more runs I lost another 3. Took it back in again, and then in another 4-5 runs through A-Line I kept losing one spoke per run, roughly. At that point I was like "fuck it, if the wheel tacos it tacos". The bike techs figured that the spokes are likely just fatigued from being 5 seasons old (bought the bike fall of 2012), even if the bike hadn't seen a ton of use. No problems with the front, but I would think that doesn't take nearly as much of the impacts.

So in any case, it was time to get a new wheel. My Aurum frame is the sweet blue and green that was the LE that year, although the components were not LE components. The bike shop I got it from had been given a bunch of brand new, next year frames from Norco because they wanted the used rental frames back for destructive testing, so the shop was just slapping on some lower grade, new parts and selling them for $2,400 CDN or so, if memory serves. So in any case, I figured I may as well pretty the bike up while I'm at it with blue wheels, new blue handle bar, green stem and grips to match up with the bike's frame. It's going to look pretty sweet when it's all said and done. It's kind of funny though, because people who don't know much about bikes think it's some stupid expensive bike (I think the current Aurum LE is $13k CDN MSRP), while those that do just look at the mediocre shocks and think I'm a jackass.

Pic below isn't my bike, but that's exactly what it looks like right now. Only thing left to pretty it up more would be blue/green saddle and cranks.

edit: Fifey / Seventh, I think I asked this before...what do you guys think of aerobars? In long rides (50-120 miles), I am for a major part, in the drop down of the handlebar. Just trying to think of ways in saving my back. lol

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Are you saying you'll ride the majority of the time in the drops and not on the hoods? If so you should be riding on the hoods and just keep a bent elbow to get low as you'd like or you can just raise your stem up slightly if it's too much of a reach.

I'm personally against aerobars but that's just because I only see them on MUP warriors wobbling all over the path.

Ok, for the most part, I am on the hoods...however, I am in the drops much more these days and find I am not only stronger but faster in that position.

Kuriin_sl said:

Ok, for the most part, I am on the hoods...however, I am in the drops much more these days and find I am not only stronger but faster in that position.

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You could always try dropping your stem down some so you'll be more aero in the drops. You live in the bay area right? Plenty of climbing to do and can't do that with aero bars.

Any recommendations on a decent torque wrench? Seems like Park Tools is kind of the go-to for bike tools. Figure I should pick one up since I started doing some work on my bike. New handle bars, grips and stem look pretty sweet. Unfortunately I fucked up and ordered the wrong goddamn wheels. Not sure how that happened. I knew I needed 26" wheels, but the order clearly showed 27.5". Now I have to ship the damn things back to Ireland.

New wheels and rotors. As I suspected, my front rotor was rubbing so I was constantly braking on my front and my front wheel also had a bulge in it, so it kept hitting my fork. Made for going uphill and rolling hills much harder. Here's my bike with updated schtuff:

I love any bike with a wound up on it.

Ao-_sl said:

wha where?

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The bike you just said was pretty.

Ao-_sl said:

Where's the wound? Am I missing something in the picture?

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Wound up, it's a fork that is unnecessarily heavy but oh so pretty. I want one for my track bike but a 1" track fork is like 350 bucks.