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What are your most hated jobs on the bike and what do you look forward to?
Nothing sucks more than cleaning out dried old tubeless sealant from tyres to refresh it. Whether you use solvents or not, it's endless elbow grease and you never seem to properly clean it out. I'd rather bleed brakes!
On the flip side, I deeply enjoy servicing suspension. There's something Feng Shui about putting everything together again perfectly clean.
I enjoy everything except gears, I need to tweak my rear on the commuter, but I’m walking to work because I just can’t find the motivation to do it.
Most satisfying is probably setting up V brakes, getting them spot on is a great pleasure.
Bleeding brakes should be a nice, clean easy job, but very rarely turns out that way... It's always a job I put off longer than I should do, and I'm well versed in using all the techniques to prolong the requirement for a full bleed as necessary.
I love wheel building though! Very therapeutic... Providing you can do it in an environment without interruption that is!
Hate: Indexing gears
Love: Bleeding Hope brakes
I find cleaning a drivetrain very satisfying. Starting with a load of oily gummed up parts, taking it all to bits, scrubbing it clean and then ending up with a smooth clean quiet transmission is very therapeutic.
Worst one? Probably bearings. Or internal cable routing.
Hate: Trying to line up handlebars with front wheel.
Straightening bent mech hangers (even though I have the tool).
Anything to do with cup and cone bearings.
Anything to do with internally routed cables.
Aligning brake callipers.
Love: Indexing gears (check the videos on the Park Tool website, makes it so easy).
Fork lower leg service (makes the fork so plush afterwards).
Setting up tyres tubeless.
Changing frame bearings on my Giant frame using their frame bearing tool kit.
Hate changing frame bearings. Mind you, current frame has 11 of them in total.
A good bleed on brakes is very satisfying. Bleed fine Guide RSC's with their bleeding edge calipers and it was lovely and simple.
Fitting (some) tubeless tyres fits both categories.
Current loathsome job is trying to get a good seal round the damaged valve hole in my rear wheel without resorting to chemical metal and re-drilling (mainly because I don't want bits of filler rattling round the rim cavity). Yes I'm still moaning!
Cleaning drivetrains is pretty low on my list of things I like doing.
I find setting up a new drivetrain or set of brakes quite satisfying.
For me it is a matter of perspective, bikes are so easy to work on compared to cars or motorbikes or washing machines, that I find all of it a pleasure.
Love eyeballing the rubber line on a new tyre at 60 psi slowly moving around the rim before it goes pop.
“ Nothing sucks more than cleaning out dried old tubeless sealant from tyres to refresh it. Whether you use solvents or not, it’s endless elbow grease and you never seem to properly clean it out.”
But why would you clean it out? It weighs so little once it’s dry and you waste new sealant filling all the air leaks that removal creates. Just keep adding fresh sealant until the tyre is worn out.
I love the smell of Putoline in the morning.
Dislike my reaction and allergy to latex - in tubeless milk. I know you are not supposed to drink it.
Aligning brakes. Either a 30 second breeze or frustrating hour chasing your tail before finally realising something is very wrong with the set up.
I like doing bar tape. Very satisfying going from the old tattered stuff to nice fresh tape.
None, i absolutley enjoy them all. If it paid more, i'd do it for a living !
I once found a stans monster in my tyre that weighed 78g.
There's a photo in my history. Since then, every 6 months, dig out. If I rode more I'd be replacing the tyres more but work hasn't allowed me. Also, any superflous weight is too much weight on my xc bike.
I don't mind doing internal routing since I bought one of those £5 Chinese magnetic wire kits. Now it's strangely satisfying.
Now getting these Vittoria mezcals to reinflate into my mavic carbon rims... 140psi in the air blast, soapy beads and no dice. The maxxis before them inflated with just a track pump.
I am not an octopus so holding all the bits and tools to mount a saddle on a seatpost is like Crackerjeck's double or drop....
Best thing, the little click as the bleeding edge tool goes into a SRAM caliper...Simples!
Stripping a frame sucks.
Building wheels with new parts is great.
Internal routing is horrible if you forget the string.
Cleaning a drive train is pants if you use greasy oil.
Setting up new gears with everything crisp and clean is lovely.
Love - any job that is going well
Hate- any job that is not going well or uncovers further problems
I was going to say suspension. It scares me every time but it's actually easy and very satisfying. But seat posts as mentioned are hideous
Hate....trying to clean minging cassettes that I have left too long and don't have time to take them apart.
Love... fitting new cables or mudguards and getting them 'just right'
I agree with Poopscoop, brakes used to be an annoyance but I just bled some Sram brakes with bleeding edge for the first time and it's such an improvement on their previous, and the Shimano system.
My least favourite job, cleaning my bike without a doubt. I regularly work on a dirty bike because the pain of washing it is so great.
A recent discovery for worst job is setting up wheels/tyres with foam inserts. 90 minutes of struggling and swearing. I’ll be running the tyres right down to the carcass to put off having to do that again.
I also hate re-cabling internal routes frames. I was not sorry to see the back of my road back that I sold a few months back. Changing the rear mech cable was a hideous job.
I find bleeding brakes and indexing gears quite therapeutic.
Hate bleeding brakes - it’s always a lottery made worse by internal cable routing.
Love building wheels - there’s something truly satisfying about building something unique to your specifications from the ground up and having it all come together perfectly.
Hate: Bleeding Brakes
Love: Bleeding Brakes 🙂
Its one of those jobs that's either an utter ball ache of messy faffing or done in 5 minutes and is a joy to behold perfect feeling brakes.
Hate: changing press fit bottom brackets.
Love: changing threaded bottom brackets.
Why are any of you using anything other than the Syndicate gravity fed bleed for brakes?
It's almost like you want it to be difficult! Bonus this prevents the dreaded shimano sticky piston issue!
Hate: Trying to identify the source of a creaking noise.
Love: Replacing gear cables and re-indexing gears. It's quite a satisfying job when everything feels all new again.
Hate: Replacing spokes
Love: Building a new wheel from scratch
“I once found a stans monster in my tyre that weighed 78g.”
Yes, but they fall out easily and if you hear them rattling around, that’s when it’s worth breaking a bead.
“ If I rode more I’d be replacing the tyres more but work hasn’t allowed me. Also, any superflous weight is too much weight on my xc bike.”
If you leave the tyres alone then you only need to add about half as much sealant when you top up, because it’s just going there in case of punctures, not to make the tyre airtight again. So the weight probably cancels out, you save some sealant cost and you save some time which you could instead spend going for a ride.
Love - Setting up gears
Hate - Anything involving mud guards, horrendous job.
Removing Invisiframe - and especially the glue that gets left behind
Hate it most as it is happening now
Any tips for the glue - only thing that appears to work is high pressure from my thumb - but its starting to hurt
Hate
- Truing a machine built wheel for the first time, as inevitably you end up going around every nipple/spoke to get even tension and not make the wheel worse than when you started.
- Working on bikes that have never been maintained. I've had this a lot under lockdown where neighbours or family suddenly want to ride after 15 years and ask for a 'quick' once over. Inevitably it's a chain rusted solid, crust around the cassette (what they hell is it and why doesn't it dissolve?), cables inners rusted into outers, dry and pitted bearing races with rusted bbs, and something broken/bent.
Love
- Building up a road bike from bare frame with clean new components - my favourite job, especially on a warm summer's evening with a few beers.
Loathesome: Taping wheels for tubeless when it doesn't go well. i.e. air escaping at the nipples after tyre is seated so back to square one. ESPECIALLY if a cushcore is involved in the process.
Satisfying: Every job, including the above when a beer is to hand 🙂
love - getting the gunk off jockey wheels, installing tubeless tyres on my bikes, and one of my GF's. That loverly twang sound when they seat.
hate - centring and aligning stem/bars, and brake levers. installing and removing tubeless tyres on GF's other bike... i'm sure the rims are oversized, its a 3 tyre lever swearfest just for exo tyres with no inserts.
frame bearing changes.
and tuning gears. I have no iea what i am doing, just twiddle a bit, and do the optician "better or worse"
Aligning brake calipers. Frame / caliper facing and friction means the whole "hold the lever and tighten gently" just doesn't work. The caliper plus some residual holding from the loose bolts just bends the rotor and doesn't centre it. Worse yet, it doesn't accomodate for uneven pad wear or uneven pistons.
In the end it has always ended up as a visual alignment on the caliper. For some reason, despite servo wave, pads never quite retract enough on any bike i've had. Formulas, shimanos, avids, hopes.
devash
Hate: Trying to line up handlebars with front wheel.
I seriously considered buying that laser thing
Cleaning dog poo out of nooks on a frame.
hate bleeding brakes sucks and cleaning drive trains, everything else is ok..
Loathesome and satisfying at the same time - Reverb full rebuild. Just as I finished it, someone sold me a longer dropper at a decent price, so I've never used it since.
Love: Lifting bike into car then going for a ride
Hate: Any mechanical work on the bike.
Still recall the disbelief when I first joined STW at how many members professed to enjoy working on bikes. I was gobsmacked how many people conflated fettling with MTBs and riding them.
Still expect to be told at any moment that you were all just jesting...
For years I worked on the principle that when the gears didn't work properly then I'd just get used to having less gears. My 27 speed MTB had two workable gears in reality.
Likewise brakes, the first ( and until recently only) time I bled them resulted in a pool of brake fluid on the patio as the pads, backing plates and pistons had all worn through.
Lesson learned: don't piss about with brakes, just leave them.
Out if necessity I'm getting a bit more involved these days, but enjoying it? Don't be stupid. Nobody enjoys working on bikes any more than anyone enjoys fixing computers, picking up rubbish or IT middle management.
Wrestling my QR rear-wheel out of the chain, rear-derailleur, brake caliper and track-ends.
Only thing worse is putting it back in.
Cold weather without gloves makes the above task extra-tortuous and more likely for the rotor/chain etc to carve bits from fingers/chainstay/powder-coat etc delete as applicable.
Destestable.
I love cleaning bikes. From dirty, muddy mess to sparkly clean is great.
I generally like fettling bikes and do as much of my own maintenance as I can.
Current hate is trying to get a Gravel King SK tyre to seat on a Giant P-X2 rim on my gravel bike. No matter what I try the bugger just won't pop in to place.
It's got to be gears for me. I always end up with what appears to be perfect shifting across the block and then notice either top or bottom has disappeared.
Bleeding Shimano brakes, Bleeding Avids,
Aligning stem with wheel (although I’ve just learnt not to be fussy nowadays), fixing anything on the Wife’s bike as she’s really fussy, indexing gears (the more cogs the more of an arse it is).
Love pushing through fresh grease on pedals.
Hate everything else.
Satisfying:
Chain cleaning, I'm a bit of an obsessive.
Changing pedal bearings. Did for the first time yesterday. Very pleasing.
Loathe:
Dropper post cable installation and associated frustration.