Mountain Biking - Cool trailside "McGuyver" fixes...

Story time folks.

I just had this happen last weekend in Moab. I was on the Gold Bar Rim trail and took a VERY silly little tumble. Not a scratch on me - but my handlebar hit the ground at JUST the right angle to SNAP my Hayes Brake housing in half (front brakes no less). The brake handle completely flopping loose on the ground, 100% unusable! The resevoir was luckily in-tact.

So there I was halfway through this LONG 28 mile ride that finishes with the Portal Trail...a quite gnarly technical decent and NO front brake. I'd be TOAST without my front brake. One of the crew of 13 with us whips out some zip ties...5 minutes of tweaking later - VOILA! Presto! It worked well enough that I hardly noticed the rest of the ride.

Look closely...the zip ties worked so well it's hard to see the break...

http://www.donaldsonclan.net/images/2003-05-02GoldSpikeBrokeBrake01640.JPG

http://www.donaldsonclan.net/images/2003-05-02GoldSpikeBrokeBrake02640.JPG

Any other amazing trailside "McGuyver" fixes out there?

Zip ties and duct tape ... a mountain biker's best friend! Is this the break????

One day out on a trail my friend's tire popped, and none of us had brought a spare or a patch kit. So we jammed the tire with fern leaves from the side of the trail and rode back home. It worked pretty well, and he was even hitting some small jumps on the way back!

Yep - that be the break! It was completely separated from the handlebar mount...

I dont know about McGuyver fixes, but i do know that one time a friend of mine got 2 flats on one ride during the local loop. No fix there, just a long walk back. Funny thing was though, we were walking on some RR tracks and were behind some stores and little to my knowledge right as i was talking about people i'd like to get rid of we were right behind a painitng session! Everyone was completely quiet and giving me some looks. I got the hell out of there fast!

What?!

Supposedly if you cut your sidewall you can take a dollar bill or an empty packet of GU and put between the sidewall hole and your inner tube.

Originally posted by PeterG1185
I dont know about McGuyver fixes, but i do know that one time a friend of mine got 2 flats on one ride during the local loop. No fix there, just a long walk back. Funny thing was though, we were walking on some RR tracks and were behind some stores and little to my knowledge right as i was talking about people i'd like to get rid of we were right behind a painitng session! Everyone was completely quiet and giving me some looks. I got the hell out of there fast!

eh?

We were walking back, just so happened we got to talking about people we'd rather not have here. I was talking loudly(as usual) and i didn't notice we had walked in on a painting session behind a store. People heard it, it got awkward, and got the hell out of there

I've had to use duct tape as rim tape on a buddies bike.

Speaking of MacGyver and bikes... Didn't they have one episode in which he sawed the tubes off a magnesium bike to use as a torch or something like that? I had to laugh at that one. Reminds me of the old joke about the NeXTCUBEs being succeptable to blowing up because of their magnesium chassis.

Not as spectacular, but water nottle cage bolts make dandy cleat bolts. I've used that one twice this season. (Not, mind you on *my* properly greased and tightened cleat bolts...)

I have no idea of what that guy is trying to say about the painting session.

A

what is a painting session?

Maybe "someone's" sniffing too much paint...

Originally posted by auger
what is a painting session?

there were people sitting down with easles(painting thingys) in front of them and looking at something

That sounds scary... I would have took off too.

i've read about that dollar bill/ powerbar package trick about 8 years ago in MBA magazine haha... wow talk about reminiscing for me!

painting session that still sounds funny. If you bend a brake disc, you can smash it with a rock till it is kind of straight till you get to the lbs, a branch can be used to "feild repair a broken handle bar (put it on the inside of the bar and slide the other peice on over it) Grass in the tire for no tube flat repair, ya know what would be a better thread is " what you say and do in the forest when your bike breaks, what swear words do you use, do you throw your bike, have you ever thrown your bike, have you ever wanted to throw your bike cause it broke and then realized everyone was watching you due to the amount of swear words you could spit out in a second and were afraid for there lives? not that that happens to me often but anyone else?

I tossed my bike once on forplay when I went up on my own. Ended up warping my rear tire. I got so frustrated because my freewheel stopped working and I couldn't coast...man was I pissed...

Dang, with how hard I ride, I rarely ever break anything.

Originally posted by danka24
Dang, with how hard I ride, I rarely ever break anything.

I have issues with freewheels...I just go through them a lot...I don't know why...

i think im going to use the word "dang" more offten

zip-tied a seat to a busted seatpost once. Still stood during the whole ride back...I, just wanted a layer of protection between my bumm and a solid-aluminum enima o.0