bobotech

I'm talking from the ground up. I rebuilt a junkyard frame this weekend where the only part still attached was the front fork. The rest of the frame was bare. The bike is a Diamondback hardtaili mountain bike.

I had to completely rebuild this bike, I dug though our parts bins at the coop to find replacement parts. Found a nice ball-cup BB, nice crankset, cantilever brakes, etc. I checked the dropout alignment, rear derailleur hanger alignment, etc. I rebuilt the front and rear hubs with new grease and clean balls. Repacked the new BB. New cables run. New housings cut. Aligned the cantilever brakes. Aligned and adjusted the index shifting.

I'm just curious how long of a job this would take a pro mechanic who was being paid to do this.

oldskoolwrench

bobotech,

(NOTE: The following comment is based solely on my personal experiences; others might have a different point of view and that is
ABSOLUTELY awesome, OK, cool, copacetic, etc.)...

In my humble (and insignificant) opinion, it depends on the situation. If it was a brand new frame set with an uninstalled fork, and I'm installing everything,
I would say about 8 hours of work, including facing the head tube and BB shell.

To be honest, with the example you provided I'd say it would take me the same amount of time if I included overhauling the hubs as well.

Now, compared to some it might look as if I'm rushing a bit... or, it might look as if I'm a slowpoke!

Like I said... I'm sure you'll get many different answers, and they are all GOOD answers.

The IMPORTANT thing is to be thorough, and don't cut any corners.

Alan

fietsbob

The Real Pros, that take care of the Pro Race team's bikes , is different from
a Mechanic in a Retail Bike shop, who has other things they also have to do,
that interrupts the work flow on an overhaul/ or frame up assembly..

JohnDThompson 

Another factor is that the looser tolerances found on cheap frames and components tend to be harder to work with than high-end frames and components. You could work on some BSOs all day and never quite get them to come out right.

bobotech

Very interesting. I was curious because of how long it took me. I ended up spending roughly 5 or so hours doing what I did to the bike. Mind you, I didn't do anything to the fork since it was already installed, no cutting or anything needed. The rear hub took me a while to redo since I replaced a solid nutted axle setup for 130mm with a hollow skewer axle that I spaced out to 135mm. i was kind of surprised that the MTB rear wheel was spaced for 130mm when I got it.

bobotech

Oh god, the BSOs. We had a low income free bike clinic 2 weekends ago in one of the lower income neighborhoods in my area. We all were working on kid's bikes that needed various help. I hate working on those things. Like every single kids bike that came though had a loose 1 piece bottom bracket. And the caliper brakes on the kid's bikes were next to worthless.

And I would die a happy camper if I never see another Next Slumber Party bike again. So many of those.

leob1

+1 Quality parts make a world of difference.

Darth_Firebolt

i'm just a LBS mechanic, not a pro pit crew guy. those guys are insane.

about 3 hours if nobody is bothering me and i have absolutely everything ready to go. we do this on crash replacement frames regularly. i put the old bike in the stand, and have it completely stripped in about 30 minutes. that's the easy part. then you face the bottom bracket and head tube (if required). add another 15 minutes if the bike has ridiculously complicated internal cable routing. add another 30 minutes if there's a shifter or bar swap that requires measuring and installing new housings + bar wrap. the last 30 minutes are just doing a regular tune-up to make sure all the bolts are to spec, the shifting is right, and the measurement numbers for the bike fit are all the same.

throw in having to help customers, answer the phone, and regular bike shop stuff and it can sometimes take 2 days.

DannoXYZ 

I've gone from brazing shifter-bosses on the downtube, to paint, build-up and putting it on the roof-rack and heading off to the races in 5-hours.

FastJake

Including some sort of time warp in there to let the paint dry? Or do you just build it up wet?

3alarmer 

I usually figure 8 to 10 hours for the stuff I buy from Craigslist,
and then budget another couple of hours to retension the wheels.

Which is why I don't rebuild bikes for other people for money.

Which is why I'm not really a professional at this point.

I bet you could find a lot of kids at various shops that
will tell you considerably less time, but a lot depends
on your standards and your manual dexterity.

And the various disassembly issues you run into can
considerably add to the time involved in a rebuild.

benbrangwyn

On my bike maintenance course, one of our last tasks was to build a bike up from naked, ready to hand over to a "customer". I managed mine in 1hr 5mins, and the only fault according to the instructor was that the saddle was a degree or so tilted back (which isn't right for Mr Customer, but it's the way I like it). It was a 27 speed Specialised racer with canti brakes, and everything went on nicely. Like the others mention above, there are plenty of areas that could get complicated.

bobotech

I will say that as an amateur doing it for fun, there really is something zen-like about assembling a bike that was nothing but a box of parts and a naked frame and making it into something rideable again.

DannoXYZ 

Imron dries enough to not be tacky in about 1 hour, yet continues to flow for about 10-15 minutes after spraying. Makes for a real glossy, smooth finish. A lot of people make the mistake of trying for a wet layer right away (no patience); which ends up with drips in 10-15 minutes. On this particular bike, I hug it by the seatpost while spraying. Then transferred it to a bike-stand to dry. Then started building it up about 1-hr later.

Although full hardness isn't achieved until about 2-weeks afterwards. That's why I don't like to use heat-lamps, it dries the surface too quickly, and can trap the underlying layers and prevent them from fully drying. Leading to paint that's kinda gooey and never fully hardens.

Burton

Catalyst paints not only chemically cure fast - they have a pot life. And if you still have paint in the gun an hour after mixing - you'll be looking at new paint guns. Think EPOXY. Most automotive, aviation and bicycle paint is a two part catalyst system. Either polyurethane acrylic enamel or urethane acrylic enamel.

Burton

A complete teardown, cleaning and greasing ( wheel bearings, bb, headset) and reassembly is billed at a fixed rate of 2 hrs.

KevinF

I've come across the "BSO" acronym two or three times in this thread... that's a new one on me. A BSO would be ...?

bikeman715

Box Store or Big Store Offering like Wal-mart .

Mark Kelly 

Bicycle Shaped Object. It's a kant term meant to disparage those who can't afford "real" bikes.

bobotech

I would not say its to disparage those who can't afford "real" bikes. I see decent brand bikes all day long in ready to nearly ride condition on Craigslist for under 100 dollars. Stuff like Specialized, Diamondback, Trek, Giant, etc. The term is intended on disparaging the cheap crappy walmart bikes themselves.

If you were at our free bike clinic weekend two weeks ago, you would have been blown away by just how junky those bikes really are. Its pretty amazing just what a kid will pedal though in order to ride their bike. I even saw a couple of kids riding bikes with flat tires. We asked them about that and they would say "Oh, it still rides okay". Brake calipers that were made of pressed sheet metal. Plastic pedals taht you could bend with your hands. Welds that aren't completed with little holes in them. Sad really.

I have a buddy who just doesn't know anything about bikes. Recently he was going to buy a new bike and was planning on just going to walmart and buying a cheap 100 dollar MTB to replace the cheap crappy early 2000 Mongoose MTB that he had. I recommended that he just ride one that I had fixed up. He was very pleasantly surprised by how nice my bike rode and mine was just a cheap CL rebuild for under 75 dollars (a Schwinn Traveler that I made into a flatbar bike). Eventually his dad gave him a very nice GT mtb with nice mid level components like disc brakes, nice index shifters (no grip shift crap) and he is amazed at the difference between a well tuned walmart bike and a well tuned even low end LBS bike.

HillRider

It isn't a perjorative, it's reality. I consider Wal-Mart, Target, and similar retailers guilty of fraud since these bikes cannot be made to function properly and their durability is dreadful. The only upside is the low price. The downside is they will never work properly and will discourage any customer who plans to do more than a monthly neighborhood tour. It will convince them bicycles are no fun and that is our loss.

tcarl

A friend asked me if I'd tear down his old frame and rebuild it with new parts he'd supply. To get an estimate of how long it'd take, I asked my LBS what they'd charge for a job like that. He said 3 hours labor to build it up, 4 hours if he had to do the stripping and cleaning.

IthaDan 

2-4 hours depending on levels of distraction and caffeine in the bloodstream. Also, it depends on how lazy I want to be repacking the bearings, whether I'm just cracking them and refreshing the grease or fully cleaning them out, replacing the balls and inspecting for pits (a lot of this decision can be gleaned beforehand just spinning the axle/spindle/fork and feeling if it's pitted and gritty or just dry).

That's with new cables and housings. I've done this to clean up bikes a ton of times, slotted housing stops expedite this a ton if the cables don't need be replaced.

Kimmo

The first time I come across the parts, it can take me ages if they're old and filthy.

Subsequently, a bit of a wipe, and bolt em on. I can build up a bike in an hour, not including bar tape if the parts and wheels are already good.

Charles Ramsey

How far do you want to go Eddy Merkx took everything apart he said there were 2000 pieces.