corrado33

My friend has recently been telling me that his front wheel needs trued and is out of true so much that it rubs the frame. I didn't really believe him as his bike is relatively new. However, I went and saw his bike the other day and noticed something peculiar... A spoke or two was simply loose, and I could see it from 5 feet away. Upon closer inspection, almost EVERY FREAKING SPOKE was much too loose. Loose enough that I could deflect almost all of them a good half inch in each direction (easily), some even more that that... Some were SO loose that they just rattled around in the holes...

I immediately offered to fix his rim for him, even though I've never fully trued a wheel before. I can at least get it to the point where it's safe enough to ride down to the LBS and have it trued by them...

I mean jeeze, the things people don't notice on their own bikes...

Any similar stories?

likebike23

There were a couple of kids in the neighborhood that were riding down the hill dragging their feet. I checked out their bikes and both had no brakes. They were department store bikes that had been so poorly assembled that the pads were just slipping off the rim toward the spokes. I adjusted the pads and cables for them so the braking was acceptable. To let you kid ride around with no brakes is just stupid to me.

Little Darwin

I rode a bike back in the 70's (my high school days), that for a while had no brakes. I delivered papers on it, and rode the bike a lot. The area I lived in typically had gravel shoulders, so I would basically just drift over to the shoulder and lean the bike over to slide the rear tire to scrub off speed and/or slide to a stop. After a month or two I rigged the bike up with brakes... because they were steel rims, and I lived in the perpetually wet Pacific Northwest, I had both caliper brakes rigged to the back wheel so I could make sure that I could stop it. It wasn't the best configuration for stopping quickly, but I could definitely stop the bike as quickly as anyone could with any rear brake only configuration.

I also saw a few people back in the day that would take a fork from a junker bike, cut off the legs, and then slip the dropouts from their bike into the severed fork legs to make their bike a chopper. No retention or anything... Of course, it rarely took very long for them to figure out that it didn't work well, and then they had to straighten out their dropouts when they removed the extensions to put their wheel back on the way it belonged.

MichaelW

Open QR skewers are pretty common. Most riders are actually offended that I have informed them of the danger and insist that they are right and I am wrong. I have stopped telling riders that their QR is open after getting so many blank looks and flat denials that anything is wrong.

corrado33

I see a lot of those! I saw an admittedly cool bike the other day. It was an old bike that had rim brakes, but the pads were right next to the spoke. The rims didn't have a "sidewall" that a brake could push against, so the brakes pushed "UP/OUT" on the rim toward to tire of the bike. The bike also had mechanical linkages (steel bars) that controlled the brakes instead of cables. However, the pads on both the front and back of the bike were so far out that when you squeezed the brakes they missed the rim completely. The guy who owned it let his friend ride it and said "careful", there are no brakes!

fietsbob

The wise ones bring them by the LBS. they fix them but dont document the before and after.

Maybe they think its like a Car , shut the door and turn the key.

Kids take brakes off Bikes .. (dont ask me why)

SpeshulEd 

Were they riding Treks?

Also, this thread needs pictures.

BobbyG

I once saw a guy riding an old sting-ray style "high-riser" bike with no tire on the rear wheel, just the metal rims. Even as slow as he was going, I don't understand why the back wheel didn't slide out, or how he was getting any forward motion.

Drew Eckhardt 

After I herniated a disc I rode a cheap comfort bike until I could tolerate a road riding position again. That was the least safe bike I've ever experienced.

The manufacturer used a "brake modulator" on the front V-brake noodle where the cable seat is spring-loaded thus limiting the force which can be applied. Pulling the lever to the handle bar was not enough to stop the bike headed down steep hills.

Keith99

I'm going to go with the fools who just loosen the bolt and rotate the handlebars on a road bike so they are upside down.

Work out just where the brake levers are and what will happen if you brake just a little too hard.

corrado33

Wow. How the heck did that thing make it past the safety inspection? I mean sure, it prevents people from going over the handlebars upon fast braking, but it also prevents... fast braking...

dynaryder

Properly set up,they do work,they give the brake a spongey feeling.

As for unsafe,I do a free bike clinic at my local farmer's market. I've seen everything. Tires with cords showing. Wheels so out of true they smacked the frame. Loose handlebars. I think the two worst were the conversion and the found bike. This gal brought me a SS conversion because the brakes 'didn't work right'. They didn't work,period. The guy who built it used long pull levers with road calipers and with the levers mashed to the bar all it would do is slow the bike slightly. I helped her search for the right type of levers,and did a follow-up to make sure she got them. Then there was a couple that brought me a bike they found for their daughter to ride. The highlight was the front 'basket'. Someone had ziptied a milk crate to the handlebars. The ties weren't even the right thickness for something like this. The brake levers fouled the crate,so they had been spun around so you had to use your thumbs to work them. The brakes themselves were super low end sidepulls,so with the levers spun around and the cables pinched,they were totally non-functional. I gave them a laundry list of things the bike needed,and about a week later saw it abandoned around town. It actually sat for a couple weeks before someone scarfed it up,it was in that bad of shape.

Deontologist

I see hipsters way way too stretched out on their road bikes here.

They think they're cool riding some department store 1970s road bike with drop bars but it's just plain dangerous when they're stretched out just to hold onto the tops of the drop bars - much less the brakes. Can't help but wonder what would happen if they absolutely had to stop. Either move the saddle, get a shorter stem, get more flexible, or tilt the handlebars upward*. None of them seem to realize any of these things.

*ETA: speaking of handlebars, I've seen at least two road bike riders with their handlebars at the wrong angle. As in the brake levers were almost parallel with the road below them. I actually saw one trying to brake by reaching all the way around the top of the drops for the brake levers.

Can't believe why people would ride like that when 60 seconds would fix the problem.

Fallingwater

I live in Italy, and every now and then I visit the city of Ferrara. It's probably the most bicycle-heavy city in the country, and unfortunately this shows in the frequency of theft. To say that the bicycle market there is shady is to put it mildly. Bringing your own bike or buying a proper one when you go live in Ferrara is like parking a Ferrari in a crackhead district with the keys in the ignition; what you do instead is to go to one of several well-known places, check out various blokes inconspicuously standing around with bicycles while not riding them, and ask them if they're selling it. Ten euro later you're the proud owner of one of the disgusting pieces of crap the whole city rides on, almost all of them pre-owned - that is, stolen.

When you buy one such bike there you're basically renting it; it's a given that at some point you'll get to where you left it and not find it there. Most people who spend more than a few months in Ferrara get so used to this that the occurrence is treated as a minor inconvenience; just go to the nearest approved place and get another bike. Buying the very same bike that was just stolen from you is not unheard of.

As a result of all the theft it's never worth to fix or upgrade any of these disasters on wheels, so wherever you go you're treated to a constant show of squeaky chains, creaky bent frames, totally worn-out brakes that might as well not exist for their stopping power, bald tires that were last changed ten years and who knows how many users ago and sloppily patched up ever since... the list goes on. To pick the worst of this sorry bunch is an impossible task.

Stucky

I had an old bike when I was a kid, when I first learned to ride- a family friend had given it to me, I think he rescued it from a scrap pile. It was a girl's bike; it was way too big for me; (and here's the funny part) the seat had broken off at some point in the short time that I owned it, so in order to ride it, I had to stand up the whole time, and keep my chooch from contacting the rather sharp jagged top of the seat post- or whjat was left of it. I had no problem with it....but when I let my accident-prone nephew ride it (we're the same ages) he proceeded to immediately cut himself on that seat post! We were about 6 or 7. I still remember him running to the house, yelling "I'm bleeding!". My mother took the bike away from me after that and I had to ride a push scooter that summer, until i got a new bike for Xmas. (I was pissed at my nephew for causing me to have to get rid of that bike!)

Then there was the BSO I found in a garbage pile in my 20's; which I rebuilt/spruced-up. It was a piece of junk....but I had a lot of fun on it- as i wasn't into cycling then; I'd just ride a few miles at night around the neighborhood. Before long, the axle in the rear wheel broke (Probably my own fault, as i abused the heck out of that bike!)...and I just kept riding it until it got so bad that it was unride-able.

Other than those two....all my bikes have been safe, and kept in perfect working order!

yuoil 

I've been meaning to post this since I saw this thread. It might not be the absolute worst I've ever seen but it's really up there. Sorry for the bad picture. I might have a better one somewhere:



The rider rode the bike until both conti gatorskins gave out. The rear wheel was so out of true it rubbed both sides of the brake. You can't see it here but there is a massive crack in the handlebars - I broke one of the drops off with my hands. Etc etc. It was used hard and not loved, unfortunately.

Sangetsu

I bought an old 50's Schwinn, and when repairing a rear flat, I counted 28 patches of various ages and colours on the tube. I was going to replace the tube, but decided instead to add a 29th patch.

I have seen bikes with flat tires taped to the rim, chains with links connected with bent-over nails, seats with no seat clamp bolt taped to the bike (I have also seen bars taped to the stem). I have also seen a rider stopping a bike with no brakes by pushing the sole of his sandals against the front tire behind the fork (Viva Mexico!).

But then again, I have seen even more unsafe cars on the road.

hueyhoolihan

i had one once that had plastic tires and no brakes. i can't believe my parents actually thought this was safe.

hueyhoolihan

children can be inventive when given the incentive...

- Johnny Cochran -

Stucky

Oh, a fixie! You really didn't need brakes. I rode a fixie too, when I was 13- it only had one wheel and no brakes. I called it "a unicycle".

TenSpeedV2

Pretty sure he means a big wheel, not a fixed gear bike.

Alaraine

When i was younger, about 12 a kid i knew had an old bike, it had no tires, no brakes and no seat... he rode it like that for a couple months till we managed to get a bike fixed up for him. . . i mean... wow.

JonathanGennick 

No brakes are pretty common. Parents who would never think to drive their automobile without brakes happily neglect maintenance and allow their children to ride down steep hills without brakes, without cabling for the brakes, and sometimes lacking even the pretense of calipers. The parents pay for that in the cost of shoes, I'm sure.

Dangling QRs are perhaps less common, but I've seen those too from time to time and maybe I've saved one or two sets of teeth. And if I have not saved any teeth, it is beyond doubt that the Lawyer Lips have saved a great many. (I am convinced that QRs should not even be allowed to be shipped on anything but the more advanced bicycles sold to enthusiasts who know how to use them correctly).

Stucky

Yeah,....but look at the damned thing- it's essentially a fixie! No gears; No coasting; No brakes.... No wonder fixies are popular today- so many people grew-up learning how to ride one from riding a Big Wheel!

Yeah, sadly, the simple use of a QR is too complex for the average American today to grasp.

DrIsotope

I rode a Fox Racing BMX bike all the way through my teenage years. It had no brakes, the bars canted way forward so my knees wouldn't hit them, and the most laid-back layback seatpost of all time. I was probably a foot too tall to fit the bike, and I rode the hell out of it. Safe? Well, my preferred method of dismount was to jump off of the back of it and let it ghost ride into the bushes. The slightly safer method was to press my shoe into the front tire.

I loved that bike.