corrianne

I recently purchased an extremely cheap, old bike from goodwill, and figured I could fix it up. I guess I was being a bit too ambitious. Anyway, I've cleaned it up, getting ready to paint it, and checked all the gears and whatnot.
However, whenever I put the kickstand down, it does not keep the bike up. the only way to do this is to move the front wheel all the way to the left, and sometimes that doesn't even work.
I figured a longer kickstand would help, but could it be the angle of the kickstand or looseness somewhere?
Oh geez.

Retro Grouch 

Try this:

Try to stand the bike up on it's kickstand. If it feels like it's too vertical, lift up the front wheel so that the bike is supported by the rear wheel and the kickstand. Push the bike straight downward. That'll bend the kickstand out a little and make it hold the bike better.

14R 

Sound like what Retro is saying. Your quickstand needs to be bent out, away from the imaginary line connecting the 2 wheels.

orange leader

Cheap bicycle kickstands come new in basically one length. And they are poor quality metal. A shop may try to sell you one for 20 bucks, but they cost them about 2. What we did when I worked at a shop, was cut the stand down to the length that worked, and sometimes the mechanics cut too much off. Other times, since the metal is poor quality, the stands just bend, especially on older bikes with thinner stands.

a bent kickstand, or one that is too short will cause the bike to lean too far over, and tip. One that is too long, will cause the kickstand to stand too upright, cut off some of the tip till it's right.

Sometimes the bolt that holds it to the frame gets loose too, so tighten that if it's loose. Or the hing joint gets worn out, but that is usually replacement time for the kickstand.

If it leans too far over because it's bent, you can bend it so it's back to straight. If it's too short, go to a store or shop and get a new one and cut it to the right lenght. or cut it shorter if it's too long. some nicer stands have a bolt in the middle so you can actually adjust the length either way.

sorry i'm so choppy on my response, I'm tired.

Goodnight

cruisepaige

I signed up just so I could thank you! I almost brought my USA bike kickstand (or quickstand, as the case may be) all the way from there to Italy to use on my Italy bike, but all I had to do was flip the bike upside down, give the whole thing a push away from t he imaginary line and voilas!!!

Thanks a million for your help!

fietsbob

the fancy way , the greenfield for example have a scale of numbers cast in , that corresponds to your BB height,

you could measure that, & hacksaw off the excess.

skimaxpower

Remove kickstand, place it in trash.

Your bicycle is now lightweight!

Jeff Wills

Please note that you are replying to a thread that is 11 years old. The original posters might still be around... or they might not.