Originally Posted by erpdat

Alright, so I went into my LBS and they were very helpful.

According to the mechanic, the problems probably didn't have to do anything with a bike-hater. I had been riding with my chain too tight for the past couple years, causing the chain ring to bend. And the rear wheel has one bent spoke (which he said won't kill me now, but will need to be replaced eventually) and was way out of true.

He said he could bend the ring back into place but since I wanted to up my gear ratio anyway (now riding 44-15), I got a new chain ring.

I rode home last night from the shop and it felt great. However, my chain ring just looks so loose to me! He said there should be about a half inch of slack.. When i lift my back wheel and rotate the crank, I notice the chain goes from tight to looser, tight to looser, as the wheel rotates. Guess it aint the end of the world but I have no money left for anything.

By this time next month I wanna get a new rear wheel, but not really sure what to go with.

I am riding Vuelta XRP's currently and I dig em'. Another factor that could be causing this is that I had this same wheelset on my old conversion with vertical dropouts. Since it was bought as a complete I believe the builder may have sanded down the axel a bit to make it work. I don't know. Bahhhhh