Originally Posted by
BikeWise1
Many of my high-end customers are professionals whose time is worth more to them than the comparative pittance they "save" by doing something like this themselves. Others are neither inclined nor able to do mechanical work. I have customers who are challenged by the idea of airing their tires and lubing their chains once a week. Others come in with tires ridden down to the carcass, and manifold other issues that they "didn't notice".
That's why.
I'm not a 'high-end customer', but I resemble the comments you make.
I do tuneups once or at most twice per year. That's so infrequent that I can't possibly get good or time efficient at them. It takes me hours to do what a LBS can do in 15 minutes or less. I still try my best, but it's continuously a learn-forget cycle for me. Add that to the fact that I manage to screw something up along the way that takes 3x as long fix as I planned, and it's a total wash for me in terms of doing my own tuneups.
I recall the last time , I tried to change my chain, and ruined two perfectly good chains in the process since I kept overdoing the chainbreaker. That sucked.
Or another time where I thought my triple derailleur could be improved, and I ended up getting it so out of whack that I couldn't even get it into a decent condition of shifting myself.
Or the time I took off the cassette and forgot to put on one of the middle cogs and had to take the whole damn thing again.
Or the time I thoguh self-degreasing was the way to go, and ended up with 1 liter of oily fluid that I found I can't pour into a sink and had to be driven to a disposal facility for proper disposal.
Yes, this is all noob lamesness, but when you only do it once a year, that's what happens.
I now do minor adjustments myself as well as the cleaning, and it probably works out to an LBS tuneup once per two years on top of that.