rwgreenberg

Hi all. I’ve been trying to do more and more in the way of basic bike maintenance over the last year. I feel comfortable with adjusting the derailleurs, brakes and replacing tubes…all essential do-it-yourself jobs. I recently bought a fairly expensive folding bike (Bike Friday New World Tourist) and did some more reading about the things one should do after riding a new bike for a couple of months. Of course I already had the derailleur adjustments down (which go out of adjustment a lot when the bike is new).

I decided to buy a Park beam torque wrench to torque the cranks, as this seems to be on the list of things to do early on (and I thought – how hard can this be?). I practiced a few times on an older less expensive mountain bike. First I undid the bolt, greased it, and then tried to torque it to specs (40nm). I found it quite difficult to read the gauge, pull on the wrench, hold the crank in place, and keep the bolt moving until the torque was reached. After going through this procedure a few times, I came to the conclusion that I really did not feel all that comfortable tackling the expensive new bike.

So here are my questions:

Is it really that important to go through this crank torqueing routine (they don’t feel loose at all)?

Should I buy a click-type torque wrench and will this make the process easier for a klutz like me? And if so, which one is recommended?

And, on another note, should I tackle the adjustment of my Chris King headset? I read a bit about this, and it does not look easy!

Anyway, any advice on the above would be most appreciated. Rich