I've been reading through this massive thread and found some pretty positive opinions on Bikes on Wheels, but I've also heard some less-than-stellar reviews on Craigslist. I'm thinking of buying a bike there in the near future, should I consider it or head somewhere else? Do they have any incentives to buy there? For example, my close(r) LBS had 10% of the purchase price of the bike goes towards paying for accessories, and 2 free tuneups, but they only deal in mountain and racing bikes.

Stop wearing your bike gear into the LCBO. Grownups drive cars!

Glad it warmed up, today ended up being a great day for a ride. Hopped on the singlespeed and road to Oakville and back.

Nice, but a vicious head wind going to Oakville! I went up to Birchmount/Ellesmere and back down Kennedy. Wonderful day for riding. Found rubber grommets to replace those on my Miele at Parts Source.

grommets for what?

To seal/protect the holes through which the rear brake cable housing runs. The original ones were all dried up and cracked.

Somebody say something! AHHH!!!

i donuted back to back sunday/monday. sunday was trying to ride into a blasting crosswind for 3 hrs.
monday the pace was a bit more relaxed and we got to go 30-40 riders deep onto the decent towards king rd. 45- 50km/h easily. a lot of racers were spent from their weekend.

hairy!

btw, i was reading a few posts back and i had no idea that the donut was so ill-regarded in some cycling circles! if anyone wants to create a smaller pack, which would prob be safer, lets do it!

I was under the impression as well it was a grouping of some pretty heavy hitters in riding circles.

Does anyone here ride a yellow fixed Cinelli?

I saw that bike at Urbane when I was getting air. The frame was fairly big, right? About a 58 or so. He was with another guy on a Nagasawa. They were nice bikes, fo' sho'

mm... saw the guy rolling west on Harbord yesterday night.

In other lulz, my BB started to thread itself out while riding last night. Italian threading for the lose.

Good to see a few postings again. I was beginning to think everyone was down auditioning for "So you think you can dance".

In other lulz, my BB started to thread itself out while riding last night. Italian threading for the lose.

How would you go about preventing this other than threadlocker, which would make disassembly a problem?

I KNOW I can dance I don't need no judge tellin' me what I can and ca...
Oh the horrors of TV dominated by let-the-public-vote shows

So I was riding my ss this weekend and noticed that there seems to be a little grinding noise coming from the cog. Here are the complicating factors:

1) it doesn't always grind. It seems to go for 5 seconds and them be off for 30 etc.
2) It doesn't matter if I'm pedaling or not (remember ss not fixed)

Any thoughts?

^^ Bearings?

Supposedly with blue locktite and a torque wrench. For now, I'll just thread it back in and deal with the locktite later.

here is my freewheel duo-speed hack:
http://img134.imageshack.us/img134/7767/photoljw.jpg
it does work as planned, with 18t at the front of the dropout and 16t closer to the rear of the dropout. gear change is as simple as undoing a quickrelease and making sure ur fingers don't fall into the grinder.

only problem is.. these cogs are not really designed for being hammered on WITHOUT a derailleur. if you do, and the chain isn't too tight, you get a POP POP POP, GRIIIIIINNND, and then ur onto another cog, OR u are on no cog... either option makes for face meeting stem a very real possibility.


sooooo..unless i want to run a derailleur, which, i don't really want to do, this budget beater is on hold, with its crazy slammed fender clearance and all.

one thing i found is that the wheel WOULD move forward, even with it locked into the drop out with the quick release getting a taste of my 24" pythons. After some inspecting, i found that the axle on the freewheel side is bent. Apparently this is common and... unfortunately, a fact of all freewheel hubs..

or is it?

I am pretty sure if i could get an axle that would stay straight, and locked into position with even chain tension, this would be be a non-issue.

OR run bmx cogs.. but bmx cogs don't fit on freewheels.... ugh.

I forsee a properly built SS/FG rear wheel in your future....

Please just get one. Your life will be so much easier/safer.

A properly chased and faced BB shell shouldn't need threadlocker. Italian thread isn't the problem. If it was it wouldn't have lasted as a BB thread standard for 50...75?...years.

Cheap freewheel and/or bent hub axle.

Shimano "twist-tooth" freewheel cogs don't do well in SS applications. Try and scour up an older one ie: suntour, regina, that uses straight teeth and it wouldn't jump off as easily.

Also I think you may have an issue with dropout alignment and wheel dish. If you are bending axles it is usually mis-aligned dropouts that cause the problem. If the wheel isn't dished correctly...and you are clamping the QR down super tight...you could potentially be bending the axle forcing it closed. BMX freewheels would work fine on that hub...chainline would be trickier.

That's why I was curious. I hadn't heard of an inherent fault, and threadlocker on bikes was unheard of back when I started biking.