I believe that there are some of us who just cant be good at certain things. For example, I can take as many drawing classes as I want and practice forever, but I will never be a Disney animator.
On a similar note, some of us are more mechanically inclined than others. I have watched videos, spoke with LBS and friends, and read books, but bike repair just doesnt seem to be my thing. I can change a tire, but thats about it (the same with cars, tires and oil is all I can do). I rewrapped my bars, and that came out ok (on the fifth try) So now that my derailer is out of wack from my "tuning" and I want to replace my dowtube shifters with bar end, it is off the LBS I go. They usually dont charge much for labor, because their parts are marked up, just hope the shifter change is under $100........

they still draw? I thought it was all computers now.

Being "good" and being "competent" are two different things. Don't beat yourself up; even though bikes are pretty simple machines, there are still many many subtleties and non-intuitive rules about working on them. Experience counts for a lot, especially with some things that are as much art as skill - such as finicky derailer adjustment.

They are computers, not fully independent robots. Someone still has to do it.

yeah the only automatons are the ones writing the scripts.

Yes, don't feel bad.

I can solve advanced problems in a variety of technical, computing, and medical fields, yet simple bike maintenance continues to confound me. Even with the excellent online resources.

Theory is one thing - experience is another, and brains don't compensate for experience.

I changed my measly brake pads last month, thinking it would take all of 2 minutes. An entire hour later, I was still unhappy with how they were working.

Derailleur repairs are the same for me - I go in thinking it'll be a quick 10 minute job, and it often takes me half hour to get it to where I'm happy with it.

The ONLY thing that's been easier than expected was bar tape wrapping - that was surprisingly easier than the video looked.

It's the same with most things - if you both KNOW and have the experience of the "best right way", you can do the whole thing in a snap. However, if you just make one wrong move, even a slight one, your problems exponentially multiply. I think of it like getting lost on a 5 minute car trip - you'll NEVER get away in 6 minutes after a wrong turn - more like double or triple the time.

I guess it depends on how determined you are. I think bicycle repair is something almost anyone can learn, but being good at it takes a lot of experience. I just recently broke my new 105 shifter (it was really easy to break). It was an expensive mistake and very frustrating, but if I need to install another one, I now know how not to break them. The learning is painful, but it does eventually get easier as you learn from your mistakes.

I am lucky to have a group around here called, "common cycle" that not only performs free repairs, but also will teach you how to repair your bike yourself, also for free.

Having someone live and in person with the proper tools for the job goes a long way in helping you learn.

Youtube is great, and so is forum reading, but hands on perspectives has no substitutions.

While not in their best interests, any good LBS I've been to is happy to show you what they are doing. Even if you don't plan on doing it in the near future, seeing how it is done often inspires you. Don't be shy.

And the folks over in the Bicycle Mechanics forum are more than willing to help.

You don't HAVE to do it yourself. You should be able to fix a flat yourself because it can be so inconvenient to depend on others for that. I am very mechanically inclined. I worked as an auto mechanic when I was young. I do most of my bike repairs myself. On the other hand, I don't get along well with wood. Because it has a grain, it acts like it has a mind of its own. I learned years ago that I'll never be a cabinet maker. I don't beat myself up over it. I buy furniture other people make and work on my own cars, bikes, and appliances.

Even though I'm good at mechanical stuff, I always give myself extra time because I'm doing a particular repair for the first time so often. My wife asks me how long a repair on the car will take, I'll say "It should be a 15 minute job. Give me 2 hours."

Hah! Just broke my Park CT3 chain tool yesterday. Pin snapped right off because I didn't make certain the attachment was fully screwed in. Another $10 mistake.

And like you, I just wrapped my handlebars for the first time after watching a YouTube video and it was CAKE! I was shocked at how simple it was to get something that looked really good. I really feel sorry for people that have their LBS charge $10 for that! Now I want to change colors every week.

Yeah, derailuer adjustments suck. I use the book by Zinn and a couple of videos I found online and I can get it relatively close. The front is a pain in the neck for me.

The bottom line is that I don't enjoy bike maintenance. In fact, I hate it. There are others that love it and I bet they're damn good at it.

I basically can change out cables, adjust the derailuers, replace the chain, change the tires and brake pads and wrap the handlebars. Anything else means the LBS. And money. Ugh.

I'm of the school of thought that emphasizes the theory on how things work and how you work on them. Then you figure out the details.

For an engine, you always check for air, spark, fuel. There are standard troubleshooting steps. You squirt some starter fluid in the thing. It fires for a second. That means you have air and spark (because it fired) but somehow the fuel isn't getting in there (because you had to squirt starter fluid in to get it to fire - you added the fuel manually). Now you can check the fuel system.

Likewise bikes have basically two things - cable actuated levers (derailleurs, brakes) or bearing preload stuff (BB, headset, hubs, although all are relatively simple with cartridge bearings). I'm skipping electronic because I haven't work on it.

So cable stuff - the cable pulls. It starts with the cable pulled all the way out. You pull it with a lever until it stops, either because the brake pads are clamped tight or the limit screw limits travel. Did it go too far? Not far enough? Did it start too far? Not far enough? Now you can adjust the start point, the end point. For indexed shifting you can consider the each click a separate end point. Too far? Not far enough? Go from there.

Bearings are similar. There's too loose, too tight. Start at too loose, tighten until it's not too loose. Don't start at too tight because you are squashing the bearings and the races together and one or both will become imperfect (usually the races).

Now you can trouble shoot any kind of brake, shifter, or bearing thing. All you have to do is figure out what limits what, what tightens what.

If you learn by rote ("Turn this screw if it's too far this way") then you run into the problem of "These screws aren't where they're supposed to be!". Or, worse, the screws are reversed for some reason, so, say, your rear derailleur ends up in the spokes or your crank rips your front derailleur off the frame.

Rote is bad.

cdr

Practice makes perfect and while some people excel with seemingly little effort, you can be good at something nonetheless. You don't have to be a master mechanic to perform routine maintenance on your bicycle, I just finished stripping my old bike down and assembling those components onto a new frame with little experience. What worked for me was understanding how the parts worked instead of just following instructions so maybe that will help you going forward. I remember the first bars I wrapped looked pretty sloppy but now I feel happy with how they look once I'm done. Good luck!

This is how I work.
It's important to know HOW the component works, not just the steps to adjust it. Becaue inevitably with all the different makes and models, the steps are not quite exactly the same. But most of the time, they all work the same way.

You think thats bad?

I repair watches and can not for the life of me fix a bike!

I think I would love it. If only I didn't have to do it in a cramped space between my computer desk and shoe rack... Whish I had a descent workshop.

Since last spring I have done nearly every possible job on my bike. The last thing to learn is the installment of new bifters. That is planned for January. I don't believe it is too difficult tough. The major obstacle for me is finding the right parts as I am not that familiar with all the models and whether they are compatible with each other (I'm upgrading a 1990s steel bike).

Since my regular lbs closed this year, I have discovered that he was far more invovled with service than most other shops which seem to be just selling items. For example, I used to go to him to get my bearings repacked once a year on my shimano hubs. This year, I have been to 4 bike shops to ask about doing this and every one of them said "what do you mean?" or "that's not something we normally do". I think the days of relying on the shop are gone. They are just retailers now.

To much to learn in this world in a short amount of time. I have a feeling that I will leave here without knowing everything...Although my wife has mentioned more than once , "that I think I know everything"! Not true. I'm no PCAD..

nice. new moto

yikes. and for such a simple process.

I do all my own repairs. Made easier by the fact that it seems like bikes are getting more homogenous these days. In my opinion, bikes are ALL about the "chain of compatibility" - Diameters, threading, widths, standards of measurement, etc. For example, I'd like to put a rigid fork on my MTB commuter, but I have to make sure it's a threaded fork. I can't just "go threadless" because a threadless fork would require a new headset, a new stem, and the new stem would mean new handlebars, which might mean new brakes and shifters, depending on what the clamp sizes are for those.

Just the other day I tried to go into a shop and buy 27inch tires, and the guy kept pointing me to 700c. When calculating gear inches for a 700c wheel, you would use 27 inches as the diameter of the wheel, but a 27 inch wheel is, in reality, 8mm larger in diameter when compared to a true 700c wheel. I finally had to say, "No, they're close, but not the same" He tried to show me that it'd work by putting a 700c tire on 27in wheel they had in the shop. Didn't fit.

It's a lot harder to go wrong with modern bikes though. They're basically all the same. Some components may require others (like new crankarms with the spindle attached will need a different type of BB), but at least there's less chance for screwing up some measurement, like BB shell diameter.

As for shifting performance.. I find it hard to imagine how it could be so difficult since they're indexed. You could always start from scratch.. Shift the chain down to the smallest cog, Turn the barrel adjuster all the way clockwise, loosen the cable pinch bolt on the derailleur, pull the cable tight and re-tighten the pinch bolt, use the shifter to shift up one gear, starting turning the crank arms while turning the barrel adjuster counter clockwise. When the chain jumps to the next largest cog, you're practically done - fine tune through the rest of the cassette.

If you're finding that shifting to a bigger cog is sluggish, and using the barrel adjuster to help it along subsequently makes it slower to shift to a smaller cog, you probably have gunky cables, and the friction is causing poor performance in both directions. replace the cables.


This post had no direction whatsoever.

i can build a PC from a pile of spare parts, but i can't send a fax. seriously, i can never figure those things out

bike repair is best learned through trial and error, and asking alot of questions online and at the LBS. having patience is the most important part. luckily there are tons of youtube videos of guys fixing bikes. I watch them before trying something new. OK, actually i try it first. fail. then watch the videos to see where i went wrong

For me I've always found if the activity is fun, I'm good at it. Bike assembly/repair is fun, I think. It's really the only time these days I get completely lost in what I'm doing -- that includes actual riding.

Also, I love bike parts. All of my training was done on 80s/90s era Japanese steel bikes and there's nothing quite like disassembling one of those older bottom brackets, cleaning it up and getting it to work just right.

Yeah, the big box trend may eventually kill the LBS as we know it as it has other retail markets. Lower overhead, high volume discounts make it hard for the little guys with real expertise to compete. Luckily, we aren't there yet. I know of at least two great shops I would trust with anything near me.

here's my workaround
1. wait until everyone is asleep
2. throw a tarp on the living room floor
3. fetch the trainer or repair stand if needed
4. carry the bike in without bumping any walls (this is most important)
5. have beer, tools, carpet cleaner and paper towels within arms' reach
6. fix bike
7. remove all evidence