Customer Reviews

The Bicycling Guide to Complete Bicycle Maintenance and Repair: For Road and Mountain Bikes(Expanded and Revised 5th Edition)

5 star:		(68)
4 star:		(21)
3 star:		(9)
2 star:		(10)
1 star:		(5)

 

 

I ordered this aswell as the big blue book of bicycle repair from park and this book won hands down in every area. The price is half, the information is better and more detailed and it covers areas the park book doesn't. If you want to learn how to overhaul your bike as I did, this is the book to get.

I used this baby to take apart that Target bike I had hanging in the garage for 5 years. It was so great, it had everything, even the cheap cruddy gear on my bike was covered, and I managed to put the bike back together again too! I discovered there was more to chain lube than that old can that you pushed on the bottom and dripped oil on the chain with. Plus I found out that I had the wrong size bike, completely, that my shifting system was the one they put on 3 speeds back in the 60's, and that it never pays to pry off stuff with the sharp part of the tool pointed at yourself. HOWEVER, the point is, this book ROCKS! I, a complete neophyte (mechanically speaking) took this bike to pieces and it went back together with not one screw left over. I actually did the Hans and Franz PUMP YOU UP pose after finishing.

I got this book in anticipation of receiving a bicycle purchased off the internet, as I knew the bike would need assembly and a good amount of adjusting. A careful reading of this book provided all the info I needed to get the bike up and running, and it included many vital tips I would not have known otherwise. Basic stuff like how to adjust seat and handlebar position and angle were well explained. The more involved instructions on lubrication and derailleur adjustment were much more helpful than the manufacturer's bare bones instructions. But what was truly a saving grace for me was the chapter on disc brake assembly, adjustment, and care. I would never have known how properly mount a disc to a hub (use a star pattern, gradually increase screw tightness, and never touch the disc with your hands) or that you should never pull a brake lever without something (the disc or a spacer) in the hydraulic brake caliper. My own curious excitement with my new high-end bike would surely have caused me to do that. That chapter alone was worth the book purchase. The book is also full of pictures (although it's impossible to have a photo of every possible manufacturer's component) which help greatly.

Since the book fully covers modern bike innovations as well (fancy suspension, disc brakes, external bearing bottom brackets and two piece cranksets), it may seem to owners of department store bikes to cater to people with high end bikes. This is NOT the case at all -- the book covers low-end components as well. In actuality the book is quite comprehensive, and covers of the full range of bike components available today.

To the reviewers who complain that the book contains so much "useless" info, it is not the author's fault that you ride a cheap bike, making much of the book's valuable info not apply to you.

I have two mid-range bikes (Ironhorse Warrior Race and Raleigh C700) and the book covers all areas of maintenance that I've needed and can foresee needing. In addition, the author is quite willing to tell you what NOT to do at home and when to see a professional instead.

In short, this book will make bike ownership safer, more fun, and more satisfying.

I'm former bike shop manager and longtime mechanic. Somebody bought this for me as a gift. I thought even an old dog can always learn a few new tricks, but this book really has none for someone who already knows something about bike repair. I kept running into sections where the procedure called for bringing the bike to a shop. What good is that? If you need to learn the basics, this is a decent book. If you need to know advanced techniques, you'll be far better off finding the info on the web, either at the manufacturer's site or someplace like Sheldon Brown's site.

Last weekend I saw my neighbor with his bike backwards on his new repair stand. I gave him the book...

After looking at several other bicycle repair manuals, it was a joy to come across this book that is just right on the money.

Todd Downs's book about bicycling repair is something that belongs on the bookshelf (or in the garage) of every bicyclist out there. The book easily pays for itself many times over by giving the novice bicycle mechanic the guidance and instruction in doing his own repairs.

The book is also interesting to read. Downs explains the pros and cons of the various types of components out there, and gives the reader advice for how to best use and care for his bicycle.

The photgraphs are clear and plentiful, never leaving you wondering what you're supposed to do, and give you the confidence to tackle just about any job.

Where other books seem to err by giving the reader too little information - or overwhelming the reader with too much - this book strikes a great balance. Every part of the bicycle is covered in its entirety, and this book should work for just about every cyclist out there, whether you're a road warrior, hard-core mountain biker, or just enjoy a casual ride to the coffee shop on Sunday mornings.

In addition to just straight repair and maintenance, the book is filled with good advice. I particularly liked when Downs would tell the reader if a troublesome part was better off being repaired or replaced entirely.

If you ride a bike, you really should own a repair manual, and this is the best one I've seen so far.

I looked at Zinn's book on road bicycle maintenance, but opted for this book based on comments by other reviewers and on examining this book in a bookstore. Zinn uses line drawings, but Downs uses excellent black and white photographs I find more helpful than drawings. The photographs help me envision what is foreground and what is background better than a line drawing does.

When I bought my first road bike in 1970 I read Eugene Sloan's "Complete Book of Bicycling" and it was very helpful for special procedures. But, bicycles have changed a lot in the last twenty years. This is a good guidebook for anyone with a new bicycle, no matter their previous level of experience.

This book discusses each system on a bike in text. Then comes a near repitition with step-by-step photographs. Finally, there is a troubleshooting section listing problems and their solutions.

I was surprised by two things. Fine new bicycles use metric hex key cap screws and some plastic collars. It is important that these are not tightened too much. Yet, a torque wrench reading in inch pounds was not mentioned in the list of essential tools. (I made my own for five dollars from a steel bar ten inches long and a fisherman's scale.) And, 700C tires are the new norm for road bikes, but the inch gear chart for road bikes is based on 27 inch wheels.

I wondered if it would be a problem to treat both road and mountain bikes in the same book, but it works just fine. Both get adequate treatment.

There are a lot of little hints about things that are not directly necessary for fixing a problem, but which will add continued good performance to your bicycle.

Update from my December 2006 review: I had begun to wonder if I might appreciate any additional information from Park Tool's Big Blue Book #2. I asked a clerk to remove the cellophane wrapper from it in a store and glanced through it. My question is how to remove a square taper crank that does not respond to a crank remover tool. Neither Zinn nor Big Blue Book #2 discuss this problem, but Downs does. I am sticking with Downs.

I can't believe this book was overlooked by the bike nazi digerati. I've looked at other bike repair manuals -shiny & glossy and vastly overpriced- and all things considered, Todd Downs $14.00, 378 pg repair advice gets the job done. Go ahead and pay thirty bucks and upwards for glitz but I'll stick with what I've got. Can't go wrong with this book in terms of tools, illustrations and coherence. No complaints.

Though it still suffers from the same old problem of the photography adding little to nothing to the explanations (typically too close up on the close ups), the explanations themselves are nicely written in plain and practical language. He also gives tips and tricks which I've never seen included in any other book on bike maintainence and repair.

There are a lot of classic or top bike maintainence and repair books out there, but generally they're highly rated because the people who review them already know what's in there and agree with it entirely--those books preach to the chior.

This book is for the masses who just want to save $8 on a derailer adjustment--or at least to give it a good try before surrendering to the shop mechanic--or do such truly simple stuff as cut and install new cables and housings, or seemingly scary tasks such as installing a new cassette (the gears in the back) which are so stupid easy to do yourself that once you're done you'll be congradulating yourself for not having paid the shop to do it and can spend that money instead on more cool bike stuff.

Some of the explainations do get a bit off track, but not by much. He doesn't get into the history of bicycles or choose one of either the latest technology or the old standard that you probably don't have on your new bike--he shows them both and gets right to the point. So if you want to learn how to care for, maintain, repair, and upgrade your bike better than you could before and thereby save a lot of money, or simply have the odd question answered about why your bike makes a certain noise or doesn't work like you think it should, this is certainly your book.

Just when I thought all these books were useless, I'm glad this one pretty much fell in my lap.

Todd Downs' "Bicycle Maintenance & Repair, 5th Edition" is a 378 page bargain of a bike repair book. Downs is both broad in scope and thorough in depth.

There are 17 chapters encompassing Home Bicycle Repair, Suspension, Wheels and Tires, Hubs, Chains, Brakes, Headsets, Gears, etc. Each chapter starts out with a general discussion and then proceeds to the specifics of individual types of components and common problems. I appreciated the precise drawings, good labels, and copious photos.

One feature of this book that gives it an advantage over many other bike repair books is the inclusion of modern components along with the old. For example, in the chapter on rear derailleurs there are photos of both an old cheap "Charger" derailleur as well as a more modern "Shimano Deore LX." In the section on wheel removal and remounting, five different examples of brakes are shown so that the user will be able to identify how to take off their particular wheel. I was impressed with the variety the author was able to compress into the book.

In summary, this would be a useful book for a bicycle owner to use to maintain their bike, especially if the biker wants to delve a little deeper and understand some of the wide variety of bike configurations.

My copy of Todd Downs' book is destined to get dirty-- dirty with the grit and grime of a bicycle in need of maintenance and repair. Modern bikes are more complex and more expensive than ever. Nowadays it's hard to just "wing it" if you want to do your own repairs. This book has really helped me to catch up on modern bike technology and gain a better understanding of my two-month-old Gary Fisher. The book is quite comprehensive. There are exploded view illustrations when needed, and the many photographs are comparable to what you'd find in a high quality automotive manual. Todd has answered my questions about headsets, forks, hubs...I could go on but you get the idea. Easily worth the measly $14.