Customer Reviews

Bicycling Magazine's Basic Maintenance and Repair

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If, when you were a toddler playing on the floor with some of your pals, and your mother sat at the coffee table talking to her friends, and she momentarily looked over, watched you, and then forlornly turned her head and said, "Well, he's a happy child even though he isn't the sharpest pencil in the drawer," this book isn't for you.

Over the years I had dreamed about retirement and fantasized about biking from San Francisco to Los Angeles. But as we all know, life can throw you some curveballs and last year, I had to go home to LA on some family business. As a result of this unexpected trip, I had to shrink my plans. So I decided to ride from Santa Monica to San Diego. As this was all unexpected, and I had left everything back in Alabama, including my bikes, I needed to buy a relatively good quality bike and the equipment that goes with it. With that done, I planned out the trip . . .

I spread out a map and I have to admit, I couldn't tell if I was looking at the roads in Southern California or the technical schematic of the cockpit of a 747. Undeterred, after all I was a graduate of the Los Angeles public schools who had proudly earned a D in geography, I decided to simply stay parallel to the ocean, figuring that eventually, after bicycling past Venice, I would eventually hit San Diego. Oh, I forgot to mention, don't try this at home, folks.

Now, I gotta admit, neither my wife nor I are the most mechanically inclined people in the world, although several years ago, rather than having a flat repaired at our local Trek store, we decided to do it ourselves. Our living room was covered with maintenance books, owner's manuals, and internet information. It looked like we were planning the D-Day invasion, but after several hours, success! We had changed a flat. Let me tell ya sports fans, I ain't making this up as I go along . . .

Anyway, remembering our little experience, and knowing that on this trip I could be on the road until at least midnight, I decided to get a little book that I could use in the unlikely event that something went wrong. Looking over the books at a store near the Third Street promenade, I found Bicycling Magazine's Basic Maintenance and Repair with a subtitle that said, "Simple Techniques to Make Your Bike Ride Better and Last Longer." That looked like just the ticket so with book in hand, at four in the morning, I set off on my Excellent Adventure . . .

Did seventy miles and thirty the next. That got me to Camp Pendleton. At the Marine base, the bike trail ends and if you turn right, the Marine's will let you go through the base where you will emerge on the other side right at the trail head. I had turned left. As it turned out, that was a pretty stupid thing to have done. The only place that goes is to the entrance of the 405. Having no choice, and reading that incredibly, bike's were allowed, in pitch darkness I rode along the side of the freeway with cars speeding next to me at eighty miles an hour.

Well, momma didn't raise no fool and it was pretty clear that if I continued, I could easily become a grease spot. So I got off the road and walked in the brush parallel to the perimeter fence of our nation's amphibious assault force. Now write this down: If you walk in the brush, little stickley things can flatten your bike's tires. And if that happens, you have a ten mile walk to the first exit in Oceanside.

So for the first time ever, I got two flats. But the walk was enjoyable. Really, truth be told, just the thing that I needed. And at the exit, a cab took me to the Hilton. There, after having removed the tires, over a glass of wine, I took out my handy Basic Maintenance and Repair book and turned to the index.

"Let's see," I said to myself, "T for tires' . . . and looking further down . . . `repairing, 25-28.'"
So far, so good. On page 25 there was a caption, "Remove the Wheel and Tube." Actually, I was getting pretty good at this . . .
"Before rolling to a stop, shift to the smallest cog," the book started out.
"A cog?" I asked myself, "What the heck is a cog?"
"Insert the flat, spoonlike end of one tire lever between the tire bead and the rim about 2 inches from the valve."
"A bead?"
"Insert the second lever under the same bead about 4 inches farther from the valve. Pull the lever down, prying off more of the bead . . . If the bead is too tight, hold the dislodged portion and move several inches farther along with the second lever. You don't need to unseat the other bead from the rim."
"You don't need to unseat the other bead?" Well, really, I had already figured that out. I wasn't stupid after all. And with that, I decided to skip to the end to see how this all turned out . . .
"The last section of bead will become tight and hard to get onto the rim. Deflate the tube completely to minimize its size, than use your thumbs or palms to force the bead into place (see photo)."
That was a black and white photo, showing, I think, a guy holding a tire.
"Inflate the tube to about half of the pressure listed on the tire sidewall. Hold the hub axle in your hands so you can spin the wheel and watch the bead line that's molded into each side of the tire . . . If it bulges up, let out the air and work that section with your hands to get the tube out from under the bead. If it dips below, continue inflating to maximum recommended pressure and you'll probably hear it pop into place."
"Probably?"

The book, which I'm sure is simple to follow if you're not dense, isn't for someone who is . . . well . . . challenged. At home, I have a simple to follow repair book that is fully illustrated with colorful photographs. For dummies, that's a much better book and that's what I'd recommend for people whose mothers' used to look at em' funny. So I put Basic Maintenance and Repair away.

By then, it was night, night time so it was off to bed. The next morning, a cab company wanted to charge me thirty to forty dollars to go to a bike store one mile away! Give me a break! Thirty to forty dollars! Fortunately, one of the Hilton's assistant managers saw me arguing with the dispatcher over the phone and came up to me. A flat? No problem. He was a cyclist. Within ten minutes, at the most, he had me changed and on my way. He had really helped me and I wanted to give him a tip. He refused, simply saying, "Just pay it forward, bro." I will certainly do that, dude . . . thanks! . . . and God bless.