I love to teach my son how to ride and repair stuffs the old fashion way. Here I will share some of our cheap DIY projects and repairs. I will also share some of my experience as a biker and as a pro mechanic. I am not a mechanic anymore but I still do repairs but mostly for my own machineries and this is why I try to keep everything easy and cheap. I also don't race anymore but I still love riding up the mountains where there is little or no help and all I can rely on is my small tool pouch and my monkey repair skills to bring me home whenever my bike or my friends bike breaks down.

If you are a tech-wiz or some kind of high-tech repair guru who likes spending too much $$$s buying stuffs and spends most of your time at a coffee shop posing your best biker battle gear clown costume and talking how great a biker you are then THIS IS NOT FOR YOU... Here we seriously ride our bikes and we try to keep everything simple, easy and cheap. Most of what I will share here are intended for riders who usually break their bikes to peices and may not be needed by other bikers.

I will also be sharing some cheap ways how I repaired my cars and computers. And for laughs, I will also add some weird / funny / odd stuffs that I or we did that worked and didn't work. Sorry about this blog's style, set-up or whatever you may call it, I'm an old school biker and its easier for me wrenching cars and bikes than typing on my keyboard...

Monday, December 12, 2011

My Off-Roading Tools

I hate bringing tools when I ride off-road (Trials or off-road). Tools are heavy and since I always have my truck loaded with real tools (hand tools, bearing pullers, drill, bike stand, air compressor, etc.) I often ride without my toolpack before but I have learned my lesson from my experiences and can't leave without them now...



I believe that complicated bike repairs should be done on my truck or at my garage but there are times that to get my bike on the truck, I have to do some minor repairs or I'll be pushing... Pushing a bike on a cemented road is hard but imagine pushing a bike when you are mountains away where you have to cross river beds, logs, steep slopes and cliffs... This happened to me several times where I have to walk back to my truck just to get some tools and there was a time that I had to tie my bike and drag it up a cliff using a hand winch and this was not fun.

Since my riding sucks... most damages my bike had were minimal. Brake or clutch lever bends from falling, front fork gets twisted and misaligned from crashing or hitting a boulder, a small tree branch got stuck on my rear sprocket... but these are the major ones. Often times the problem are very simple like the bike only needed was a spark plug change or my rear fender flew off when I crashed and all it needed was a few plastic tie-wraps.

Getting a flat tire doesn't really bother me. Riding a dirtbike with a flat tire is a lot better than pushing so I make it sure that my dirtbike's engine will always run. It doesn't bother me if I had to ride at turtle speed as long as I get home but for road bikes it is different. Doing minor repairs on road bikes like spark plug replacement, light bulb replacement, lever adjustments, etc. are easy and safe to do even on the side of a road. Doing tire emergency tire puncture repairs on a road bike is near impossible without using propers tools unless you are prepared to lie it down on the asphalt and get it scratched. Whenever I get a busted tire on a road bike, my first option is to leave it and get my truck. My second option is to find a garage or a gasoline stand and get the repairs done by someone else. Though I can't do full repairs on my road bike, I still bring basic tools because it makes me feel a bit safer even though they are only good for minor repairs.
Posted by iWrench at 2:49 AM

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