Maintenance

Tonight I worked on my bike. I try to degrease and lube the chain at least once a month. Because of the rain it was especially dirty. Tonight I also replaced the front and rear brake pads and the front barrel adjuster.


The barrel adjuster, adjusting barrel, whatever, broke in a minor fall during one of the rainy-ass days a few weeks ago. I was going about two miles an hour up the sidewalk on Sutter, eating a donut when my front wheel slipped on some metal inlaid in the sidewalk. The barrel adjuster is the round thing at the top of the above picture that lets you adjust brake tension on the fly.

I have a SRAM chain with a "powerlink" ("a tool-free master link for derailleur gear chains") which is the shit. The technology makes removing the chain and putting it back on easy. I ran out of good degreaser so tonight I used simple green, which works well enough. I poured it in a tupperware container, dropped in my chain, sealed it and shook it up.

This is what it looked like after the first round of shaking. I should have taken a before to show how filthy it was. All black. I repeated the rinse once more then cleaned it with my roommate's toothbrush. I'll let it dry overnight, then apply lube tomorrow morning before heading out.

I clean drive train feels...so nice.