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Is My bike Safe To Ride?
Not only is it more fun to ride a bike that is working well, but getting mechanical issues fixed promptly can prevent further issues and helps keep our rides safe. We encourage you to check all of the items on this list at least once a week to ensure your bike is in good working condition. However, we also encourage you to bring your bike to one of our local bike shops every year for a full inspection and repair or replacement of any components that are not in ideal working condition. Checking the bike’s headset is easy to do and is extremely important. If your headset is not adequately tightened, your fork will have a small amount of play, which will make your bike much more unstable, and can lead to cracking in the steerer tube, which is very dangerous. To check the headset, turn the front wheel 90 degrees, hold the front brake, place your thumb at the base of the headset bearing cover or at the base of the head tube, and gently shake the bike back and forth. If you can feel the fork “knocking” in the headset, the bike should not be ridden until the headset is adjusted. If you are a visual learner, here is a video. If your chain is wearing out, it is likely that you’ll notice it because the quality of shifting will be worse and you may drop your chain more often, but it’s easy to measure chain wear using a chain checker such as the Park Tool CC-4. This $17 part will show you if your chain has reach 0.5% stretch (the recommended limit for 11- and 12-speed chains) or 0.75% stretch (the limit for 10-speed and lower). By replacing your chain at the appropriate time, you will have better shifting and extend the life of your cassette and chainrings (which are more expensive), and are more likely to avoid the worst case scenario of breaking your chain mid-ride. Brakes are one of the most important components of the bike for safety. It is easy to visually inspect brake pads and check that they still have a good amount of pad thickness left. If you have rim brakes, you will get the best performance by keeping your brake track clean and making sure that the brake cables are set so that the pads contact the rim quickly and evenly. Disc brakes require less frequent maintenance to keep their best performance, but if your brake levers start to feel “squishy” then you should have the hydraulic lines bled immediately, or if your brakes are making noise in dry conditions, that is a sign that your rotors and pads may be contaminated, or your rotors may be warped. Tires are one of the most important features for safety, as degraded tires, or tires at the wrong pressure, give you worse grip and more flats. Before every ride, inflate your tires to the correct pressure. Don't know what pressure to run? Check out the SRAM pressure calculator. Check that the tread of your tire is still in good condition and is not worn out. A worn out tire will look "squared off" or may start showing the threads of the tires casing. Some manufacturers will make it easy by manufacturing tire wear indicators on the center tread - for example, Continental road tires. Checking that all your contact points to the bike are in the right condition is easy and worthwhile. Handlebar tape is often considered as an aesthetic component, but bar tape that is wearing out or starting to come unraveled makes it easier for you to lose your grip on the bar. Checking the spring tension in your pedals ensures that you will be clipped in when you need and clipped out when you need. And making sure that your saddle is not moving around on the seatpost will keep you steadily planted on your bike. Finally, avoid buying bike parts from Amazon, eBay, or similar websites. Many items on these sites are bought from Chinese retailers such as AliExpress and then resold, and so the products you get may not be legitimate OEM parts. Chains and brake pads are the items that are most commonly faked. We have heard of several instances of riders buying chains from Amazon, only to have them snap within 300 miles of riding, and subsequently discover that the chain was not made from steel (as advertised), but from aluminum (which is cheaper and easier to machine, but softer and weaker). You will never go wrong buying spare parts from one of the local bike shops, so we always recommend that, but if you must buy parts online, Jenson USA or Competitive Cyclist are good places to go. |
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