Is there someone in Glasgow who can help set my gears up?

[stonedwolf]

Hey

With my bike back from the "mechanic" my gears are out of whack. I've watched a couple of YT videos on adjusting the allen bolts but I really can't get it right.

It's probably an easy thing for an experienced rider/mechanic to sort, but it's beyond my ken.

Is there someone in the Glasgow area (I can drive over with bike) that could give me a hand, or do I need to take it in for one of those three-week waits at a repair shop?

 

[Gary]

Hiy
The only adjustment "bolts" on a rear mech are limit stops. upper/lower and B-tension.
and none of them are used to adjust the indexing. So leave them well alone.
If your gears have suddenly stopped indexing properly you need to check your cables are smooth and the mech and hanger are properly aligned. But also check there's no excessive play in the main mounting pivot or the pulley wheels
I'm an hours drive from Glasgow so probably too far

 

[stonedwolf]

You're not too far if you're ONLY one hour away. Even if I can find a slot in Glasgow for a mechanic it's a three week wait. A wee drive is preferable to that, heck I'd likely use that drive out as a spring-board to a trail either along the way or a bit further along so it wouldn't just be a chore trip it would be a ride too. And of course I'd bring thank-you beer, a Govan Cigar, an offer of a lift to a trail if you don't have a car, basically something plus thanks in the forum.

However - good news. I did do the cable tension thing. I have no idea what the store did but I pretty much unwound it, it's almost back to working completely again. I have a bit of twiddling to do I think, but I think I can get there. Oh, the the front-of-store guy when I delivered the bike was full of praise for the mechanic, a different front-of-store guy when I picked it up and he called the mechanic a "f--king moron", loudly and proudly. Not what I was expecting - or wanting - to hear.

I really, really need to get a proper set of tools and watch videos and get to learn to mechanic my own bike. I need to learn how to strip it to bits and reliably put every bit back together. To build a bike from bits. Tweak everything. I know that but I'm starting from scratch, literally I know how to pedal and that's about it. That I have found so far the infrastructure just isn't there in Glasgow, not yet, at least not that I can find. Just today Velo (I'd already asked them for a slot for a gear service to get this fixed) said they couldn't service the gears because I have an e-mtb not a clockwork bike. It's the bloody gears. But they won't even LOOK at them. So take it to an e-mtb shop that is also Bosch? Love E-Bikes on Dumbarton road would be my local candidate, but they're so busy they will ONLY repair or service a bike they have sold.

So anyway, thanks but just for now I'm out and about again.

 

[Gary]

PM me if you need help.

 

[dobbyhasfriends]

I'm an hours drive from Glasgow

takes this long to slow down if you have had to build enough velocity to escape the gravitational well that is the Glasgow ring road

 

[Gary]

Glasgow doesn't have a ring road. Just how much did you drink when you lived here?

 

[dobbyhasfriends]

Glasgow doesn't have a ring road. Just how much did you drink when you lived here?

im sure it used to.. I was last there in around the early 90's though.. I must have driven around the city 3 times before I built enough velocity to escape

 

[Gary]

Glasgow has motorway running straight through the middle of the city crossing the Clyde and linking to the motorways to the East, North, South and (kinda) West.
You'd need to be a certain kind of "special" to accidentally manage a loop around the city on it.
I spent a large portion of the 90s in Glasgow. Good Times! ish.

 

[stonedwolf]

You could make a ring of it if I guess, the M74 & M8 connect in Glasgow itself around Kingston/Tradeston, and again east via the M73; but that's quite a distance out. Way beyond the "city wall" as it were.

The Spaghetti Junction around Kingston/Tradeston is a special kind of stupid though. Whose big brain move was it to connect the M8 with the M74 via the obvious junction of, erm, Dalintober Street via Wallace Street? Oh and you miss one filter and without an up-to-date satnav you could be stuck in a one-way maze for days. The eastbound junctions are about as clear as explosive diarrhoea in an unlit coal mine, but not as funny. And don't even get me started on the hard-barrier they put up that stops the M8 northbound traffic from taking the A814 without going around the block and traffic lights of Anderson.

 

[Gary]

Wasn't the M8 M74 junction opened late 90s?

I reckon Dobbie's early 90s driving might be the inspiration for it's design.

Anderson

TBF EVERYONE should experience stopping their car in Anderston at some point in their lives.
I spent a couple of years in the 90s living in a flat in James Watt St back when there were no street lights... The things I saw and stories I could tell from just returning home after dark

 

[stonedwolf]

I've been Glasgow since 2005 and Scotland since 1990.

Before that? Tea and crumpets. Now? Irn Bru and tattie scons.