Bike Repair 101
Inspite of what us bike tech’s would like you to believe, the fact is, there isn’t that much to bicycle repairs. It is actually hard to make a mistake that is going to cost you more than if you had taken it to me in the first place. This is as true for an e-bike as a traditional bike. Your bike mechanic should be a convenience, not a necessity.
There are no service intervals on traditional or e-bikes. If it isn’t making noise, making it harder to ride or about to fall off, leave it alone. The single biggest reason I have to tune up any bike is that people tend to over lubricate their chains. This collects dust that becomes a grinding paste. It also cakes up on parts of your drive train. It is not even unusual for me to clean this off and a formerly inoperable deraileur to work like new!
There are some basic bike bike repairs you should know if only to avoid being stranded as you bike longer and longer rides. Everyone should carry a spare tube, maybe some patches, a pump and a few basic tools (tire levers, allen wrenches, adjustable wrench and screw driver). They make multi-tools that have all of these and more, but carrying just these few items is not heavy at all.
If you get a flat, before you remove the wheel, see if you can find the what caused the puncture. If you do, you can remove the offending object, then pop that portion of the tire off and repair it with a self adhesive patch. No need to remove the wheel. You are back on the road in one or two minutes!
If your bike was assembled correctly originally and you haven’t crashed, adjusting brakes is simply tightening cables. At some point you might need new pads, but you’ll know. Hydraulics are a little different, but actually even more simple to bleed (in time, they will need to have rancid fluid flushed so it doesn’t eat seals and such, but once again, you will know).
Once a deraileur is set, the adjusting screws never need adjusting. Once again, this assumes no crashes that would have bent deraileur hangers or broken anything. The rest of the job of “tuning” a deraileur is tightening cables and adjusting that final tension with the barrel cable adjuster either on your deraileur or shifters (sometimes both).
Park Tool is the go to tool company for bicycle mechanics. They have YouTube videos on just about any bicycle repair. These tutorials are hard to beat. You can learn most anything.
Want to know more about something specific? Leave a comment or send us a text. I’ll get right on it.