New Bike day! 2011 Specialized Enduro Comp

Yep! you read that title right: its new bike day. What is the flavor today you ask?

2011 Specialized Enduro Comp

So...those of you know know me in person will attest to the idea that I am a cheapskate: I never buy brand new when it comes to significant purchases like cars or bikes. I really want that brand new all carbon 29er enduro but at the end of the day I simply cannot come to terms with spending the better part of $10,000 on a car, let alone a bike!

Me and eBay go way back though. Way further than craigslist could hope to go! I have bought vehicles and paintball gear and all sorts of useless chinese junk through ebay and now i have bought a complete, albeit used, bicycle!

Of course this idea comes with lots of unknowns and puts a LOT of trust in the seller. This is not always well founded trust.

But it is usually enough of a good deal to me to take that risk and worry about the details later. This bike was one of the "worry about the details later" moments just like the Porsche adventure was.

I did get a complete bicycle and not a box of rocks, so at least I have that going for me. I ended up paying about $950, once shipping was added on, for a well abused 6 year old bike. maybe not the best of gambles but it should be fun to ride once I spend a bunch more money on it!

This is what she looks like assembled and out of the box. 

Per the ebay ad I already know the following:

• Rear triangle was replaced with a piece from a 2012. Gives the bike a 12x142 rear axle.
• Rear Easton Havoc wheel has a pretty big dent in it.
• Lots of paint scuffs and chips.
• Thompson Elite seat post

Now for the things I have discovered since unwrapping and setting it up tonight:

• LOTS of scuffs and paint chips. Way more than anticipated and clearly from trail use not just "from the cheap bike rack I used" stuff.
• Tires are original, and full of tubeless goo, and have bent presta valves. But do take air and appear to hold at least for a few minutes!
• Handlebars are from BlkMrkt. Hubba hubba!
• Seat is an old Bontrager junker...will probably replace with the WTB Speed on the old hardrock.
• front brake master cylinder is shot. pushes fluid out of the gasket somehow.
• Shock needs a rebuild. oil comes out when pumping the pressure up.
• Cranks are badly beaten and at least one is bent.
• Rear derailleur hanger is bent, possibly from shipping as pictured above. Hard to tell if the derailleur itself is bent.
• Fork should probably be rebuilt while I am at it.
• Should probably replace the suspension bearings while I am tearing things up.

Thats all I have so far.  Looking forward to some, hopefully, easy wrenching and tuning!

Stay tuned for more!

2010 Specialized Hardrock Disc

Thought I would give a little more detail on a couple of my bikes, to help flesh out what I do around here.
As I have recently mentioned I bought this 2010 Hardrock off of craigslist.org for the princely sum of $150. It was as original as they come.

I think this picture was the day I bought it. It still has the specialized tires on it even!

Since I was getting more into bicycles when I bought this one, I decided to go through and do some clean up and simple maintenance that i knew how to do. I took the fork apart and cleaned and re-greased it. I also rinsed and re-packed the headset bearings while I was in there. I tried to lube the cables and clean and adjust the derailleurs. I also replaced the clanky BB with a cheap Shimano one.

And then I rode it for a while. It was great! I could ride over way more rugged terrain without having my fillings or kidneys fall out. It had disc brakes so I learned what good brakes felt like. things were wonderful.

Of course I couldn't leave things alone! Why have disc brakes if you aren't going to hydraulic, right? Here comes our friend eBay: $60 for a full set of Tektro china specials, with all the hardware and discs even!
Then a new seat. Then some new stems to play with ergonomics.
Then some pedals to replace the poly original ones. Cheap Wellgo pedals. Work wonders over the worn out stock poly ones.

The chain and sprockets start looking poorly so I buy a new cassette, a new chain, and decide to take the raceface crankset off of a frame I got and freshen up the whole drivetrain. I learn how to adjust derailleurs correctly this time.

Finally I bend the wheels one too many times. Brian, the mechnic at my LBS, says "these things can't be trued correctly. I got it straight but if you hit too many more bumps its probably going to pop right back to where it was." So off to the internet! what looks robust: Azonic Outlaws! they cost twice as much as the bike but they come in green so it happens. May as well put some of these aggressive looking Michelin ATs on it while I am in there.

Lots of time and money spent on this rig. I just took it out for a ride today as a matter of fact: since I have been recently riding my XC bike this thing feel terrible. but it is still light, flickable, and nimle feeling comapred to my 33lb full squish. :) Experience it a terrible thing sometimes.

cheers!

2009 Specialized Cirrus

Well, again I started this post a while back when we picked up the bike but had not had a good chance to update it and finish typing.

So I bought Leann a road bike. She has long complained about how much she wants a road bike so that she can go on rides form the house. I see no problem in hoping on a MTB and adding some air for a nice recreational pedal around the park, but women think differently.

So I did a little craigslist browsing and VIOLA! or something.

a very nice condition Specialized Cirrus in 54cm size. nice metallic white in largely original condition.

First things first: get rid of the crappy changes that previous owner had done and make it more suitable for biking 150 miles. Remove and discard old MTB seat and install Leann's body geometry seat. remove crappy walmart plastic flat pedals and install simple VP clip-ins. Remove and discard squishy grips and install some decent modern clamp-on grips.

I also did some easy maintenance. Popped the pedals and bottom bracket out to clean and regrease threads. a few squirts of lube into the brake and shifter cables. Clean and lube of the chain.

And that is it. so far Leann has got one flat on the front after we went for a ride, luckily Pricepoint.com had recently had a sale and I stocked up on 700 tubes!

And that is it so far. Leann seems to enjoy it and we go out for rides. happy pedaling!