the blog at eric moon dot net

The finishing touches are done! I attached the brake cable ferrules and taped up the handlebars.  I couldn’t wait so I took it out for a spin – what a blast!  It rides great.  I had two small issues, one which I fixed, the other I’ll have to check into.

First, I was doing some “track stand to hammer” transitions and the chain would skip.  Not cool, so I put it back onto the rack and could tell that my chain was way too loose.  I pulled the wheel all the way back into the dropouts and took away the slack. After 10 track stands or so, I can declare – Problem fixed!

Surly with Single-speed Chain

The second issue I ran into is the dreaded “Cantilever Squeal” (Is someone torturing a pig in the neighborhood??).   The front brakes are complaining when I pull ‘em tight.  Rears are nice and quiet. It’s not horrible, but I’m going to play around with them a bit more before I give up.  And it might be my imagination, but I’m pretty sure they weren’t squealing nearly as bad after 10 minutes of use.  Maybe it’ll go away on it’s own??  Fingers are crossed on that one.

A couple of other notes, mainly for myself when I end up replacing some parts down the line:

(more…)

I am not a bike mechanic.  I have done most of the maintenance on our bikes for the past couple of years, but I’ve never put a bike together from a pile of parts.   I thought that with the help of the all-mighty and all-knowing Internet, I would breeze through building a bike in no time at all.

Almost true, but not exactly.

(more…)