Maintenance day

I suppose this title should be "Maintenance days", as the work has been spread over several days when I have the time - the sprog has been in hospital to get his casts removed, so that and doing physio have kept me too busy to go riding on my vacation.

I managed to get the Nishiki back up and running, although the smallest cog needs replacing as it's looking extremely worn. I had to clean out every last speck of dirt to make the cogs fit together perfectly, as there's very little clearance between the cogs and the frame, first time around I had some gunk in there which meant the chain was rubbing on the frame. Even after cleaning the cogs I had to twiddle with the high limit screw to get it just right. The wheel didn't get up to as high a tension as I wanted, as the drive side reached its limit before the offside was tight enough. I'll run the wheel as-is for a week and see what the effects are.

I replaced the rim tape on the rear wheel of the hybrid as it was looking really manky - all the trail riding I did last summer shoved gunk in there which I'm guessing is either extremely acidic or alkalinic - the tape had stretched over the spoke holes and gone a really funny colour. Rim tape is cheap enough at $2 for 2 that I don't mind replacing it "just in case".

Finally, I put the slicks back on the mountain bike so I'll be able to take the sprog out in the bike trailer. While I was at it I noticed the rear brakes were worn past the wear line (as a result of my ride around the whopper dropper trails, I think) so I swapped them out for some fresh pads.