Shop Bike

Part of the beauty of a local bike shop is the creations that come out of them. One of the best and most creative is the shop bike. These bikes come in all shapes and sizes and are often just barely rideable. Now, some might call the building of a shop bike a waste of time and energy that should probably be used on something else. But others would call it creative genius and team building in it's best form. Here at Gregg's we consider it a bit of both. Regardless, here we share our shop bike with the world!

This particular creation was originally a Trek Bruiser 2. The rest of it is pure frankenbike. In a shop this size a lot of random parts come through and it's often hard to find a good place for them. This is a good place. Many of the shop bikes don't handle very well to say the least, but this baby rides like a dream. Just don't slam on the front brake, you won't go over the bars, but the front end will actually hop about 2 inches in the air as the front wheel locks up and shudders. It is quite a sight. As you can imagine we get great looks as we ride this around the local neighborhood to pick up lunch or supplies or whatever. It's a beauty and needs a name. Anyone out there have one? If so, leave a comment and let us know what you think.

Stop Pedaling!

We see a lot of broken bikes and bike parts here at Gregg's but we rarely see something quite this messed up.
In this case a few things went wrong and the person riding the bike didn't recognize the problem quite fast enough to prevent further damage. The first thing that went wrong was beyond control. Our best guess is that the chain was not pinned correctly at the factory and came apart during the ride. The second thing that went wrong is that the rider kept pedaling through the problem. So, the chain broke and spread just enough to grab the derailleur, as the rider continued to pedal the chain pulled the derailleur not once but twice around the cassette and embedded it along with cable and housing into the cassette. Not an easy task!

After taking this picture, I talked to the Service Manager at the Greenlake store, Garick Matson and asked him how this could have been prevented. "When you feel something is wrong, stop pedaling, get off the bike and check it out" was the short version of his reply. We've all been, "Just Riding Along" when we feel or hear something that is not right with our drive train. Maybe a stick if you are out Mt. Biking or in this case a broken chain. The best thing to do when you hear or feel something like that is to stop pedaling and check it out. If you can't check it our right away, at least stop pedaling and coast until you can stop to check it out. This will save you a lot of money! This particular incident would cost anywhere to from $350 - $450 depending on labor costs. That's an expensive mistake that could have been prevented by simply stopping you legs.

We Need a Blog!

I've been watching it happen for a while now. More and more people are turning to blogs to get information, share information and just browse. So I thought it high time for Gregg's Cycles to have it's own blog. Check back in this space for information, pictures, howtos, and news about cycling and Gregg's Cycles. Hopefully this will be a useful and enjoyable place for you to come visit often. I'm going to try to keep this updated at least weekly and more often when more is going on (it's a bit slow this time of year!). We're excited about starting this blog and hope that it can be a good resource for our customers. Thanks for checking us out! Today