Riding Clipless or Not

Recently, I had to do a trail ride clipless because I forgot my SPD shoes. I realized at the trailhead that I never stuck my shoes in the car. My choices were to forget the ride and head home or ride with what I had. With MTB rides for me not being an everyday occurrence, I decided to wing it in regular shoes. Thankfully, this particular trail in Birmingham, AL (at the Trussville Sports Complex) is mainly technical with few long climbs. Yes, it wasn't an ideal situation, but I actually had a lot of fun. Once I figured out how to keep from slipping too much, I enjoyed the style of riding that reminded me of BMX in my youth. I was more comfortable in an off-camber rocky section because I knew I could but my feet down quickly. In the tight switchbacks, I was much faster because I could use my foot to help navigate the inside of the turn. By the end of the ride, I was questioning if I really need to be clipped in. Granted, I may have hated the whole experience if I had one long climb. Still at certain trails, it may be a whole lot more fun to just ride with platforms. I'm thinking hard about ditching the SPDs with the Florida move. The twisty trails with only small elevation changes may make clipless a thing of the past for me. Perhaps there is a pair of Crank Brothers 50/50s in my future. Father's day is just around the corner.

It was several days past when I wanted to get everything done, but Geer's Trek was completed this past Thursday.


I decided to put this post up to complete the record of the project. Most of what was left involved cleaning... steel wool on the aluminum, Meguiar's Scratch X on the paint (applied like car wax), and wadding polish on all of the metal. I installed a mid 90s Shimano STX rear derailleur and put the original Grip Shifters back on.


I also installed a used but cleaned chain. Everything worked pretty nicely. The Exage brakes mounted up well, and I was able to get the pads adjusted about perfectly. I added some new cables and routed them through the existing housing. I then attached the cantilever straddle hangers to where when the cable moved, there was enough clearance that when the levers engaged, the hangers wouldn't hit the housing stops. Finally, I adjusted the length of the straddle cables to where they were just off of the rim and wouldn't rub when the brakes were not engaged. The bike has plenty of stopping power. Overall it was a good project. No money was spent because the added parts were take offs from bikes I have parted out in the past, so it is actually good that they found a home. Hopefully this bike will help push Geer toward a lifetime of riding.


I find that in general I loathe working on kids bikes. They tend to be rusty, abused, and plagued by low-quality parts to begin with. Typically though I am fairly pleased with the results when complete. Unfortunately, adult bikes are much bigger money makers. Still, I usually won't turn down a kids build when asked by friends. It is always a good feeling to get kids interested in bikes, being outdoors in general, and fostering healthy habits.

This bike turned out great. It is a cromoly frame with mostly decent, lightweight aluminum parts. The result was a solid, attractive used bike for much less cost than one from a bike shop or even the junk in department stores. If I sold this bike, I would hope to get around $150 for it.

Well I completed what I intended today plus a little more. Also hit a slight snag, but I am past it now. I repacked the front hub bearings and the headset bearings. The headset was pretty dry as shown in the photo:

I didn't have to fool with the bottom bracket as it is a sealed cartridge model, so the bearings are not serviceable. Its not perfect, but it should be good for a couple of more years. Unfortunately, the drive side crank arm is going to be a bear to remove for any unfortunate person who chooses to do so in the future. I also did a quick polish of the frame and fork. I'll hit it again in the sunlight to make sure I didn't miss any spots. I also polished the stem and reinstalled it with a new wedge bolt because the old one was rusted. The second photo shows the status of the bike after tonight's progress.

The snag I hit was that the cantilever brakes had plastic spring covers that had all cracked. I didn't have any replacements that matched, so I removed the pads and tossed the arms in the recycle bin. Geer is getting some 80s Exage cantilevers which are much better than the Altus that were the original equipment. The Exage arms have a molded aluminum flange that holds the spring in place so that they are not dependant on the plastic covers to prevent the springs from deforming and popping out of the holes on the cantilever studs.

I plan to wrap everything up on Saturday. I hope so anyway.

So I have my daughter's bike on hold because I am rebuilding a 24 inch Trek 240 for my good friend Diana's son Geer. Geer is a cool kid who needs a bigger bike, and my friend found this Trek for $6.88 at a thrift store. This Trek needs a lot of love as it obviously spent many nights outside in the cold and rain. I should have taken a before picture, but I have a habit of immediately removing the crap parts off of second hand bikes as soon as they enter my basement. I did shoot a picture this evening with most of the heavy steel bits removed (see above). It's too bad that even the "good" brands put heavy steel parts on kids bikes. I guess it helps keep the costs down, but this bike was heavy. It is getting a new seatpost, handlebar, and rear derailleur all in aluminum.

So as I said before, this bike was abused. The chain was so rusted that it was a solid piece of metal that was impossible to get out of the rear derailleur. I didn't shoot a pic of that, but I do have a photo of the cassette. The one on the right is the rusted original, and the one on the left is an almost totally clean replacement from a donor bike. Yikes. I was worried that it wasn't going to come off.

So I wrapped up tonight with rehabbing the rear hub with Phil grease (only the best for Geer) and reinstalling the replacement cassette. I have a lot of work to do with a deadline of March 7. Tomorrow I plan to grease the front hub, bottom bracket, and stem.

Hi and welcome to my site. I am just getting started, but the first project I will be working on will be a 24 inch kids mtb to road bike conversion. I plan to put on a set of 24 inch Panaracer Pasellas, drop bar (scrounged from the basement), bar cons (still need a source), and Nitto dirt drop stem on an 80s Diamond Back Sorrento for my daughter. It will be getting pink bar tape of course.