the Way of the Turtle

AARGH... ANOTHER BROKEN SPOKE!
17.7 Mile Ride to Colonie and Back
Friday, April 13, 2007
Saturday, April 14, 2007

Friday after work I packed what I needed for the weekend into a pack and rode over to the karate school. Tough ride - cold with nasty headwinds much of the way meant I had to pump pretty hard just to maintain forward motion. After changing clothes I walked to where I was meeting my ride to Utica (iaido Friday night, a rank recognition breakfast and instructional staff meeting Saturday morning and early afternoon.)

Saturday I got back to the school and headed home on the bike. Weather was a little nicer, plus the wind was at my back to in a few places I was flying down the road (well... flying for me.) About halfway home, noticed an odd clinking sound, so I checked the rear wheel and sure enough, had a broken spoke. So that made for a slow 2nd half of the ride home... I took it easy to try and avoid breaking more spokes.

Unfortunately, the broken spoke is on the sprocket side of the rear wheel, so I need to remove the freewheel to replace it. Unfortunately, all the research I did tonight seems to indicate that I can't do that without a special tool that I don't have... the freewheel removal tool I have in my Spin Doctor tool kit won't work with my freewheel. So now I have to take the wheel to the bike shop, at least to get the tool from them (my preference, since I'm guessing I'll probably break more spokes, at least up to the point where they've all been replaced with stronger ones), or possibly to have them do the work (a distance second choice.) So after finally fixing that bike a little over a week ago... it's out of commission again. AAARGH.

On the other hand, we're supposed to have crappy weather all week (cold and rainy) so I probably won't be able to ride much anyway. But it's still annoying. Maybe someone is trying to tell me that I should have saved my pennies and bought a low-end "real" bike instead of this cheap-o department store bike. Oh, well.

UPDATE: May have found the tool on-line... we'll see when it arrives and I try to remove the freewheel...

JMH