Diary of a Bike Mechanic

My friend, Cade, recently came to visit from Australia. Upon arriving he discovered that somehow he’d lost the barrel adjuster on his Shimano Duraace brake. Shimano make exploded parts diagrams super accessible so after finding the corresponding diagram and getting the part number I think easy, I’ll phone Shimano and order a replacement and we’ll be sorted. 

Not the case.

While Shimano do indeed make the part I needed, Shimano New Zealand don’t bring it into the country and have no intention to anytime soon leaving me stuck because I don’t want to write off a brake I have kicking around to get him up and running and I also don’t want to have to charge him out for an entire brake to replace such a small part.

I get thinking and have a bit of a dig around and discover a chainring bolt fits inside the cut out for the barrel adjuster perfectly. I break out the drill and drill it out to take a cable ferrule and before you know it his brake works perfect and looks super clean albeit minus a barrel adjuster.

DT Swiss tools - hands down best bladed spoke holder and nipple key.

A local mountain biker dropped in after recently having his Rockshox Monarch Plus serviced at another shop and having the same issues he was having pre-service. After a bit of back and forth it was decided he’d drop the shock in and we’d strip it right down and have a look at it.

He was having issues with the shock blasting through travel super quickly regardless of which compression setting he was in and with 3 volume reducer bands.

Upon popping the shock open I discovered there hadn’t been a service carried out. The oil looked as though it had been in there for two years, not one week, and some of the seals were damaged from being taken off. It looked as though the shock had been stripped, cleaned, and then reassembled with the same seals and oil. I also found a massive scratch in the IFP chamber along with an IFP pressure of 80psi hence the lack of compression. The scratch looked like it was caused by a spoke or similar used to set the IFP to the correct depth.

I installed a new seal kit, new IFP chamber, and replaced the oil and one everything was bled up and pieced back together it was operating exactly as it should.

My name’s Cam and I’m a bicycle mechanic in Auckland, New Zealand. I’ve been wrenching professionally now for a little over three years in various cities around the country.

The idea behind this blog is to give you an insight into the life of a shop mechanic, along with sharing tips and tricks I’ve picked up working on bikes.

My shop sees literally everything. It’s not uncommon for us to have a top flight Cervelo S5 hanging up next to a bike you’ll struggle to sell for $100. If the customer is willing to pay, I’m willing to work on it.