I decided at the start of the year that I wanted to be able to complete a sprint triathlon and bike a full century (100 miles). Ambitious fitness goals for 2017, but I always like to push. I don’t have any desire (at the moment) to compete, but the triathlon seemed like a reasonable framework for some fitness goals. Obviously, I have a lot of training to do, given that I don’t know how to swim, cannot run, and have never biked more than 20 miles at 15 mph. But, whether I succeed or fail I will be a much better athlete than I am now.

So running- obviously, I’ve posted a lot about my Couch to 5K progress here (and here and here). Next run is week 8, day 1! Almost done! But I wanted to talk a little about biking. I was finding it really hard to get either the mileage or the speed I needed. There are some nice, flat, 20-30 mile, recreational trails around my house that I tried to use. Technically, trail rules state that you must keep your speed below 15 mph. I thought I could just ignore this. But in practice, the trail is so crowded that you really cannot go fast, even if you wanted to. I tried going during the middle of the week, figuring there wouldn’t be that many unemployed bicyclists, but I was wrong. I don’t have a problem passing people, but when you have to pass four people in a row, and you have traffic from the other direction, you end up waiting. A lot. And then you end up with a bunch of time at 7 mph and a bunch of 20 mph bursts. I’m sure the sprinting is useful for something, but it was more frustrating than anything else. And all those people on vacation on rented bikes riding side by side across both lanes… well, I only heard them get cursed out once, but I’m pretty sure most of us were thinking it.

But I wanted to talk a little about biking. I was finding it really hard to get either the mileage or the speed I needed. There are some nice, flat, 20-30 mile, recreational trails around my house that I tried to use. Technically, trail rules state that you must keep your speed below 15 mph. I thought I could just ignore this. But in practice, the trail is so crowded that you really cannot go fast, even if you wanted to. I tried going during the middle of the week, figuring there wouldn’t be that many unemployed bicyclists, but I was wrong. I don’t have a problem passing people, but when you have to pass four people in a row, and you have traffic from the other direction, you end up waiting. A lot. And then you end up with a bunch of time at 7 mph and a bunch of 20 mph bursts. I’m sure the sprinting is useful for something, but it was more frustrating than anything else. And all those people on vacation on rented bikes riding side by side across both lanes… well, I only heard them get cursed out once, but I’m pretty sure most of us were thinking it.

So, I went old school with a new school twist. I bought a bike trainer, which is a device that you mount your bike in so you can ride it indoors. The trainer provides resistance, so you can get a good workout. The modern era version of a trainer provides detailed feedback about your efforts to a computer on a second by second basis. Useful. Boring. The old school solution was to set yourself up in front of a tv. But the new school spin on this is a smart trainer and a gamified riding environment. With the right program, your trainer can talk to the landscape you are riding through. You see a hill on your screen? Your trainer cranks the resistance so you actually have to climb. You want to race? You can join one with everyone else logged in at the same time. Currently, I’m using  Zwift for the virtual ride environment.   It is humbling to discover exactly how amateur a rider I am; the world is populated by extremely powerful bikers. But, I am enjoying myself. It isn’t as fun as riding outside, but I am more confident that I am making progress towards my 2017 fitness goals.

This is what my setup looks like. ( Yes, I have a fluffy saddle that indicates that I am not serious.  I don’t care. And yes, I have the coveted and now discontinued Jerker Desk.  There is apparently even a facebook group devoted to pressuring Ikea to bring them back.)

So, the Mongoose is still in pieces.  I did buy a replacement bike- the sales guy at the bike shop says it is a great commuter bike.   I was pretty explicit that I commute to work on it, and the bike had to handle potholes, debris, sand, and mild off-roading as part of the daily task.  I don’t think he believed that I rode it as hard as I do.

So, the bike doesn’t handle sand at all well, which lead to a spectacular crash as I was turning a corner.  Crash perhaps isn’t the correct word, but as I lost control I started to slow down which lead to me toppling into a canal.  Since I had a giant backpack, I ended up flailing around like an upside-down turtle.  Mortifyingly, the bus I sometimes ride passed by at that moment, and some passengers jumped out to drag me out.

Anyway, so this bike might an okay choice for a not financially strapped beach town that cannot afford to run the street sweepers frequently enough to keep the bike lanes clear of sand.  Additionally, I’ve already gotten a flat from all the broken glass in the street, which is less an issue with the bike (though the tires and tubes are both thinner than on the Mongoose), and more another complaint about lack of street sweepers.

Potholes are another task that the bike doesn’t handle particularly well.  I didn’t realize how much the shocks on my mountain bike were smoothing out my ride, but they do make a huge difference when dealing with potholes.

I generally have to ride much less aggressively with my new bike, which is sad, since lighter framer and larger tires should mean that I can go super fast compared to the Mongoose.

Anyway, I’m now even more firmly in the ‘mountain bike for commuting/daily use’ category than I was before.

The Mongoose Spire goes thunk, thunk, thunk

So today I made my 80th attempt to fix my bike.  I’m not a super mechanical person, but I am extremely stubborn, so…

Anyway, my bike made a thunk, thunk, thunk noise when I rode.  It seemed to get worse when I went faster.  I wiggled various bits on my bike and the only part that felt sketchy was the kickstand.  So I tightened it down so hard it will probably never be removed.  Still, then thunk-thunk continued, but with an escalating symptom of randomly switching gears.  Especially fun when transiting an intersection where your bike lane has disappeared and you have a procession of annoyed cars behind you.

So, with this new symptom, the internet suggested that my problem was a loose cassette.  Upon testing this, the cassette could clearly be moved with much more play than the internet deemed advisable.

Bike repair requires so many tools…

Annoyingly, cassette repair requires specialized tools-  the kinkily named chain whip and the blandly named cassette removal tool.

The thing you have to understand about my bike is that it is a $120 POS bike likely made by child labor in China.  No one repairs a Mongoose Spire- you either buy or steal a new bike.  You especially don’t buy specialty tools to repair it, since they end up being such a large fraction of the cost of the bike.  As a consequence, the internet has no information on how to repair this bike.  I purchased a general bike repair book, which is usually provides enough information that I can fill in the blanks.  Additionally, it is impossible to find specifications on this bike other than it has wheels and is gray.  I’m not kidding.   This lack of specs is significant for two reasons, both of which enter our tale.

Firstly, there are several different types of cassette removal tools (and chain whips) so you need to know the brands of the components in order to buy the correct one.  I attempted to duck around this by attempting to remove the cassette without tools, following some extremely sketchy videos I found on the internet.  This lead to a greasy and frustrated me.   I made two major attempts to fix without tools before admitting defeat.  I then ordered a chain whip, and what I thought was the likeliest cassette removal tool.

Bike repair is hard…

Upon arrival of the tool, I spent something like 3 hours attempting to use the tool.  The thing about the videos and illustrations online is that they rarely showed the cassette on the wheel.  If they did show it on a wheel, it was a fancy quick disconnect type that bore no resemblance to what I had in front of me.  So, I then determined that I had to remove the axle to get the tool in the proper place.  This didn’t go well either, and I discovered, that despite my repair book’s assertion that only “older bikes” had freewheels and all new bikes had cassettes, my Mongoose did, in fact, have a freewheel.  There is also no information in my book about how to repair a freewheel, and the half page section on freewheels ends with the suggestions that you should probably upgrade to a cassette system.

Pissed off, and unwilling to admit defeat, I then set about to learn how to remove a freewheel.  Unsurprisingly, removal of a freewheel requires a specialized tool called a freewheel removal tool, of which there are many incompatible types.  The local bike shop didn’t have what I thought was the correct one, so of course I had to order it online.

Today was the first day I felt mentally strong enough for round 4 against the Mongoose.  The tool seemed to go on okayish.  It had little groovy bits that aligned properly with the matching part on the freewheel.  It had a hole in it that the axle went through.  But every time I tried to turn it to unscrew the freewheel the tool fell out.  This problem was easily fixed with a hammer, so now I have a freewheel removal tool embedded in my freewheel.  (It is important to note that use of a hammer is not actual a recommended repair procedure.)

Despite this, I still can’t get the freewheel loose because I am a puny weakling.  Apparently,  freewheels get increasingly tight as you ride them, so you-tube is full of videos of dudes adapting their crescent wrenches (which you grip the freewheel remover tool with) with 4 feet of pipe so that they have enough leverage to loosen the freewheel.

So, to recap- I’ve purchased a chain whip, a cassette remover, a free wheel remover (probably of the wrong type given the hammer action) and probably spent about 10 hours on this.  I now need to source 4 feet of pipe that will fit over the handle of my crescent wrench.  Oh, I should note that I also don’t have a crescent wrench so I need to buy that also.   I was using the less optimal vise grip, but I don’t think that was the problem. Stealing a new bike is looking increasingly viable.

The battle to repair the Mongoose Spire- to be continued…

Updated (January 2017).  The Mongoose still lies in pieces.  When I invite people to my house for dinner I trick them into trying to undo the freewheel.  All have failed.  It is becoming a King Arthur/ Sword in the Stone type deal.  I even thought maybe I was wrong and that I did have a cassette.  When I started researching the topic again, I found this blog post was one of the top search results for “Does the Mongoose Spire have a cassette?”  So yeah, no one repairs the bike.

So, in my capacity as the official internet authority on the Mongoose Spire,  the manual does confirm it is a freewheel.  The manual further advises that the mere mortal should not attempt this repair.  “Such action is beyond the scope of this manual and you should consult a specialist”.