Kristen Nicole’s Neighborhood

I received most of my tools yesterday.  Got them hung and rearranged my board a bit.  I was just waiting on my truing stand to be the final piece for now.  I did get the stand but there is one problem.  the wonderful Park Tool company sent me an incomplete box.  Two of the three control knobs are missing from the box.  I have called Bike Tools Etc to tell them and they were very helpful and apologetic, especially considering that it is not even their fault.  They simply sent me  the sealed box that they had on their shelf from Park.  There was no way for them to know it was missing parts.

So while I wait for Park to call me back and send me the control knobs I set up the stand anyway.  Here is the (almost) finished Toolboard and work stand.

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WOW I just spent the last 5 minutes trying to get that picture to post, great job VOX, my days here might be numbered with your crappy service.

Then here is a quick pic of the hub, rim and spokes that are waiting to be made into a wheel if Park Tools decided they ever want to send me all the parts of what I ordered instead of just some of them.

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This is an old rim and hub that I've had since the 80's.

Well I thought that I was set with the toolboard until my big tool order arrived but I got a little antsy about it and said ta hell with it and decided to hang the board with the tools that I have and just add as they arrive.

So I cut some 2x8's to length and coaxed them tight between the ceiling and floor.  Then I had to hang that sheet of 3/8 plywood by myself, which isn't easy, then I put some of the tools on and put the bench back.

So until my new stuff gets here this is what I have:

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Another angle of the cycling room.  That's a new cable and housing set on the bench ready to go on the Colnago.

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Not too much progress today as I'm still waiting on stuff to arrive.  Don't want to start attaching things to the board until I have everything that is going to be attached.

One thing I did get done is the vise attached to the bench:

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Finally had some time today after work to get to work on my new tool board.  This board has to have a couple of capabilities.

• It must be large enough to hold all the bike tools I'll mostly use.
• It must be portable to the extent that it will be moved about twice a year.

So I decided on a piece of 3/8 plywood.  I did not use pegboard as I have now in the barn because I didn''t want to have to buy a ton of hooks to fit it and can instead use finishing nails of which I have a ton.  Also, pegboard looks kinda sloppy, and by using nails I can be more flexible with where I place items.

So away I go building a new tool board.

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A clean slate to start.  Obviously the goal here is to put the most used tools in the middle and center and trying to anticipate the best fit for the lesser used tools.

As a guide I have a little help from Jim Langley's bicycle tools toolboard site

Here is his toolboard:

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It's also difficult getting started at this time as I made a huge tool order this week and I'm waiting on a bunch of stuff to get here next week.  Important things like my truing stand, spoke wrenches, chain tool, spoke ruler, etc.

I do have enough to get started though and here is where I currently stand.

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That's a magnet strip in the middle that will be removable and currently has feeler gauges, small metric ruler and some scribing tools.  To the right is a small board that will hold screwdrivers and some 1/4 inch drive ratchet extensions.  Next to that is a set of three ratchets with 4,5,6 hex wrenches attached.  Above those are some regular allen wrenches and an allen Y wrench.  Then above that is a set of metric open end wrenches and to the right of those is an assortment of bottom bracket tools.  Over to the left is a chain whip, pedal wrench, 3rd and 4th hand brake tools a metal hammer and a rubber hammer.  Finally at the bottom is some pliers, a digital caliper and a few sharpies (one black and 2 silver, very important tools as BBI taught me)

So for the winter this board will be placed in the basement above a small workbench that I have down there.  One problem:

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It's a bit of a mess!!!...:)

A few minutes of organizing though and it's much better.

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Much better, now it's ready for a small vise.  I'm thinking a small vise on the left side of the workbench so that the truing stand can sit off the right end of the bench and be mostly out of the way when not in use.  Tune in tomorrow.

Go forth and fill your libraries with media.

Seriously, thanks to everyone for being so amazing and patient. You are the reason I love Vox.

~daisy

Just got back Friday from completing the first of many bike classes that I have planned.  Went to Colorado Springs for the Barnett Bicycle Institutes, bicycle assembly and maintenance class .  While I was there I also did the one night spoked-wheel lacing class.

It was a great class with great classmates.  In the class of 16 guys (I was surprised there was NO women) we had people like me who are mostly enthusiasts with an idea.  We had 1 cat 2 racer, 1 junior cat 1 racer.  A bicycle messenger from D.C.  Several shop owners,several shop mechanics and a guy that works for American adventure cyclists.

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This was just a one week class that covers slightly more basic stuff .  We did get into wheels pretty good however, which was the main reason I took the class.

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Also took a quick trip down the road to see the olympic velodrome.

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So for now the plan is to go back in February for the BRO class.  Bicycle repair and overhaul.  This is a 2 week class that gets more detailed.  There is also a suspension class the following week that I haven't decided if I'm taking yet.

Now I have about $5000.00 worth of tools to buy...:)

Hope everyone has a great Halloween and weekend.

Billy xoxo

I was just told that the Amazon Conduit will be fixed by tomorrow. I will post here as soon as I get word that it's back up and running.

I know this has been frustrating and I am sorry there wasn't more I could do to make it less so. I really appreciate your patience though.

Cheers,

daisy

Bad news. As many of you have probably noticed, the Amazon Conduit was not fixed in the last week's release. Unfortunately, there was an undetected bug that is preventing the conduit from working.

We are working on this bug fix and hope to have the Conduit back up and running this week.

I will keep you posted.

Thank you for being so patient.

~daisy