More dredging

With the stagnant state of affairs currently stinking up the place I think that I have no other choice than to continue with my virtual tour of Bad Idea Racing Headquarters. So here we go with the highly anticipated and very expected Part Two...

The Work Space.

clicky make biggy

This is "the zone". Many a bike has been birthed in this corner as well as a few that have been brought back from the brink of death. Instead of being lazy and making you squint at a blurry image I decided to get some close ups this time so you can see what's going on.

First off here are some detailed shots of my tool box (on the left hand side of the image above)


This is the bin of all things small and smaller. All the interesting tid bits, cast-offs, rubber do-dads, and various what-nots that I find laying around but with potential future potentiality end up in here. This is definitely a tribute to my late father who would MacGuyver the shit outta things using inappropriate parts in an inappropriate manner in all manner of repairs. When it comes to half ass solutions to whole ass problems I often turn to the bin for answers. The hottie photo is a much younger Pie wearing a downhillers jersey I found at a NORBA race at Seven Springs. It has been part of my manly tool box for fifteen years, and I will never let her live down that moment of poor judgement.

The upper deck of the tool box has more of the same, but with a bit more order and logical division. Bolts, washers, and very small tools that I would otherwise lose in the vast wasteland that is my workbench (to be discussed in Part Twelve of the virtual tour of Bad Idea Racing Headquarters).

The lower deck of the tool box is full of the stuff I don't really need that often, but need to have some clue where to look for it. Need to adjust my 1" headset on my road bike? Need to rebuild my antiquated square taper bottom bracket? Perhaps re-Stan's tape my rims or replace my worn out Hayes pads? When I lift the lid it really is a "bring out the Gimp" kinda moment. You never know when you're gonna need a Gimp, but you always wanna be able to lift the lid and have one available.

I have an Ultimate workstand, but more often than not I find it less than ultimately handy. I end up sitting on the floor with my bike upside down or supported on my Performance Quikstand (funny, but after years of using it I just got the play on words). It's not that it's not THE ultimate stand, it's just that with the limited space in my work room I end up tripping on the legs if I leave it fully extended, so it spends most of its time just holding these useful items handy in its plastic tray. These are not the "go-to" tools, but definitely the second line of defense in home bike repair. The cup full of zip ties is actually there to supply guests who show up without their own zip ties. These are all recycled zip ties that city workers, festival set up crews, and other people who have a license to litter in the uptown of the Queen City leave scattered all over the sidewalks. I cut them, discard the unusable portion, and thank the minions of careless workers for leaving me to my plastic refuse harvesting.

I own nice wheels, so I treat my wheels with TLC. Here you have my cheap ass, rickety Park TS-7 (I think it's a 7) truing stand with pointless dishing tool and ultra sexy Tensiometer. I mounted it to an old wood crate I found in the parking lot of the USNWC back in the days before it had a fake river running through it. It's originally from Ohio and so am I, so it just seemed like an appropriate place to mount my stand for portability and ease of use. For some reason I have an old, useless pair of Sidi's and a shower curtain shoved into the back of the crate. I'm afraid to throw it away because I'm sure I had a reason to stuff it in there when I did, and the day after I pitch it I'll probably remember just why I kept it and end up on the floor in a sobbing heap mourning its loss.

Here's a preview of things to come...

This is a project that has stalled on the workbench (to be discussed in Part Twelve of the virtual tour of Bad Idea Racing Headquarters). I was finally getting around to making the Ergon byproducts into something useful when I discovered that The Wonderboy never returned my hack saw or my flat file. The project is now shelved until The Wonderboy returns my tools or when I give up hope of ever seeing them again and end up buying new ones.

And in totally unrelated news...

Bike Snob is currently the last name on the registered riders list for SSWC09. I'm not sure why that is interesting, but it just is.