Bikes

 

The folding bikes that we use are “Dahon’s” and they have been a joy to use while traveling on the boat. They don’t take up very much room (we store them under the side deck in a cockpit locker)and they have been essential for going places that are too far to walk comfortably to.

it's a cold day, Edie has a sweater on!

They don’t weigh that much and Anna and I can load the two bikes, us  and a bunch of groceries into the dinghy without trouble. The only problem that I have with them is that they are a ‘light weight’ bike (not intended for heavy use) and they were built them with inferior spokes. The spokes are stainless steel and they did something wrong when they manufactured them. These spokes break for no good reason at all. In fact, these spokes will break while folded up in storage. I have replaced over 15 spokes and today, replaced my 16 one.

Today also was a “major” repair day for the bikes. I remove the rear hubs, grease the hub and sprocket bearings and replace the rear tires.

special tool to remove the cranks

both sides off

look close and you can see the remains of the crank bearings!

Then, I removed the pedals and the crank bearings on both bikes and replaced the wore out bearings with shinny new ones.

It’s well worth the headache of tearing apart these little bikes for the freedom that they give us.