Grunge, Gunk, and Grease

"Rumble......rumble......rumble....."

I could feel it when I was pushing a big gear on the Orange Crush. "Hmmm....... Gonna hafta change that bottom bracket soon!", I would think. On multiple occasions.......and never doing anything about it afterward! Well, I knew it could not last forever, and one day it would disintegrate while I was miles from home, likely, on a remote gravel road, of course, where Mrs. Guitar Ted would have to come and get me, and end up giving me the "stink eye", most assuredly.

Yes......I had to get that done and soon! The alternative probabilities did not sound that great to me. So, I bought an inexpensive Shimano replacement bottom bracket. It is hard to believe that these things cost less than an Acera rear derailleur but work as well as they do. I mean, just the machine work on a bottom bracket cup is far more precise than an Acera rear derailleur's is. Yeah.......I could spring for something better, but would they last as long as a Shimano bottom bracket? Maybe..... But I could probably buy several Shimano bottom brackets for the price of one, Chris King, let's say, and I think the value is there in the Shimano one. Plus, did you know that you can recycle the cups with new cartridge bearings? Yep..... You can. If you are industrious that way.

It's a dirty, gunky, greasy business, but someone has got to do it!

Of course, you simply do not just remove and replace a bottom bracket. Oh no! You end up cleaning up the frame while the crank is off to get to those otherwise hard to reach nooks and crannies of your frame. Then you clean up the front derailleur while you are at it. Then it's time for that nasty crank arm and rings. The cleaning up of the things takes far longer than it does the removing and replacing of the bottom bracket. It is a big, time consuming job when you do all of that stuff. But......it ain't gettin' done on its own, and the thought of having to make that possible bail-out call to Mrs. Guitar Ted......... nuh-uh! Not gonna happen!

Now watch. Something will break on my next long ride! I've done myself in! Ha!

All done! Ready to rumble down the road again, with a rumble-free BB that is!

 Well, once it was done and I had done a couple of other maintenance jobs while I was at it on the BMC, I ran it up and down the neighborhood to check my work. Seems good to go now. I am considering removing the fenders for the Summer, but........I don't know. Maybe I'll just finally trim back those stays on those fenders and leave them on. I have some new bar tape coming for this and I probably will change the cassette and chain for now. This will end up becoming the single speed gravel travel rig later in the year though. Once I get the pink MCD here and put together.

Then the gears and derailleurs will go away and I also will likely change out the handle bars to the good ol' Luxy Bar. Those are awesome for single speed use. It'll be fun to try this out as a single speed again after so many years of geared use.