I am more of a lurker to this forum mainly because I am new to triathlons and to cycling and don’t really have much to offer that someone more qualified can’t say and say it better. My question is: how do I gain bike repair and maintenance experience? I try working on my own bike but all I seem to do is make matters worse. Recently I had to do a rather hilly ride with two gears working, both of them kind of big so there was a lot of standing involved. Can I gain this experience through these bike repair classes I read about? What do you think a bike shop would say if I wanted to work for free on the weekends and an evening or two just to be in the shop and gain experience. I wouldn’t ask for anything in return except a little education on bike repair.
You can get a book or two: http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1884737706/104-8076661-6595135?v=glance to help familiarize yourself with basic and even advanced maintenance. I don’t know if a shop would want you working on customer’s bikes, but you can certainly ask if you can watch them work on your bike and explain what they are doing.
Your best bet is to join some type of cycling club. They’ll often have clinics and there are no shortage of people who would be willing to help you work on your bike.
Park Tools has a great web site with a repair section that walks you through almost every maintenance task I’ve done.
My LBS in Charlottesville, Va once held a bike class in the evenings for a number of weeks. The instructor was a former bike mechanic for the Brazilian National Team for RAAM. I learned a ton. Basically we took our bikes apart and rebuilt them, doing one area of the bike each week.
Look at local bike shops, they will occasionally have classes like this. They may not advertise unless they get a number of people interested.
I just finished a bike maintenance course that was offered by a community cycling center here in Portland. $75 for a 7 week course (met every Monday for 2.5 hrs). We basically took our bikes apart and rebuilt them. It was a great experience and I learned tons. Just look around online for something similar…it’s worth the $.
great suggestions. I guess I will get a book and look for a course. I would love to become perfectly adept at bike maintenance and repair so that when I finally afford a good bike, I can build it myself. For now I will just keep training on the POS bike and hopefully keep it running as smoothly as possible. No more climbs in big gears. Although, I did notice an improvement in leg strength after a couple of days of recovery.