My birthday happened almost a month ago, but today I was to cash in on a somewhat belated, but much appreciated gift: a new chainring for my bike. Unfortunately apart from receiving a chainring, very little went right.
When I initially went in to order the new chainring I brought my current ring in to make sure the BCD was correct. But when I went back to pick up the new 48 tooth, gold Sugino chainring I discovered it was shy a few teeth. While the receipt was properly written (by my friend, Dana), the order was poorly called and I ended up with a 44 tooth ring instead. I was disappointed to find that out—it would take a few more days to reorder a new ring—until I remembered I had a 16 tooth cog laying around at home which I wasn’t using.
We quickly calculated the gear inches. My current 52/18 setup (that is, 52 teeth on the front ring, 18 teeth on the back cog) held at 188.9%. My desired set up (48/18) was 166.7%. The new setup (44/16) was 175%. This sounded okay to me. It would be a little easier to pedal, but still provide a challenge. But this also meant I was going to need to remove the lock ring and cog from my rear wheel, something I couldn’t do in the store because my bike was my ride home.
When I got home I decided to walk to Truly Spoken Cycles, a shop located only a few blocks from my house, to get the lockring removed. I’m glad I didn’t attempt to remove it myself without the proper tools because it took three people, a pair of spanners, a large metal pipe, some zip ties, some penetrating oil, and some duct tape (I kid you not) just to get the thing to budge. But we got it off and back home I went, where I removed my chain to clean it (and boy did it need it) and set about removing my chainring.
When I went to put the new Sugino chainring on, to my surprise, it was the wrong BCD. The flanges that held the chainring to the crank flanges were not properly spaced. My crank has a 144 BCD while the new chainring had a 130. A second, critical mistake.
So now I’m not entirely sure WHAT I should do. Do I put the bike BACK together again and wait another week for them to get my order right? This’ll be the third time I’ve removed and replaced the same chainring, but this time I would be riding on a 52/16 setup—a knee–killing gear inch of$225%—on the new rear cog. Or should I borrow a bike from the Bike Collective in the meantime? Do I suck it up and ride my Frankenstein winter bike (shudder)? None of these options appeal to me. I want to be on the frame that feels the best. The frame with which I have a bond.
All I can say is, once this gets all sorted out, come talk to me, because I’ll be in a fantastic mood.
