The most difficult bike repair?

[CC07 PEU]

Having just spent the last few hours trying (and then succeeding) to remove a worn out bottom bracket that was seized into a steel frame, it got me wondering if bike repairs come much tougher than this. It was proper man stuff: wheels and crank arms off, BB tool in the vice, flip frame onto the side and then use absolute brute force to try and get the damned thing to budge. It was an absolute nightmare and I can't think of anything worse than bottom bracket removal.

So, what in your opinion is the most difficult bike repair?

[Minnsy]

Bottom bracket!

Everything else (usually) pales into insignificance when the BB needs sorting...

[langy]

Cleaning all the crud out of a VPP

[deadtom]

bleeding formula the one disc brakes.

lovely when they work, but an absolute stty fking of an arse wky piece of st to bleed. fk.

[Captain Answer]

Bottom brackets, closely followed by headset strip and replacement

[zasker]

Getting a siezed seat post out of the seat tube takes some beating!

[P-Jay]

deadtom said:

bleeding formula the one disc brakes.

lovely when they work, but an absolute stty fking of an arse wky piece of st to bleed. fk.

Awesome

I was just about the write:

External BB's are easy, bit of stuff to take off to get to it, but no hassle really. I used to hate bleeding my old Avids, hoping my Formulas are easier...

[deadtom]

P-Jay said:

Awesome

oh, sorry that was a typo... I meant to say, they're fine and easy to work on

actually the bleeding process itself is no different to any other brakes system (syringe at each end, shunt oil back and forth, remove air bubbles etc etc) its just that most of the time, it seems to make no difference. Nor does it make any difference after bleeding the same brake for the 3rd time.

or maybe im just rubbish at it? :/

[essayer]

Must be bottom bracket, although balancing/truing a wheel is fiddlier

I did mine a few weekends ago.
First I tried with molegrips on the tool, no chance to get enough leverage
So I went to Halfords and bought a 32mm impact socket. Fitted great, but the assembly kept sliding off the BB!
I had to drill a hole in a pair of 2p coins (no washers around) and screwed the tool onto the BB using a bolt.
Then I could attach the impact socket and apply unnecessary amounts of leverage.

Oh, then I put it back together and didn't do it up tight enough. So it had to come off again ...

[Matt London]

zasker said:

Getting a siezed seat post out of the seat tube takes some beating!

+1
Had to take mine to the LBS as it needed a vice to shift it.

[PugwasHDJ80]

setting up V-brakes

everything else is just muscle- setting v-brakes properly takes genuine magic

[P-Jay]

deadtom said:

P-Jay said:

Awesome

oh, sorry that was a typo... I meant to say, they're fine and easy to work on

actually the bleeding process itself is no different to any other brakes system (syringe at each end, shunt oil back and forth, remove air bubbles etc etc) its just that most of the time, it seems to make no difference. Nor does it make any difference after bleeding the same brake for the 3rd time.

or maybe im just rubbish at it? :/

I doubt it's you, I was hoping, they'd be more like Hope Brakes which whilst still fiddly do bleed really nicely.

I guess Mountain Bike Brake bleeding is one of those very strange phenomenons where you can indeed get varying results from exactly the same actions.

[Mr E]

essayer said:

although balancing/truing a wheel is fiddlier

It's a black art. You can either do it, and they'll be perfect with minimal effort. Or it takes 3 hours and you make it worse.

I tend to be in the latter catagory.

[XitUp]

BB, especially as none of my tools seem to fit the one I want to remove.

[walm]

Getting the crown race off a second-hand set of forks.

Don't bother trying at home. Unless you have the special Park Tool 4-bladed crown race removal thing.
Wife was not pleased at the state of her Sabatiers after my lame effort. (Not a euphemism!)

[deadtom]

PugwasHDJ80 said:

setting v-brakes properly takes genuine magic

really?

I would have said V brakes are easy to work with

[ZAndy]

Another vote for stuck seatpost. Especially a steel post in an aluminium frame or vice versa, what with the galvanic corrosion etc.

[CC07 PEU]

ZAndy said:

Another vote for stuck seatpost. Especially a steel post in an aluminium frame or vice versa, what with the galvanic corrosion etc.

And this is another job I have on the list of things to do for my steel framed hybrid... It's not urgent thankfully.

[groomi]

Matt London said:

zasker said:

Getting a siezed seat post out of the seat tube takes some beating!

+1
Had to take mine to the LBS as it needed a vice to shift it.

I used to work at an LBS when I was a teen. I used to enjoy cannabilising a few knackered old heaps chucked out the back (in the rain/snow/sun) into a decent bike we could sell out front. Managed to sheer one or two frames with a stuck seat post though!

[Paul Drawmer]

In the old days...cranks were fixed with cotter pins. If they didn't work loose, then they were fixed, and I mean fixed. Hammer out job.