- Even if you always take a spare inner tube,
a pump, and a multi-tool with you on your ride,
there may still be occasions where you come unstuck,
and you're left either facing a long walk home
or an embarrassing phone call to get someone
to come and pick you up.
However, all may not be lost because
coming up are some of our favourite get-yourself-home
roadside maintenance hacks.
You've got a flat tyre.
You've run out of inner tubes,
and you've got no puncture repair kit.
What do you do?
Well, before you resort to stuffing your tyre with grass
which, as we've shown, it can work
as long as you've got a spare hour or so
and a good supply.
And there is a much better and much easier hack.
Firstly, you need to remove your punctured inner tube
and then find the hole in it.
Then, tie a knot in the inner tube, over that hole
and pull it really tight.
Then inflate your inner tube a little bit
to make sure it is now airtight.
And if it is, you're good to go.
Pop it in back in the tyre, inflate it,
and then be amazed at how you can't even feel the flat spot
as you're riding along.
Magic!
What happens if you tear a hole in your tyre
that's so big that when you come to put a new inner tube in,
it will simply poke through and then explode
as you inflate it?
Well, all you gotta do
is to line the inside of the tyre with something.
And you'd be surprised at just what can do the job.
So, for example, if you were to have
a gel wrapper in your pocket,
simply neck it and then you can line the inside of the tyre
with that or a dollar bill does the job, I'm told.
And I suspect most currency will if it's made out of paper.
Well, I'd probably more likely,
if I'm honest, to have a gel wrapper
than actual money with me.
And if you don't have either of those,
then you probably actually would be as well
to have a rummage in the hedge next to the roadside
and see what you can find.
That'd be true recycling at its best.
Breaking a rear derailleur is a truly heart-sinking moment.
Not only is it a very expensive problem to have,
it also looks traumatic
with bits of mangled metal everywhere.
And it can also seem like your ride is over in an instant.
And yes, it pretty much is.
But you do not have to walk home.
There is a hack.
Firstly, we want to split our chain using our chain tool
we will, no doubt, have with us.
Then, when the chain is apart,
we can actually remove the tangled mess that is,
or was, our rear derailleur.
And then, essentially what we're doing is
turning our beautiful 22-gear bike
into a rudimentary single speed.
So we need to make sure the chain
is on the smallest chain ring.
And then, we need to wrap it around the cassette
about mid-way down the block.
So that should give you a gear
that can pretty much get yourself home.
Now, before you throw your rear derailleur into a bush
out of a fit of rage,
I would say stick it in your back pocket and take it home.
First, you see, you're not littering obviously.
But also, because it's actually loads of really useful bits
that you can salvage in even the most mangled
rear derailleurs.
Now, putting the chain as tight as you can,
you'll be able to see where you need
to then split the chain again
before rejoining in its shortest configuration,
giving you, hopefully, the right amount of chain tension
in your preferred gear
so that your chain doesn't keep coming off.
Or, indeed, make sure that the chainline is correct
so that the chain doesn't keep trying to shift
into a larger cog and then, potentially,
breaking the chain again.
A truly horrifying roadside bodge then
but an important bit of knowledge that could well help
get you out of a very sticky situation
at some point in the future.
And also, if you needed another reminder,
a very good reason why you need to keep your bike clean
because, really, that kind of mechanical
can always be avoided.
Oh, and just so you know,
no rear derailleurs were actually harmed
in the making of this video.
I like this one.
If you break your gear cable,
which can happen out on a ride,
then rather than getting stuck in your smallest cog
at the back, which is a pretty tough old gear, really,
then you can do this rather cool little hack.
First, you unscrew the cable from your rear derailleur.
And then, take the other end of the cable
out of your shifter.
Now for the cool bit.
You need to re-thread the cable
directly into your rear derailleur.
And what you'll find is that the little barrel
that normally lives in your shifter,
will then get wedged in your rear derailleur.
And then you can actually move the mech by hand,
then tighten the clamp bolt onto your now
tiny section of cable, and it holds it in place.
And then you could even use the barrel adjuster
to fine tune the position to get your gear spot on.
Told you that is cool, isn't it?
There you go, job done.
Now, if your cable actually breaks in the shifter,
then all you gotta do is tie a knot in the cable
and then have that wedged down the barrel adjuster
to hold the cable in place.
It will do the job just as well.
It looks quite clean really, doesn't it?
Finally then, what do you do if you snap your chain
and you don't have a chain tool,
or your pedal falls off, or your crank snaps,
or indeed your freewheel breaks?
How do you get yourself home?
Well, you could do what one enterprising GCN viewer did
which was to use your spare inner tube as a tow rope
and then harness the power of one of your riding buddies
to pull you all the way home.
Genius!
All I've got to do now is hope
that someone actually rides past
on this slightly out-of-the-way gravel track.
But I hope they do come and take me away from this corner,
because I've never had quite so much bad luck
in just one place ever before.
While we wait, do make sure that you suscribe to GCN.
To do it, just click on the globe.
And then, if you're after more content,
if you click just down there, then you can watch that video
about stuffing your tyre with grass.
Can it be done?
And then just down there,
the five legitimate roadside maintenance fixes
that you probably need to know.