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@6pt
The following year we set our sights further, on a 1,500 mile return trip to (almost) Munich. As part of the pre-trip check-up I had the wheels looked over (by Jim, again, who's helped me far too much with this time/money sink) who spotted the rims cracking around the nipples. As they were less than a year old (and had less than 3 weeks of use on them), he kindly swapped them for a new pair under the guise of honouring the warranty. Truth be told, I think we were too heavy/overloaded for the 36h rear wheel, but they'd lasted two weeks before, so they'd last two weeks again. I took the shiny new pair and went on my way.
At the end of the last tour we'd stretched the timing chain to such a point that the eccentric bottom bracket could no longer take up the slack, and in putting a new chain on realised that we'd also worn the timing chainrings down to such a degree that they needed replacing (this was discovered on Friday afternoon, with a ferry booked for Saturday afternoon). I thought it would be a simple fix but it turns out that old specific-bcd 34t chainrings are hard to find (who knew!). After frantic phoning around, Edwardes of Camberwell found me a pair being held by JD Whisker up in Welwyn Garden City – with the tandem in pieces and no time to get it back together and hop on a train, I despatched my long-suffering father who grudgingly went to collect them for me (for which I'm eternally grateful). The tandem wasn't roadworthy until gone midnight, but apart from poorly indexed gears it rolled us quite happily all the way to Dover for our ferry out. The bike, however, was set up much the same
(us waiting at a crossing in Belgium)
The poorly indexed gears were our downfall, however, as after two days of fettling and making-do, I overshifted the chain into the spokes. We got away with it on that day, but every other day that followed a spoke went ping. And we sheared the front rack at the end of the first week. And we cracked the rear rim (even worse than last time). Our knowledge of French/German technical bike terms increased, and the people we met were pleased to help us, but it was a stressful trip.
(one of the many guys who rescued us along the way)