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I hate the idea of buying something new when you can work it loose with a bit of elbow grease. I've renovated loads of front mecs, some that were totally immovable when I started and ended up moving sweetly. Once you've loosened it up a bit, the easiest way to give 100s of back/forward pulls is by tugging on the cable where it runs down the down tube (use gloves or a spanner shaft to avoid cable burn).

DoctorBike

Just to reiterate the key bit of Sheldon's instructions, the easiest way to set them up properly is to set the cones so that there's still a bit of lateral movement (ie a bit too loose) and then get the cones and locknuts reasonably tight together but not fully tightened. Then you turn the locknuts inward just a 10th of a turn (the cones will move inward as well) and check by a) checking whether the axle still has play in the hub and b) spinning the wheel very slowly. Another 10th and check. Keep doing it until it's spot on, then do a final tightening of the locknuts against the cones. Check again, just in case.

Hope that helps. DoctorBike

Have you checked that it's not the hub? To do that, just spin the cranks and pull on the little chain that activates the gears (where it comes out of the rear axle on the drive side). You should feel tension on the chain, but it should move in and out freely. If that's ok, then it was a cable/casing problem.

Often it's the cable that's the culprit, and a quick going over with some light sandpaper and then squirting oil into the casing sorts it out.

If the casing you have is gear casing and a) the cable moves smoothly in it, b) handles the routing around the frame and c) it fits into the casing stops on the frame, then I'd go ahead and use it. The Sturmey cable I've found to be very pliable, so I'd be very surprised if the modern stuff was problematic in terms of compression.

Cheers. DoctorBike.

Try here - your shifter is towards the bottom: www.parktool.com/blog/repair-help/shift-levers-shifters

You can repair the rim if it's not too badly bent. Get an adjustable spanner and put it over the bent part and bent it carefully back. You'll still feel a bit of a bump when you put the brakes on because the rim will always be a bit deformed. Good luck.

If you do get a rim, make sure the ERD is the same otherwise you'll need different spoke lengths. For ERD, go to www.sheldonbrown.com.

Cheers.

A little dab of superglue will keep them in place but not fix them permanently. The cable needs to be clean before doing this. Let us know how you get on. Alternatively, get 3,000 of them and there's no room for them to move around.

Bollox, realise you're doing pickup only. Please cancel my order. Double bollox. Ben.

Just what I'm looking for...

5) Saddle £5 and
6) pedals £5 please.

Have pm'ed you. Ta. Ben.

Spoke nipple sizes differ. Take the wheel to your LBS and get them to tell you which one you'll need.

For an old wheel, I recommend getting a spoke key that grips all four sides of the nipple to avoid rounding them off - see the discussion here: http://roadcyclinguk.com/tech/maintenance/winter-wheelbuild-part-one.html

You may find the nipples don't twist on the threads properly, and instead just twist the spokes instead - this can make them break quite easily, especially with older ones. It's a really good idea to lubricate that whole area.

Put some oil on the spoke just where it enters the nipple and also just where the nipple enters the rim, then spin the wheel fast for a minute or two. If the tyre's off, dab some oil onto each nipple from the inside of the rim too.

Good luck.
www.doctorbike.org

Watch out for these. (http://www.parkersofbolton.co.uk/p-2175-moon-gem-20-usb-recharge-rear-led-light-black.aspx)

The design is perfect for a front light, but in order to get a rear light they just switched the lens to something red, and that's a problem.

The reason it's not suited as a rear light is that the cutouts on the body that enable it to be seen from the side (when it's being used as a front light), can't be seen as a back light because of the vertical vs horizontal mounting. If it's mounted on something horizontal (eg handlebars), the cutouts are visible. If it's mounted on a vertical part of the frame, the cutouts only are visible from the top or bottom.

I wrote to the distributors and they said they'd take them back, redeem the postage and send me something else (they also amended the listing to remove "side visibility"). I wrote to the manufacturers (http://www.moon-sport.com/) and they wrote back with a hilarious thankyou in Chinglish.

Apart from that, with its USB chargeability, it's a bloody marvel.

I think I'll replace it with either the Gem USB 3.0 or this impressive beast.

Here's a great resource for the Raleigh 20/Stowaway - http://raleightwenty.webs.com/

I've done a similar job to the one you're thinking about on my own Raleigh 20 / Stowaway.

I ground down the drive side by about 4mm down to 73mm (which, along with 68mm is a standard size for BB width. It was much easier than I thought and I was able to get a very clean and square result using a grinder, then a coarse file, then a fine one, then a bit of sandpaper to finish it off. Probably took 15 minutes at the most (and I'm a real stickler for this kind of thing).

After that, the drive side cup took some effort to screw into the BB, having to go 4mm further into the BB - the threads were there, just a little stiff. The drive side cup stopped turning at exactly the right point.

FYI, the axle that I'm using is available from ebay - http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=380144695945

The non-drive side cup went in fine and there was enough room for the lock ring. I ended up with a perfect chain line (possible more by luck than judgement).

Good luck with yours.

@ sdw - you can hit your seatpost with a file edge to raise up little bumps. These will increase the friction between the seatpost and the frame and should stop it twisting. Had to do that in my Team Marin. Felt a bit brutal at first - MY BEAUTIFUL SHINY SEATPOST!!! - but I got over it. A shim was impossible, even coke can. I fucking hate coca cola anyway and didn't want it anywhere near the bike.

@axelk - gotta watch out for minimum insertion point. General rule is 2.5 times the diameter of the seatpost. I'd carefully file off the burr inside the frame. If it's sticking out it's not adding to the strength of the frame. You might wanna turn the bike upside down when you're filing - getting little bits of metal into the bottom bracket isn't recommended.

1. tighten up the cones so they won't move - in general they're not usually tight enough on the bikes I work on (apart from mine, natch)
   
2. when you're taking the wheel off, loosen each side gradually - 1/4 turn each side until they're loose. bit of a pain, but works fine.
   

I drilled a hole through the handle to the shaft and, covering all the bases, I squirted a combination of grease, oil and GT85 down it.

Topped it off with a perfect little screw. Then I spun it hi-speed for 5 minutes by holding it up against a rear tyre of my racer as I pushed a big gear by hand while it was on the workstand.

Very smooth action now.

I still reckon I can get a sweeter model somehow. Been scoping out the bottom of all my spares drawers and spotted an old Hope front hollow axle - a nice lightweight model perhaps...

It would be easier if the metal shaft had been a narrower gauge. I had to grind down the end section so that it would fit through the hole in the outer layer and reach down to engage with the nipple head on the inner part of the rim. I'm still keeping my eye out for a better version.

Can't explain why making my own tools feels so great - it's just real deep, man.

Been looking at a way to reproduce one of these (£20 is too much for the Sapim or the Bicycle Research ones) and felt that Musson's version was a bit too flakey with the shaft that drops out.

Finally saw what I wanted, paid £2 for it and took a hacksaw to it:

I bent the end over using a socket held tight in a vice - you gotta watch out not to bend the metal where the handle is because it restricts its rotation. Then I shaped the end using a grinding disk and file. Altogether most satisfying...

It works a treat and it's helped me speed up a lot - using it I managed to lace a wheel in just a shade over 10 minutes (32 spoke, rear, asymmetric).

Just found and bought a rim gauge on ebay, less than £6 inc. postage. Looks identical to the one referred to above.

8 more available...

What Dicki said :)

Of course you could tie up a spare tube under the brake bridge to the saddle ready to go, then roll the tyre off and switch them over with the wheel in situ.

But really HTFU :D

Fixedwheelnut almost had it. In fact, you'd need to have the spare inner tube looped inside the rear end of the bike. It would end up looping around the non-drive side chainstay and seatstay, effectively running parallel to the seat tube. You could zip tie half a dozen there if you're a really unlucky person. You'd need a sharp knife to a) cut out the old tube each time you punctured; b) cut the zip tie holding the new one. Then you'd just pull it around to the inside of the rear end and put into the wheel. This is such a shit hot idea, I may even write in to Viz!

There's already a fix-it-for-free guy working in the market in Lewes on Saturday. Try http://www.lewescycleaction.co.uk/. Not really creating a proper bike scene there though. Good mechanic, older fella.

Any pics for these?