An Amusement & Diversion for The Genteel Cyclist. Daily.

Thursday, April 10, 2008

Even more demoralizing than Mavics + Connies

Dang, I just spent an hour trying to get some old Connies on a pair of vintage Campy rims. It ended in tears, with bloody knuckles, three bent spoons, and two flat tubes. The dog won't even look me in the eye, after the blue streak that came out of my mouth.

So that's when I remembered an important truth to help me keep things in perspective. Punk rock kills!



3 comments:

monogodo said...

I recently swapped out some old Continentals for some new Continentals on a pair of 1989-vintage Campy Ypsilon rims. I broke a tire lever doing it.

It always pisses me off when people say "a real mechanic doesn't need tools to change a flat." I bet those "real mechanics" have never tried to change a flat with a Conti tire on a Campy rim.

dr2chase said...

Could go the other way -- putting some Schwalbe Marathons on a pair of Velocity Synergy rims, for the first time in 40 years of changing tires, I had a tire unseat and blow out. Twice.

Boy, was I embarrassed. Boy, were my ears ringing.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, my mountain bike, you can just flex those tires off by hand, but I have some 700C Schwalbe Marathons that are a total bitch to put on. I used 3 of the Soma metal levers and barely made it, I was double-checking the print on the side of the tire to make sure it was the right size. Happily, I hadn't pinched the tube going on but that's not a foreign concept to me.