I live near Atlanta and ride my 2014 Sam year round on city streets and rails-to-trails. I'm not a "power rider", just a continuous one. I'm 74 and bang along at about 12 mph, doing about 1500 miles a year. I was shocked when I actually wore out a chain.
It’s garaged, so I wash it with Zaino’s a couple of times a year or when it gets filthy from riding after a storm. But I tinker constantly because, hey, it’s a hobby. RocRide Epix, Phil Tenacious Oil, and Parks grease are my friends - if it looks like it needs lube, it gets lubed. If I want to try a different cassette, set of bars, rack, bag, or rearview mirror, I just do it. In the winter I do a yearly "annual", tightening check on bolts, etc. in case my pre-ride checks missed something. I rotate the tires - the rear really does wear out faster than the front - and check for tire problems. At that time I also give it a thorough wash and a quick polish with show car polish, and Proofide the old Brooks. I have all the Zaino polish/wash stuff because I used to own a Lotus 7. I tear it down completely to a bare frame, fork and headset when it gets close to 5000 miles since the last teardown. Grease every bolt, take apart and lube everything else. So far, the Sam has had three teardowns and I have seen zero issues. Having worked all my life with airplanes, I know that if you do a scheduled maintenance, like annually, and a major maintenance based on use, like miles or hours, mechanical things tend to last forever. I only let a shop work on it if there is a tool I lack and it is cheaper than buying the tool. If it ever needs anti-rust, they can do that, too. But like a lot of folks I have more than one bike. So there is always something that may need doing. I also bought a bunch of Sigma bike computers when I started this hobby to keep track of mileage, etc. Sigma has a pretty good computer app, and I download the data after every ride, so tracking is easy. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/rbw-owners-bunch/ad08ce26-bf10-4c02-9f92-e3073d8c7520n%40googlegroups.com.
