Hot Mountain Biking How-Tos — Page 2 of 4 « Mountain Biking

How To: Cut and install SRAM Avid Juicy brakes on your bike

Being able to stop a mountain bike abruptly is crucial to your continued survival if you ride. SRAM Avid Juicy's are a popular type of high-performance mountain bike brakes. This video will teach you how to install and cut said brakes on your bike, as long as you have the proper tools. It features many safety tips for keeping your corrosive brake fluid from damaging all sorts of other things, from your bike's paint to your eyes.

How To: Adjust the front derailleur on a mountain bike

Unlike rear derailleurs, which are very complicated and come in at least two very different styles, front derailleurs are pretty standard across manufacturers. That means you only have to watch this one video to learn how to adjust them! It features a professional mountain bike mechanic walking you through the adjustment process. This ensures proper shifting and chain flow, which will keep you on the bike and riding smoothly.

How To: Do an overhaul on a Shimano free hub

Bicycle equipment company Shimano is the father of the free hub. This video features a professional mountain bike mechanic walking you through the process for overhauling a Shimano free hub, ensuring that your wheels spin as freely as possible and that your rides will be as easy and fun as the terrain and your effort level will allow.

How To: Do an overhaul on a Mavic free wheel hub

Overhauling the wheel hubs on your bike is important to ensuring proper wheel spin. Proper wheel spin means you get more power out of your pedaling. This video features a professional bike mechanic explaining how to overhaul the free side of a Mavic wheel hub. Keeping the hub clean is vital to making your rides as fun and easy as possible, so don't skip it!

How To: Do an overhaul on a Mavic wheel hub

The wheel hub is the center of great wheel performance for your mountain bike. This video features a professional bicycle mechanic explaining the process for overhauling a Mavic wheel hub, installing a new bearing and cleaning all of the parts, ensuring clean spinning for your wheels and a smooth ride.

How To: Determine why your bike chain is skipping

If you bike chain is skipping, and you aren't sure why, you could have a worn-out cog issue. This is especially likely if you cogs are substantially older than your chains. This video will teach you how to assess your cogs for wear. which will help you determine whether you need new ones or need to take other steps to get your bike riding smoothly again.

How To: Install a P knuckle while overhauling a derailleur

The p knuckle of the rear derailleur is a small part that regulates the tension of the chain running over the derailleur. This video features a professional bike mechanic installing the p knuckle into a rear derailleur during an overhaul of the derailleur. This is an important piece of maintenance even for new equipment, so take note!

How To: Get your rear derailleur into a high normal standard

Most rear derailleurs (read: not Shimano) are high-normal, which means that they shift into the highest gear on the bike by default. This video features a professional bike mechanic walking you through the process of adjusting the rear derailleur and its cables into a high-normal setting, ensuring crisp shifting and a more successful ride.

How To: Put the replacement cable in a rear derailleur

The cable that connects your rear derailleur to the shifters on your bike may seem too long, delicate, and complex to fix yourself. You may be right, but if you have some bike maintenance experience and want to try then this video is for you. It walks you through the whole process of replacing the cable in your rear derailleur. It is a long process, and elaborate, but will dramatically improve your shifting performance if your cable is old and worn.

How To: Adjust the adjustment screws on low normal derailleur

Adjusting the rear derailleur on a bike is an important way to fine-tune your bike's shifting performance, but is complicated and can vary in method and effectiveness depending on the brand of derailleur. This video features instructions on how to adjust a low-normal rear derailleur using the adjustment screws.

How To: Adjust a rear low-normal derailleur

Most rear derailleurs are high-normal, which means that they default the chain to high gear. Shimano derailleurs, however, are low-normal, defaulting to the lowest gear on the bike. This video details how to adjust a low-normal derailleur into normal cable tension. This works very differently than on a normal bike, so make sure you pay attention!

How To: Install the Rear Derailleur on the derailleur hanger

The derailleur is an important, albeit French, part of most modern bikes. This video features a professional mountain bike mechanic demonstrating the installation of a rear derailleur on a mountain bike. It is a short video, but detailed enough that any DIY bike mechanic should be able to do it themselves.

How To: Use a Cyclone tool to clean your bike chain

Cleaning your bike chain is an arduous but necessary part of regular bike maintenance. The Cyclone chain cleaner, or any of its competitors, make the process a lot easier to do without taking the chain off the bike. This video features a professional bike mechanic demonstrating how to use one such product effectively, saving you time.

How To: Remove your bike chain using the master link

Taking the chain off of you bike for cleaning is an arduous task, especially since you usually don't explicitly have to do it. It just seems like a good idea. That's because it is. This video features a professional bike mechanic detailing the process of removing a bike chain using a master link in preparation for cleaning. Most modern chains have a master link, so you should be able to do this yourself.

How To: Illuminate a stiff link chain on the trail

Does the chain on your bike skip? One common reason for this to happen is stiff link chains. This video features a professional mountain bike mechanic demonstrating how to illuminate, or make loose, stiff link chains if you get caught with them out on the trail. If you don't do this, and your chain skips enough, it's going to come off and you are going to stack, so make sure your bike is maintained properly!

How To: Install the chainring on a mountain bike

The chainring is without a doubt the most intimidating part of a bicycle. It looks like a ninja star from hell, and working with it can be difficult. This video features a professional mountain bike mechanic demonstrating how to install a chainring on your bike yourself. If you ride a lot, this is something you are going to have to do eventually, so learn it now, and don't get you leg stuck between the chainring and the chain! Painful.

How To: Remove a non-self extracting crank from mountain bike

If you are unlucky enough to have a bike whose setup does not features a self-extracting crank, then this video is for you! It shoes you how to remove a non-self extracting crank properly as part of you normal bike maintenance. Never envy the self extracting crank kids again after you learn how to take off you non-self extracting crank yourself easily.

How To: Fix a loose bearing square taper

If you have a more old-fashioned mountain bike, you may be familiar with the loose bearing square taper system of bearings. This video features a professional mountain bike mechanic demonstrating the process of overhauling a loose bearing square taper, giving new life to that old bike that made you fall in love with mountain biking in the first place.

How To: Install or remove an Octalink-ISIS cartridge

This bike maintenance video features an experienced bicycle mechanic removing and installing an Octolink-ISIS cartridge from the bottom bracket of his mountain bike. You need some specialized tools if you're going to try this bit of mountain bike maintenance yourself, but doing so will save you time and money on going to the shop, so try it!

How To: Set up the rear suspension on a mountain bike

Rear suspension bikes are the bikes of choice for most hardcore mountain bikers. This video features a professional mountain bike rider offering a quick tip on how to set the rear suspension of your bike properly to give it the right amount of travel and maximize its effectiveness.

How To: Fix a loose bearing on Shimano Octolink bottom bracket

This video will help you perform a rather elaborate piece of bicycle maintenance, overhauling and fixing a loose bearing in a Shimano Octolink pipe spindle bottom bracket. It is a long, complicated process that requires some specialized bike maintenance tools, but if you have these and are ready to increase the amount of maintenance that you are performing on your bike yourself, this video will walk you through the process in great detail and at a manageable pace.

How To: Take self-extracting crank off square tapered bracket

In the old days, you needed a crank puller to get the crank off of your bike. This video demonstrates how to remove modern self-extracting cranks, that do not require a crank puller to remove, from a square tapered bracket. This is a fairly complicated piece of maintenance, so if you're new to biking you may want to leave this to the professionals.

How To: Install a Truvativ GXP external bearing crank

The external bearing crank is just one of the complicated, necessary parts of a modern mountain bike. This video demonstrates the overhauling and installation of a Truvativ GXP integrated spindle external bearing crank. Without this video or a mountain of bicycle maintenance experience, this would probably be way beyond the skills of most bikers, but now you can install this exciting part on your bike yourself and reap the benefits.

How To: Disassemble, overhaul, and clean a Crank Bros pedal

Cleaning and overhauling each bike company's pedals is different. This video focuses on how to overhaul, clean, and and replace the bearing on Crank Bros bicycle brakes. It features step-by-step instructions and a demonstration, allowing you to spend less money having your bike fixed at the shop!

How To: Clean and overhaul a Shimano bike pedal

Cleaning your pedals is an important part of regular bike maintenance, but annoyingly enough there is no one way to overhaul a pedal. Every bike maker builds their pedals differently. This video demonstrates how to disassemble, overhaul, and clean Shimano pedals so that they will be free-spinning and functional as the day that you got them.

How To: Install the rear brake hose on your mountain bike

While the front brakes get all the love and attention, the back brakes of your mountain bike are nearly just as important and more difficult to install. You have to run the hose all the way across the bike without it getting in the way of your feet or any other parts of the bike! This video shows you how to install the rear brake hose properly, whether the bike has brake hose guides on it or not.

How To: Install the front brake hose on your fork

The front brakes are the brakes that you will be using the most often on your bike, and making sure that you have installed them correctly is crucial. This video walks you through the process of installing the front brakes on you fork, with the handlebar part of the brakes already installed.

How To: Cut and fit a Shimano hose with an olive

The many hoses that connect your mountain bike's transmission and brakes are vital to having a good ride. This video demonstrates how to cut and fit Shimano hoses using an olive. It includes a handy diagram of where all of the relevant pieces go and instructions on how to cut the hose.

How To: Set up Hayes Mag calipers on post mounts

Hayes mag calipers on a chain-stay mount are not the most common sort of brakes anymore for mountain bikes since they can't be put on a full-suspension bike, but they are great for those without. This video shows you how to set one up yourself and maintain it.

How To: Set up post-mount brakes on an IS mount for your bike

Post-mount brakes are just one of many types of brakes that can be installed on a mountain bike. This video features detailed instructions on how to set up a post mount brake on an IS mount, making your mountain bike stop like Deepwater Horizon spill refuses to. It is a complicated process, but a rewarding one.

How To: Install V-Brakes on a mountain bike the complex way

V-brakes are just one of the may types of brakes that you can install on your mountain bike to keep yourself from flying off the side of the mountain. This video features a step-by-step demonstration of how to install v-brakes on your mountain bike. Bike maintenance is a chore, but get it done and get back out on the mountain safer than your were before!

How To: Replace the brake pads on your bicycle

Eventually when you get a couple of thousand miles on your bike, you'll find that you'll need to replace your brake pads. Take a look at this instructional video and learn how to replace your brake pads on your bicycle. Most brake pads have grooves cut into them, this allows you to see how far the pads have worn away. When the grooves are gone, it's time to replace them. When you're going through this process, pay particular attention to how the parts come off the bicycle.

How To: Bunny hop onto any obstacle on a Trails bike

Take a look at this instructional video and learn how to bunny hop with your bicycle onto any obstacle. To perform this trick, you'll want to crack to the gears one or two rotations to gain sufficient speed. Then, shift your weight backwards until your front wheel is in a high position but relatively short so you don't fall off. Then jump; keep in mind that the front of your bike won't be any higher than it has been just yet. Next, lift up your bike with your arms onto the obstacle and spread...

How To: Make a bicycle sound like a motorcycle

Check out this video and learn an easy way to make your bicycle sound like a motorcycle with just a plastic bottle.

How To: Measure out a good sized bicycle frame

Measuring out a bicycle frame is useful knowledge. This instructional video shows how to determine the best sizes and angles for weight distribution on the bike frame. Georgena Terry's drawings and geometry help explain which bicycle frame designs are best for riding.

How To: Make your bike "ghetto" tubeless

Convert your bike to tubeless using the "ghetto" method. You will need a sealant, a tire, a rim, a metal tire lever, a knife or scissors to cut the tube, a tube a size smaller than your rim, an air compressor, and soap and water. You will need a sweet, doggy mascot as well.