New bike assembly

Whether you are working in a shop unboxing and assembling bicycles all day, or assembling a bike you just bought from an online retailer, a lot goes unsaid about proper bicycle assembly. It is a bit more complex than most bicycle customers realize and most shops do not take the time to assemble a new bicycle in such a way as to ensure the machine will perform and last to its potential.

I recently watched a video made by an online bicycle retailer illustrating how to assemble one of their bikes into a rideable condition: remove parts from box, attach handlebar to stem, screw in pedals, attach front wheel, raise seatpost, and TA-DA, your bike is dialed in and ready to shred!

Not so fast! I do not know about this particular manufacturer’s factories, but, of the dozens of mass-produced bicycles that I have assembled and sold, none of them are even 50% ready to go after that hasty kind of job. If you are lucky, this will set a bike up for one or two rides before problems set it. This is why some bike shops sell bikes that come back to them all the time, and others don’t see a bike again until the customer has worn through a part in an expected way, such as a chain or brake pads.

Regarding bicycle assembly- there is a wide range of definitions of what a properly assembled bike is. It usually takes me the better part of an hour to assemble an adult bicycle with derailleurs, including a test ride. That's quite a bit longer than other bike shops where I have worked, but it pays off to be really, really thorough on the build so the bike does not come back with problems soon after. It takes me about half that to assemble a kid's bike, and most of that time is spent getting the loathsome one-piece cranks to spin smoothly.

Department stores seem to only care that the bike is all in one piece and rolls. We have all heard the horror stories. If that is your highest aspiration, don't knock yourself out trying to make the bikes actually work. Your employer doesn't care and customers with lowered expectations on a $150 bike won't care either. It just has to roll. If you want to “wow” someone with a smooth-running, reliable bike, especially those who are skeptical of a $600 bike when they think they can get the same thing for $200 at a department store, make it worth their while to pay more for a quality product and quality technical work.

I have found a pattern that works for me when assembling a new bike: unpack everything, wheels, bottom bracket, brakes, shifting, contact points. Your mileage may vary, so do these things in whatever order fits you.

Unpacking is simple. Take all the now-useless crap off the bike. Recycle as much of it as possible; there is a lot of plastic and cardboard in there that can go in the recycle bin rather than the trash. Remove all the silly inspection stickers. Remove the R and L stickers from the pedals, as “left” and “right” will need no explanation once your customer sits on the bike.

Wheels:  A wheel that is properly prepped for riding will stay true longer, ride better, and be more durable, which will make your customers happy so they will buy more stuff from you and you can continue to put food in your belly. My experience has been that machine-built wheels on new bikes are often noodle-ish right out of the box. This is where a tension meter such as the one made by Wheelsmith or the Park TM-1 are essential. Wheel building sage Jobst Brand asserts that “Failure to stress relieve is the most common cause of spoke failure in an apparently sound wheel.” If you ever hear a wheel pinging and popping during its first ride, that’s a sign that the spokes have not been relieved and this will spell bad news for your customer down the road (or singletrack, or cobbles, or muddy grass track, as the case may be.)

Hubs, especially those with cup-and-cone bearings, are almost often "adjusted" too tight on a new bike. For quick-release hubs, JA Stein makes a hub axle vice which makes this adjustment a breeze. If you don’t have one, study up on other ways to adjust these hubs and use them. Hubs, even “cheap” ones, will spin better and longer if adjusted properly in the first place.

Bottom brackets of the threaded variety are rarely installed with durability in mind before they arrive in a bike shop. Cups that seize into the frame, or back out of the frame on their own, are headaches you want to avoid at all costs! The cups on new bikes are often over-tightened into the frame and sometimes barely tight at all. I am not certain which has worse result, but the only way to be certain they are not going to be a future migraine is to check them before they get to that point. I pull all threaded bottom brackets from new bikes, wipe the pitiful amount of sticky grease from the threads, reinstall using a thread locker, grease, or anti-seize, depending on the application, and torque the cups to the manufacturer’s recommendations. Install crank arms correctly and torque those bolts.

I work on brakes next so that I can stop the wheel while adjusting shifting after that without mangling fingers. I find that many suspension fork and frame disc brake posts have excess paint on them, making caliper alignment impossible; so be ready to perform a tab facing if needed. Adjusting brakes and shifting needs no further explanation if you already know what you’re doing. Suffice it to say that I usually have to completely reset everything about brakes and shifting from the factory’s settings, so assume nothing about their work and get comfortable with that.

Contact points: this is the point at which I torque the pedals in to the cranks (a crow’s foot on a torque wrench will accomplish this), and take the bike out of the stand to make final adjustments. So far, the bike has been suspended in the stand this whole time, so now it’s time to adjust the headset and set the initial position of the saddle and hand controls. Consistency is more important than specific settings- make sure that every bike on the floor has roughly the same initial control set up so that customers who ride several bikes can compare apples to apples. My practice is to put a spirit level on the saddle so that it is dead-on level, raise the stem to the highest position, flat bar controls pointed down at 45 degrees, and a consistent space between grips and brake lever clamps on hydraulic systems so riders can maximize lever efficiency. Of course all of these these things can and will be adjusted for each individual customer, but it’s best to have everything set to a common base setting for all bikes to start with. It looks better to have a line of bikes with uniform settings to boot.

Finally, test ride every bike within reason (this will probably exclude small kid’s bikes) before putting it on the sales floor. Even better, have someone else test ride it for you so you can get an unbiased opinion of your work. If you assemble a lot of bikes in a short amount of time, you’re bound to forget something and have a maladjusted bike leave your stand. Better that you notice this rather than a customer find out about it the hard way! This test gives me an opportunity to burn/ bed/ break in new disc brakes so they are close to maximum stopping power right away, along with a chance to load the wheels, test the brakes and shifting, and generally feel for odd noises and mis-operating functions so the bike is perfect before anyone else touches it.

I have left out a few obvious things: checking all fasteners with a torque wrench, greasing the seatpost and quill stem, pumping up the tires, et cetera, but those should not need much extra instruction. What else do you routinely do on a new bike build?