How to make a quick release wheel lock
If you’re an urban dweller like myself, you’re probably familiar with the unfortunate need to keep your bike (and its parts) away from the grubby hands of crackhead thieves. Thieves love three things: transit stations, cable locks and quick releases. In other words, easy pickings. Cable locks are easily cut and quick releases live up to their name and release quickly often leaving a sad wheel-less, saddle-less bike. In my last post, I showed you how to lock a saddle and in this post, I’ll show you how to make a cheap (or free) lock for your quick release wheels.
You will need:
- A suitably sized hose clamp. Stainless would be best
- A piece of inner tube to protect your frame (if you care)
Unscrew the hose clamp all the way until it opens. Slide the clamp on to your fork leg or chainstay or seatstay and with the quick release lever position parallel to the frame, tighten the clamp around the quick release elver.
Voila, you’ve made it just difficult enough to remove your wheel that most thieves won’t even bother and will just move on to a vulnerable target. Remember though to carry with your patch kit something suitable to undo the clamp in case of a flat. A coin might work in a pinch
28.May.11 
How to build a bike repair stand for cheap
Want a heavy duty repair stand but just can’t spring for Park Tools $200 wall mount clamp? Ya, me either; so I made one. It’s a fairly easy straight forward construction that uses standard iron plumbing pipe and a woodworking clamp.
Mine is mounted to the ceiling but it could just as easily be mounted to the floor. The clamp shown is a Pony 3/4 inch pipe clamp from Home Depot for $13.36 but if you have a Harbor Freight nearby, you can get the same clamp for $7.99. Next step is to drill some holes through the clamp with a sharp metal bit (and cutting oil). To clamp the tubing of seatposts and bike frames, I made a “V” shaped cut in some scrap wood then stapled scrap innertube to it to provide slip resistance and to cushion the clamping force a bit. You can make this cut with a handsaw, a table saw or even a circular saw (just be careful of course). I originally used douglas fir but that cracked after a month of use so I made a new one out of oak (much harder of a wood).
The clamp simply slips on to plumbing pipe (in this case 3/4”). From there you thread on elbows and fittings to attach it to wherever you like. At the ceiling or floor, a flange is used.
My flange is attached via four through bolts with fender washers on the back; this is plenty of support. If you can find the pipe at a salvage yard or free on Craigslist that’d be ideal but otherwise you can get pre-cut pre-threaded sections at your local big box
A setup like this is by no means as versatile or fine tuned as a commercial offering like Parks bank breaking clamp. For instance, you can’t rotate and lock it in position and you can’t raise or lower the height but I’m more than happy with it even without those luxuries. Even with the daily use/abuse it takes in the shop it still holds up great.
Tutorial: twining
Sorry for the bombardment of videos, hope no one minds (I like videos :p)
Today we have a tutorial from Epicurean Cyclist that shows you how to wrap just about anything with twine. Very slick method. My only recommendation is to run your “loop” of twine underneath the bars so that when you finish and cut the ends, the little nubs of the cut twine are on the underside of the bar and don’t show. It should also be mentioned that twine, like cloth tape, takes well to shellac and provides weather resistance, makes the twine stay in place and adds some color to it.
Source: Epicurean Cyclist: How to twine stuff
