Product Details
The Bicycling Guide to Complete Bicycle Maintenance and Repair: For Road and Mountain Bikes(Expanded and Revised 5th Edition)

The Bicycling Guide to Complete Bicycle Maintenance and Repair: For Road and Mountain Bikes(Expanded and Revised 5th Edition)
By Todd Downs

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Product Description

This revised, updated, expanded fifth edition is indispensable-with all the latest models, parts, and repair techniques, and terrific money-saving tips to keep any ride in tip-top shapeSince its first publication, Bicycling Magazine's Complete Guide to Bicycle Maintenance and Repair has sold over 400,000 copies. The fifth edition is guaranteed to remain the category killer. This long-overdue update is a must-have for weekend riders and serious cyclists alike. Whether they own the latest model or a classic with thousands of miles on it, beginners and experienced cyclists alike can depend on this book to get their bikes out of the shop faster and keep them on the road longer. They'll discover information on:o Building a dream bike workshopo Disc brakes, both cable-actuated and hydraulico Dialing in front and rear suspension shocks for comfortable rideso The latest crankset and bottom bracket designso Overhauling freewheels and cassettes for peak performanceo Specs on all the latest handlebar and headset sizeso Servicing clipless pedals for maximum safetyWith troubleshooting sections to quickly identify and correct common problems, 450 photographs and 40 drawings to clarify all the step-by-step directions so even the complete neophyte can get repairs right the first time, and Web sites and phone numbers of bicycle and parts manufacturers, this is truly the ultimate bicycle repair and maintenance manual-now better than ever in its fifth edition!

Product Details

  • Amazon Sales Rank: #589 in Books
  • Published on: 2005-03-16
  • Released on: 2005-02-24
  • Number of items: 1
  • Binding: Paperback
  • 384 pages

Editorial Reviews

About the Author
TODD DOWNS is a self-taught, full-time wrench since 1989. He's built wheels that were raced in the 2003 UCI Cyclocross World Championships and prepared a bike for an Olympic hopeful's trip to the 2004 Summer Olympic Trials. Downs has been published in DirtRag magazine and serves as an editor of MTBJournal.com. He currently resides in the Boston area.

Customer Reviews

Great bicycle repair manual5
This is a great book for anyone wanting to save money and do their own bike maintenance and repairs. It's straightforward, easy to understand, and has lots of pictures to guide you through the process. I highly recommend it.

Decent, but best for rank novices4
I bought this book and the Zinn book at the same time. Both books have good illustrations, but this book is much less detailed and helpful. It is VERY basic and leaves out detail needed to really tune anything to any extent.

Having said that, this book does a fair job of showing how to do routine maintanence/repairs. It spends time describing things that should be obvious at a gance, while leaving out detail you need to fix something, however. So, it would seem to be aimed at the rank novice, with 2 left thumbs--above a "Dummies" book, but not by a whole lot, IMHO.

Zinn's book is more detailed, and offers a more comprehensive tour of subjects than this book. It can be used by the novice, but aims at those who have some basic understanding of what is right before their eyes--bike or tool.

However, if you are a gear-head, you probably won't be happy with less than Barnett's painfully exhaustive 4 volume set--which is likely overly detailed for anyone short of a professional shop-set.

Anyway, if I had to do again I would have bought the Zinn book and skipped this one.

Easy to understand & well written.4
This is a good book for the beginner; it has a lot of drawings, pictures to help you understand different styles of bikes and the parts that make them a bike.

I found that it had a little too much on the older bikes but perhaps this is good as I have taken a real liking to bicycles and hope to build my own this winter; Todd does not waste words, the book is well written and precise; it is nice to have when learning as it does provide a good understanding of how bikes parts work together to make a bicycle.

It does have all but the latest shifters and such; in reality bikes are made of many brands and models of parts making it impossible for any single book to have all you need to know about all bikes; for the latest specifications most bike component manufactures have web sites where you can download your model of derailleur, fork for the manufactures specifications.

I gave this 4 stars because of the dated information the negative and 4 for the positive comprehensive coverage of so many possible items he coverers so well.

This is a good book for the beginner, gives a comprehensive illustrated example of how bikes work.

Hooty