So here I am with my beloved Flyzipper, a Dahon Impulse P21, at the
doctor's because I didn't know how to change an inner tube (put the
wheel on backwards). I resumed my commute to work with Behemoth, a
monstrous Dutch bike.
As some may recall, the last we heard from Behemoth was when I had some
strapless mini clips fitted to the pedals to help me get her lumbersome
weight up the many hills surrounding Paris (which is why, incidentally,
so few people have Dutch bikes here, as I now know from hindsight).
Although everyone encouraged me to persist with the mini-clips, I found
that they made a difficult bike even more unrideable. Behemoth has
always been very hard to start. The added conundrum of having to thread
my feet into clips caused a few near-accidents at intersections.
So I gave up on the clips. Since I no longer have an LBS worthy of the
name, I simply bought a new pair of pedals and attempted to screw them
on myself. They are mountain bike pedals and much easier to use, with
their toothed metal structure, than the awful, eel-slippery sugarloaf
rubber pedals Behemoth was born with.
Today is the second time I ride out with Beth since I changed the
pedals. Puffing up a hill in first gear, I find the going harder and
harder, and the right pedal showing a sort of assymetric grind, twisting
my foot a few degrees at every revolution. I carry on, past the top of
the hill and coast down into a village. Right there in the center of
town, with a considerate motorist behind me, I abruptly lose the pedal,
which clatters off onto the pavement. Motorist stops in time not to
back-end me or crush the pedal, and waits patiently while I gather up
pedal and Behemoth splattered clear across the road with all the
contents of her basket.
Stopped nearby is a builder with a pickup truck and some wrenches of
appropriate size, who helps me screw the pedal on again. He tightens it
as much as he can.
I resume my route but after only a few hundred yards, I can feel the
pedal going wobbly again. Not wanting to trust indefinitely to the
kindness of motorists, I decide to walk the remaining 7 km to work.
Now what? I realize I cannot trust that pedal. By and by, I see no
reason to trust the other pedal either. Is it that the thread where it
screws in is shot, due to my inability to screw it on straight in the
first place? (For I am constitutionally incapable of screwing straight.
Read into that whatever you please.) Does this mean replacement of not
just pedals but also pedal cranks? Or is there any endemic reason why
one cannot have steel MTB pedals on a aluminum cranks?
Evidently not my week for cycling.
Elisa Francesca Roselli
Ile de France