Tag Archives: old bikes

Change Your Life, Ride a Bike

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I just found the Change Your Life, Ride A Bike blog via The Old Bike Blog. The Change Your Life blog highlights how riding a bike has impacted folks’ lives. Thom, the creator of the Old Bike Blog, was feature in a recent post.   I thought what he said about learning to fix your own bike was pretty cool:

I started the Old Bike Blog to chronicle my progress on restoring the Columbia, and within about five months, I was done. I had absolutely zero previous experience, just a few tools, and a healthy dose of concern that I would never be able to get the thing put back together correctly. But in the end, I successfully dismantled, cleaned, sanded, painted, re-greased, and reassembled my bike. Today, it is my grocery bike, and has been joined by several other old bikes, all of which I’ve restored or refurbished. My learning curve has been (and still is) extraordinarily steep, and I discovered not only a passion for the work of restoration, but also the absolute importance of really *knowing* your bicycle, inside and out, front and back. It’s something everyone *can* do, and I believe very passionately in the democratizing potential of do-it-yourself bicycle mechanics.   That’s how riding (and working on) bicycles has changed my life, and will continue to do so for many years.

I’m still learing to work on my own bike.   One of the reasons I don’t work on my bike more often is I’m afraid of having it down for too long; that is, me taking too long to figure out what I’m doing and missing riding.   His comments there do give me some confidence and inspiration to attempt to learn and *know* mby bike more.

Ebay and bike prices

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I subscribe to an RSS feed for a search for “Schwinn World Voyageur” in ebay.   I don’t really need a new bike, but I’m simply curious as to what prices things fetch.     And, if I can ever get a really good deal on something, you never know.   Unfortunately, I have yet to define to myself what “really good deal” actually is.     Below is an example of a single frame that sold for almost as much as a complete bike.   The two are different sizes, with the frame being the 21″ version of the bike, and and the complete bike being the same 23 inch size that I own.

ebaybikes

The complete bike was in decent shape, with very little surface rust on the chrome, brakes, or other parts. The frame had a few dings where the chrome plating showed through the orange paint.   The frame-only was in much better shape.   Still, it’s hard to believe that the frame fetched almost as much as the bike.   I wonder what the other parts will fetch, assuming the owner parted the bike out and will auction the other parts as well. Regardless, it is amazing how auctions can cause prices to fluctuate so much.