10 Mildly Useful Hacks for Mountain Bikers

so most bikes have a bunch of black parts  on them and here these cranks you can see   are a little worn away there now if  you want to get your bike in super   showroom condition you can take a  black sharpie and just touch it up   welcome back to Berm Peak I'm Seth and today we're  going to be doing something a little bit different   but kind of the same I'm sure many of you  know about the sharpie hack and I'm sure you   also know that you could use actual touch-up  paint if you want to do it right but that's   what makes this a hack you're using something  that's not necessarily designed for the job   but it also works and that's what hacks are about  we're going to be going over 10 of them today   related to mountain biking let's get on to the  second one so this right here is a Fox 36 a really   legit mountain bike fork and it looks it there's  just something about it that looks serious   well maybe you have a cheap fork like this  this Suntour fork that comes on a lot of   entry-level bikes I'm going to show you how  to make it look more legit so first things   first you want to take all the stickers off of  it that part might take a little bit of time so you're going to need this tool I left a link  to it in the description just a few bucks so you   can remove the caps on the top of your fork then  flip it upside down and the springs are going to   come out they're going to be real dirty if  you clean these up and re-grease them it'll   actually make the fork run a little bit better  yeah this this fork seemed hell you're going to   then loosen these two bolts on the bottom of the  fork and then at a certain point you're gonna need   a 300 foot socket extension with  a five millimeter hex on the end   so we're just gonna pull the lowers right off and  now we can take our little red o-ring and put it   up on there just like a high-end fork so while  we have this apart I'm gonna clean it all up   I'm gonna put new grease in the fork and put  it back together so that it runs like new now it looks legit exactly like a Rockshox fork or  a Fox fork maybe not exactly but pretty damn close   and this is functional you can push  it down at the beginning of your   ride and see where it is afterwards see  whether you need to increase your preload   or reduce it pretty fun little hack  doesn't require a few tools but   you'll be the only one on the trail  with an o-ring on your sun tor fork so you got a vinyl bicycle seat with all sorts of  crazy colors or maybe it's old and tired and you   want to freshen it up you can actually paint  it what if I were to tell you that this seat   wasn't always black they actually sell vinyl  paint you can get it at any hardware store   probably use normal spray paint basically  all you have to do is sand the seat down   very very lightly all over make sure it's really  really clean there's no oils or anything on it   and then put very very light coats of paint on  it until it's whatever color you want it to be and the best part is it comes out so good it looks  like it was born that way damn that looks good   and yeah you can sit on it the seat can flex  you can abuse it and it will stay painted you   can inspect this really really close there's not  a flaw in it we were really surprised to find that   out when we researched it that painting a vinyl  bike seat actually no big deal so on most mountain   bikes or gravel bikes you're going to find a whole  bunch of little bolts like the ones that hold on   your bottle cages the ones that are made to  hold luggage racks and then also bolts like   the ones that hold on your disc rotors well it  turns out that all these bolts are the same size   and thread and the reason this is important is  that disc rotor bolts are available in all sorts   of different anodized colors they're lower profile  they look way better than water bottle cage bolts   and if you like customizing your bike this is a  really cheap and easy way to do it because there's   lots of blank areas like those luggage rack bolts  you can change to whatever color you want and give   the bike a little pop another appearance  mod but hey you might not have known that   disc rotor bolts are the same thread as  water bottle cages and luggage rack bolts so if you've seen our Flip Bike series we  fix up a lot of bikes and we also restore   individual bike parts sometimes it involves  cleaning them so we can paint them or just   make them look better and so I want to show  you a hack today how to make a sandblaster   out of an air compressor and one of these little  compressed air attachments so to do this you   need your air sprayer you need a water bottle  and of course you're going to need some sand   you're also going to need some tools to modify  your air sprayer first thing we're going to do   is drill a hole in the base of the bottle so  that this makes an airtight seal through it cool that's what we were going for next we have  to modify the tip of this and we want to open a   little channel right in this part of the sprayer  and I'm gonna just do with an angle grinder i think I'm gonna turn this into like a hopper so  we've got our water bottle we've got our sprayer   now we're gonna test it okay so now you can see  that the sprayer is in here and the little opening   that we made is right at the bottom so that the  sand is going to fall into it get a healthy amount   of sand in there probably dry off the inside  of your bottle better than I did let's see   how it works oh yeah yeah that sprays some stuff  going everywhere yeah maybe i'll just go out here okay so here's the dirty part I'm gonna spray  right here and see if we can clean it up are   you as amazed as I am dude I mean that is insane  I wonder if it can take the paint off of something dude immediately so yeah the the problem is a I  think I made the hole too big and b   that that you can't take the top off of this  you have to leave the top on and then see um   you want better sand that's not gonna jam the  thing up okay I'm gonna do a couple little   adjustments here to our design just to make the  prototype work better and we'll try her again   I would say the design doesn't call for hot  glue but you got to do what you got to do   you know got to get your do sometimes it  takes hot glue this is going to work amazing all right so that's the current state  of our derailleur we're going to try   and blow the rest of the paint off  of this with our revised sandblaster it freaking worked look at this  proof of concept works it's a hack   so we're all mountain bikers right and mountain  bikers wear clothes when they're riding mountain   bikes and those clothes get stains depending on  the trail the stains might be in your underwear   but other times there are actually blood stains  on your clothes now I have a real blood stain here   I harvested it from a bug bite and I'm going to  show you how to get it out usually a blood stain   is considered a death sentence for a garment but  hydrogen peroxide works as well on clothes as it   does in one of your wounds so we're going to  pour a little bit on here and you can see that   foaming action on the blood just like when you're  cleaning out a cut or scrape and the sooner you   can get to it the better the chance you're gonna  be able to get the blood stain out completely   I think we're gonna get this 100 out yeah this is  one of those hacks that 100 of the time a mountain   biker is going to run into needing to do it and  as you can see we've got pretty much the whole   blood stain now yeah it's like it just eats blood  and that's it so this is not dry we've got almost   the entire stain out had we caught it a little bit  earlier I think it would have come out completely   but yeah you be the judge is there a better way  to get blood out I think this is pretty much   it and as a mountain biker at some point you're  going to stain up some of your clothes with blood so eye protection is really important  when you're riding downhill because a bug   or a branch or anything could go into your  eye but when you're climbing a lot more   comfortable to ride without eye protection  and one of my subscribers sent in a hack   for a glasses holder right on your handlebar  I'm gonna show you how to do it so you're   just gonna need two zip ties I'm using two  different colors make a little loop like that   then attach that to your handlebars then go ahead  cut off the excess and now when you're climbing   or you just don't need your glasses you can  stick them in here and they're not gonna go   anywhere I mean that doesn't look like it's  going to come loose so thanks Marcel from   Switzerland for sending that one in I think it's  a pretty good hack and I might actually use it so part of having a good ride is staying hydrated  but not only do you have to stay hydrated but also   your trail pup Oscar come here you want to  drink a water buddy now when your dog needs   a drink of water you either try and pour it  into their mouth some people try and like   pour it into the cap and have their dog drink  out of it which is kind of nasty to be honest   but one of our subscribers on instagram actually  filmed this hack you pull a rock out of the   ground and then where the rock was there's a  little indentation you fill it up with water   and then your pumpkin drink out of it way better  if you can find like a round rock that leaves a   nice bowl in the ground but here on Berm Peak we  oh we got a shale but Oscar you're hydrated right so part of setting up your mountain bike properly  is setting the air pressure in your suspension   and to do that you need to determine your sag you  push this little ring down you put all your weight   down on the bike and you very carefully climb  off and then you check where the ring is so you   know where the suspension is sitting when you're  just riding in a straight line now the problem is   when you're getting off the bike you tend to  move the suspension around and you don't get   as accurate of a reading especially if you're  at a trail head or something it's a difficult   process you usually need help from a friend to  hold up the bike there's a little hack I learned   from my friend Clint go up on the bike cycle the  suspension a few times put your ring down and then   before you get off the bike turn your compression  all the way up this way the suspension moves less   as you're climbing off and now you can get a  much more accurate sag reading anyway really   simple trick I always use it learned it  from Clint Gibbs and uh thanks for that one we build a lot of outdoor mountain bike features  out of wood like this one and depending on what   type of wood you build it out of it's eventually  going to get moist grow algae moss those types of   things and not only can that make the wood rot  away but it can also make the feature slippery   and so thanks to a tip from one of our subscribers  we can now treat it and delay that process just   a little bit more so we have here is a garden  sprayer filled with water and then some outdoor   bleach so what you're going to want to do is mix  it up in the garden sprayer hit the feature once   or twice a year and it's going to kill all that  moss and allergy and all the stuff that's making   it slippery and making your feature not last as  long but since we've done this we noticed a big   difference in just how the planks look and we're  excited to get a little bit more life out of our   features and for them to be a little bit grippier  because there's less organic matter on them now   should you have any environmental concerns about  spraying a little bit of bleach on your feature   well you could just let it rot away and then  go out and chop down a tree build a new one   so that's it 10 bike hacks I know that it's been  a long time since we've done one of these videos   and that's because I want to try and come up with  a list of 10 original ones before we move on and   we've done a lot of them already so if you  know of any hacks that I haven't done in   any of my other hack videos put them down  in the description i'll take a look at it   and maybe it'll find its way into a future video  until then I hope you found some of these useful   thanks for riding with me today  and i'll see you next time

Channel: Berm Peak Express

Views: 993,358

Keywords: do it yourself, diy, tools, home, backyard, mountain biking, cycling, outdoors

Id: LCFPni6Y0yE

Length: 12min 41sec (761 seconds)

Published: Sun Nov 14 2021