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In July 2027 I should, in theory, be able to build a bicycle wheel in about an hour, and this means building the basic wheel in about fifteen minutes to allow as much time as possible for the rather more complex task of straightening the wheel, and I’m some distance from that.

I’ve been too busy at work to get any practice, so a lot of my “free” time at the moment is spent sitting at the dining room table, listening to a variety of podcasts and lacing a wheel repeatedly. At the moment it is taking about 20-25 minutes to build the wheel on average, which is certainly an improvement.

Mind you, It seems to take almost as long to take the wheel apart again, and most of that is spent crawling about on the floor with a torch, searching for missing spoke nipples…

It’s that time of year again.

Riding into the sunrise. Slight levels of dampness notwithstanding, the commute can be very pleasant at this time of year.

This bike usually lives in the secure parking at work, but unfortunately the touring bike is becoming ever more unreliable. I’m working on a solution, but it will take a bit of time, so this will be my “go to” commuter for a while…

I thought I’d been really well-organised last week: there are about two trains a day that run from Stuttgart, all the way to my village, and I’d timed my journey home to catch one of them. This plan was scuppered by Deutsche Bahn cancelling said train, leaving me with the option of changing in Tübingen, or catching a train to Eutingen im Gäu, about ten km from home, and cycling the rest of the way.

Given DB’s track record so far for the day, I didn’t trust their ability to make that connection, so I took the train to Eutingen. Here the Brompton can be seen on the way from the station to my village.

The old city of Tübingen is built around the castle, on the castle hill, which divides the Ammer valley from the Neckar valley. This is great if you’re building for defence, but a bit of a pain when citizens just want to get from one side of the city to the other.

Fortunately in 1974 the city dug a tunnel under the hill for pedestrians and cyclists to avoid a long climb, and/or wriggling through the old city. Here the Xtracycle can be seen using this most helpful facility on my way to work.

I don’t normally take the Xtracycle all the way to Tübingen, but it is handy if I’m planning to carry something bulky or go shopping on the way home…

The commuter bike doesn’t appear here that often. It lives in the secure parking area in our city centre workshop in Tübingen, and had the rather unglamorous job of transporting me the few km from there to the main workshop and back.

Yesterday the gears were playing up, and refusing to change, or bouncing into a different gear at random intervals, which is not something you want when pulling away from a traffic light. When lunchtime came, I put the bike in the stand. Process of elimination led to measuring the chain, which it turns out was getting worn. With a new chain the gears are now behaving, and all is well once more.

Will try and find something a little more photogenic for next week.

I’ve had to cover some early shifts in a different workshop over the last month, which meant starting the commute in the dark…

It could be worse…

In less than a year I’m supposed to take my bike mechanics exam, so I’m taking every opportunity to practice for it. Currently, I have to cover for a colleague two days a week in another workshop. I can’t do much that is useful, so for the last few days I’ve been taking a wheel to bits and rebuilding it repeatedly.

My goal is to be able to build the wheel in about 15-20 minutes so that I have about an hour to straighten it out.

Not quite there yet, partly because I keep having to check the instructions (read: “Re-watch the YouTube video”). I’m in the other workshop again next week, so I’ll practice more then…

Taking a quick break in Burladingen, before heading back home. This is the source of the river Fehla; water from here will eventually flow into the Donau in Sigmaringen.

Decision time way up yonder in the Swabian Jura, the range of limestone hills which at this point form the European watershed. I’d cycled from Hechingen, and just reached the point where water stops running to the Rhine and starts flowing in the opposite direction to the Danube.

This was as far as I’d planned for the day, but according to the sign I was a mere 14km from Gammertingen, one of the towns I really want to visit, in fact I was closer to Gammertingen than Hechingen at this point. Unfortunately I know it would be downhill all the way. This is a problem because it would be uphill all the way back.

Part of me wanted to try anyway, but that part didn’t include my legs: I went home.