Sunday, February 7, 2010

"Meh" and "Cool"

Hmmmm, it's been a week since my last post, mainly because there hasn't been much bike-worthy stuff to talk about here in my neck of the woods.
I could talk about my trainer workouts doing x number of intervals for y number of minutes with z minutes of rest, but who wants to read about that.
I could talk about how I replaced the chain and chainring on my fixie, and include step by step pictures, but again, who wants to read about that.
I could talk about the run I went for today, and, well, you get the picture.
So instead, I'm gonna talk about a neat little doo-hickey I picked up last year.

Ritchey Torque Key

Enter the Ritchey Torque Key. A very simple tool, but extremely handy, and worth every little penny. It's a 4mm allen key/torque wrench, preset to 5 N/m. It saves you the trouble of guessing how tight a bolt needs to be, long before you hear the "crunch" of carbon fibre parts failing. The 4 mm wrench is pretty standard for most seatpost clamps, brake levers, shifters, stem face plates, stem top caps and all the other stem bolts (well, that actually just leaves the steere tube clamp bolts). Most bolts in in the stem/handlebar area have a manufacture's spec of 5 N/m, so this dandy little tool is right on the money. When tightening a bolt, the handle "clicks" and gives way once you hit 5 N/m,  and therefore doesn't let you tighten any more. Combined with a little carbon paste, there's no worry of slippage.
Not sure if any other companies make a similar tool, but it's one of those things that make you think "what a damn good idea!"

2 comments:

  1. I ordered mine through Bushtukah. Msrp is $25, but even if you special ordered it, I don't think it would cost that much. They can order it through Norco distribution.

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