Chewing through brake pads

Mike Rocket J. Squirrel Elliott wrote:

My son's favorite bike, a yard-sale 1973 step-through Raleigh Sport
3-speed, is chewing through brake pads at a rate I've never seen in my
nearly 40 years of cycling. The wheels are not the best I've ever seen,
being chrome jobbies that are not very true (spoke nipples are fairly
rounded -- ideas welcome here), with a few kinks and bumps in them. The
chrome plating is worn off here and there in a speckled fashion, but
it's not like they feel like sandpaper or anything. No visible rust. Yet
he is fairly grinding down the new salmon Kool Stops at an alarming
rate. He's not even a very aggressive rider. I'm scratching my head over
this one.

Yes, where the chrome is chipped, the rim is quite abrasive.
In the big picture, a more frequent pad change is still
not a lot of cash; new rims might be an excessive answer on
that bike. YMMV.

--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

In article
.com,
"Adam Rush" wrote:

Congradulations on being the only signal in the signal/noise ratio of
this thread.

What are you talking about?

--
Michael Press

get the kid's stomach pumped!
then give him one tablespoon of rubber conditioner every 3 hours
that's a nice bike-they don't make them....

On 2/20/2006 11:18 AM wrote:

get the kid's stomach pumped!
then give him one tablespoon of rubber conditioner every 3 hours
that's a nice bike-they don't make them....

He loves the bike. I know he'd love to resto it completely. He just
found a classic old chrome torpedo-shaped headlight that he's trying to
figure out how to put more modern lighting bits into. But, as is the
case with teenage kids, he has no money. So like many of us, he gets to
tinker a lot. I may pony up the cash to build him a couple of al wheels
for it with a more modern internally-geared hub for his birthday. He
would dearly like to have a coaster brake on it, so I might toss that
in. I sure wish I could find a nice vintage frame pump with mounting
hardware.

Me, adding more noise than signal to this thread . . .

--

Mike "Rocket J Squirrel" Elliott
71 Type 2: the Wonderbus
84 Westfalia: Mellow Yellow ("The Electrical Banana")
KG6RCR