Perusing the bike ads Craigslist this morning, I noticed a sweet Mongoose XR250 for sale. The owner claimed they paid "almost $300," which is fairly ambiguous, although it includes a bike lock at that price! Never mind that the XR250 retails at Wal-Mart for $189.00, after all, if you paid that and bought a lock, you'd probably be looking at well over $200. Like, $210. Not that buying a new XR250 is any safer than a used XR250. Staying far away from the Wal-Mart bike rack is by far the safest thing to do.
(whatever you do, don't sit down)
The point of this ramble though, is that when doing a search for "XR250", I stumbled on a site called socalmtb.com, which seems to be rife with bad advice from all sorts of inexperienced people. Basically like the rest of the internet, only in concentrated form. The post that led me there was this question:
"My husband bought a Mongoose XR250 bike at WalMart today, and it came without a manual. As of yet we can't figure out how to raise the handlebars. Would anyone here know? Any answer or opinion would be appreciated. Thanks! :)"
No manual? Although I've never actually read a bike manual, or any other kind of instruction manual, I find it odd that Mongoose, or its parent company Dorel (which also manufactures baby seats and home furnishing) would fail to include a manual with a bike that has (one) disc brake, front and rear suspension and a threadless headset, things that most Wal-Mart customers have presumably never seen before. Still, the worst thing about this question was the responses. To be fair, the first response was an accurate, articulate description of the threadless headset and stem and the process for "raising the handlebars." The rest were evidently written by Chucky, or the Seed of Chucky, or some other malicious hellspawn with the intent of injuring the aspiring mountain biker.
Response#2
u would prob get a wrench and there is a nut on the bottom of the handle bars and turn that and loosen that and raise them if that doesnt work i dunno.
The first rule I have of internet advice is automatically disregard anyone who substitutes the word "you" with any other combination of letters and/or numbers. I'm assuming this person meant the stem bolts. Loosening them and moving the handlebars will indeed raise them, if they were installed upside down originally, which is actually a better possibility than one would hope.
Respose#3
yes you just take awrench and loosen the bottom of the handlebars nut then shift it by moving it back and forth.thats how i did mine and it works just fine well it didnt brake yet and i race it hard all the time so i kind of know what im doing.
Obviously he knows what he is doing, because he races on a 45 pound bike with 1.5" of travel. Never mind that he also doesn't know the difference between a nut and a bolt, or the difference between "break" and "brake," his sweet rig hasn't "braken" yet, so you should trust him indefinitely.
Response #4
On the top of the handlebar stem(which the handlebar mounts on) you will need to use an allen wrench and loosen the screw on top of the stem up then pull up on the handle bars. Tighten the screw making sure the front tire is level with the handlebars. then it should work wonders. If your husband races, jumps, etc., you might tell him to get some razor scooter foam grips to put on it, they really helped me.
In fairness this reponse was written by a 13 year old and is much more articulate than the previous two, he also recognized that it is not actually a you are working with, although a "screw" isn't accurate either. Still, he offers the same advice, essentially pulling the handlebars up from whatever distorted position they were originally built into what I can only hope is the correct position. He also goes beyond the previous bad avice by suggesting "razor scooter foam grips," if the husband races or jumps. This is a bad idea on many levels, unless Razor Scooter makes lock-on grips, which I somehow doubt.
Response#5
Yes. If you look at the stem where the handlebars are attached to the bike, you will see a little rubber cap. If you remove this cap, you will find the nut that can be used to raise or lower the handlebars. Good luck!
Although it appears to clear and well-written, this response is actually more diabolical than the rest. This is actually the method used for raising and lowering a threaded stem. Unfortunately, there is still a hex bolt on the top of the stem, which can be loosened and tightened. And if the person realized that, they might also realize that the stem bolts could be loosened as well, and if they get that far, well, it's best not to think about.
Speaking of sweet rides, I found this the other day:
Seriously.
we all come to bicycles inexperienced and ready to embrace an experience cycling in each of our own ways. i honestly don't know much about the structure of a bicycle and am still learning. i have always known although that the place to purchase a bicycle isn't Wal-Mart, and that is sound advice to stay away from the Evil Empire.
ReplyDeleteExactly. Which is why it's great that there are so many places online you can get good advice, like Sheldon Brown's website. It's just that for every one peson who has good advice, there are four or five who have no idea what they are doing, but give their opinions anyway.
ReplyDelete