Skewered

As I have mentioned before, I am being driven to the very edge of madness by a semi-horizontal dropout and the associated quick release mechanism that allegedly holds the back wheel in place on the back of my Cycles Toussaint Vélo Routier v2. The issue has come and gone, but has never entirely gone away and last week it finally came to a head when in an attempt to tighten the quick release for the third time in five miles of riding, the skewer itself snapped, leaving me stranded on the side of the road. Fortunately the Managing Partner was along for the ride and was able to return to the Bartlecave, retrieve the Bartlemobile and rescue me. 

SuuuhhNAP!!!

The quick release skewers supplied with the Velo Routier DIY build kit are of the "exposed cam" variety which seems to be the norm these days. It's a kind of nice looking item, all silver and shiny, but it has been slipping for a while now. I think it was fine for a while, until it wore the paint off the dropout. Once there was no "soft" paint to hang onto, the shallow knurling on the bolt part just polished the dropout and it more or less started regularly slipping out of the dropout.

See the scratched paint foreward of the dropout? That's where the teeth of the quick release come to rest when it inevitably lets go of the dropout.Those are new screws, by the way - all the futzing wrecked the old ones, so I replaced them.

I put up with it because I'm lazy and didn't really know what to do about it. Then, SuuuNAP!!! So, no alternative but to head to the GoogleNet in search of a solution. And of course, the oracle of information about bikes is where I ultimately found the answer.

Saint Sheldon explicitly warns against using "boutique" exposed cam quick releases on horizontal dropouts.

The exposed-cam skewers are generally OK for vertical dropouts in back, and for forks with "lawyer lips", but should not be relied on with horizontal dropouts or plain forks.

So, the quick releases supplied with the bike are not the best choice for the dropouts. Well, I guess I'm not surprised. Though really nice to look at, it's obvious that the wheelset provided with the Velo Routier DIY build kit is a budget wheelset (ever hear of the Rimnet brand? Me neither.). I don't have any problem with the wheels - they seem pretty sturdy and though a bit to the heavy side, do what wheels are supposed to do. The problem is with the quick releases. It's a small detail, but at least for me, an important one.

So, armed with a potential solution, and in obvious need of a replacement skewer, I turned to the parts bin. The most obvious choice was to use the rear skewer from a bike that doesn't exist anymore; one that also had a 10-speed cassette. So more or less just as a proof of concept I grabbed the one from my unused pair of 2011 Bontrager Race Lite wheels. Fortunately they fit pretty well (they seem a bit long (135 mm?) with about 3/8 inch of threads extending from the nut, but they tightened up nice and snug and the extra length doesn't seem to have a negative effect. I've only been out for one ride since I set it up with the "new" skewer, but over two hours of fairly vigorous riding it seems to have stayed put. I'll leave it this way for a while and see if it resolves the issue.

In the mean time I'll be the guy riding around with a silly looking "aero" quick release hung on a vintage looking bike. Not the weirdest thing you'll see on a day of riding in Rock Creek Park. And who knows? Maybe the aero advantage of the new quick release will make me faster.

Horizontal dropout with a Bontrager Race Lite quick release!