Somewhere along the line, I lost my inclination to suffer on the saddle of a cheap bike.  I rode the Next Challenger perhaps four or five times, and that was four or five times too many.

Writing about the original Bike of Doom was fun and challenging.  This time around, it’s just a chore, and I don’t have the stomach for it.

So, last week, I gave the bike away.  I had intended to take it downtown and leave it unlocked.  It looks new and shiny and bike shaped, I’m sure somebody would have wanted it.  Before I could take the BOD on its final ride, my daughter chirped up that she would take the bike.  She said she would use it once or twice a week, on very short rides to her music lesson or choir practice.  Although I explained how lousy the bike was, she insisted.

So, the BOD is off my plate.   The infrequent trips my daughter puts on it are probably all it’s designed for.  In fact, she may be the Next Challenger’s perfect owner.  We’ll see.

For myself, I’m done with department store bikes.  I can’t recall having had less fun on a bike than when I was sitting on the Next Challenger.  Well, maybe once, cycling 40 kilometers back from Lockport into a 50 KPH wind.  But that’s about it.

So, what does that mean for BIKEOFDOOM.COM?   I don’t know yet.  I may let it expire.  I may turn all the BOD blogging material into a static website.  Or I may just leave it up as my cycling blog.

Either way, my Department Store Bike story is over.

R.I P. - Bike of Doom - 2007 - 2010

Did I mention the Bike of Doom died?  Winter cycling took its toll.  More on me than on the bike.  I lost my passion for doing weekly repairs.  The bike languished, needing a new drive train, wheel repairs, and a lot of TLC.  The thought of investing another $100, not to mention many hours of time, into keeping a $99 bike on the road seemed ludicrous.  So, in the spring of 2010, with some regret,  I put it out in the back lane with a “Free bike” sign on the saddle.  It was gone in a couple of days.

That was two years ago.

Did anybody ride it after that?  I don’t know.  I can’t imagine anybody having the patience to repair it.  More than likely it ended up in the landfill.

I think the problem was more with me than with the bike, in the end.  I just didn’t want to invest the time or money into keeping it running.  I’d already put more into spare parts and upgrades than the bike cost.  Even so, I had a lot of fun with the BOD.  I rode almost 5,000 km of daily commutes on it.  For awhile, I preferred riding it to my better bikes.

Although I would never recommend a department store bike to anybody who was just getting into cycling, I keep thinking that I wouldn’t mind another one for myself.

I’m thinking about it.

As recent posts may have led you to believe, I’m working through the urge to put the SC-1800 back on the road.  The big problem at this point is the icy tomb in which it is encased.   The hardened steel Master Lock with massive chain is just one of the barriers to beginning this cycling season.  The lock is frozen.  After three days of efforts to open it, I finally caved and squirted a generous dose of WD40 into the keyhole.  Half an hour later, with some strong language encouragement, it finally popped.

Unfortunately, the covering of snow you can see in the photos in the last post is only camouflage for the deeper, harder, apparently impenetrable layer of ice in which the bike’s wheels are currently embedded.

Enough for one day.  Tomorrow, the shovel comes out.

The Bike of Doom has been resting for some time now. Some might consider this an ignominious fate for such a worthy beast, others might relish the thought of a well deserved plague of rust. You know who you are. In any event, cycling season has not yet arrived in Winnipeg. These photos were taken this morning.

Interesting note: the odometer is working! The bike has been stored outside for two years, in all weather, including a reasonably long stretch of near -40 temperatures this winter, and the cheap $8 odometer is still working.

This could be a sign of the apocalypse.

Although I often claim that my $99 SC1800 is a reasonably good bike and has done me well, I’m forced to admit that, hey, I may just have been lucky.  I got a good 1,000 Km out of it before it needed any repairs, which is not bad for such a cheap piece of machinery.  Is my experience typical?  Hmm.  Let’s just say “No.”

After expressing an interest in possibly beginning cycling, my daughter’s boyfriend received an SC1800 as a gift from a family friend.  He knew my story and thought the bike might not be bad for piddling around town, commuting and the like.  He picked it up at Canadian Tire, cycled away, and had gone barely 100 yards before the cassette disintegrated.  The gear assembly slipped away from the core of the cassette (which remained attached to the rear wheel hub), spilling micro-steel-balls all over the road.

He took it back to Canadian Tire,  who told him, “Sorry, you can’t return it if it’s broken… we’ll have to send it out for repairs.”

When I heard this, I was a bit angry.  The kid had barely taken three pedal strokes before the machine blew up!  Anyway, to save him the trouble of taking the thing back to Canadian Tire and conceivably being without bike for a month, I made the repair.  The remnant of the cassette was removed with an adjustable pair of pliers.  The hub was in good condition, as was the wheel.  I had a couple of spare cassettes of the right size sitting around, so I installed a new one and had him back on the road in less than 20 minutes.

Three things here.  First, if that had been me, and I’d come back and received that answer, there would have been a scene.  Let’s just say it might have gotten ugly.  I think my money would have been back in my pocket within a minute or two, or I’d be walking out with another bike at the very least.  They bullied my daughter’s boyfriend because he is a quiet guy and didn’t raise a fuss.  Second, to address this before it comes up in comments, if the bike had been bought at a Local Bike Shop, I’m not so sure they would have taken it back, but at least they’d have been able to make the repair on the spot and perhaps throw in some extra equipment for the inconvenience.  Third, despite my enjoyment of the cheapo SC1800, there’s no getting away from the fact that it’s a department store bike, and the almost the cheapest one you can buy, at that.

And the moral of the story is, I guess… you get what you pay for.