On Yer Bike

As well as this, we've had a couple of warm weather moments in between the hail, sleet and pouring rain and what with flowers out and birds singing, it's starting to feel like spring.

And with spring comes Spring cleaning!

Spring cleaning for me generally means doing the washing up, but now it's time to spring clean your bike, too.

After another winter outside, despite oiling locks and chains intermittently over winter, it's now a good time to give your bike a good checkup to look for cavities and see if it needs a new filling or something like that.

My On Yer Bike counterpart, James Styring, is the expert on bike stuff - I just take mine to the Bike Workshop to get it serviced. Usually after a bike fix, bicycle repairers say something like the sprocket and 'mdoobree gubins' need work and I nod 'knowingly' - well 'knowingly' in the sense that I haven't a clue what they're on about, but so long as it fixes my baby", I 'knowingly' nod to anything.

Actually, I have a spare bike that my brother rescued from someone who wanted to put it in a skip as a punishment for only having three gears.

My spare bike is old fashioned, but is really comfortable and although not for regular use, gets used when neighbours want to take friends on cycle rides or if people come to stay at my house.

The problem with it being spare is that it lacks the attention of my own bike and when friends came last week, I felt embarrassed as I cycled along behind them with the squeaking chain and flat tyres.

In fact, it made me remember that as well as fixing my own bike, I ought to keep the spare up to speed as well.

Occasionally, it's also worth having a look at your bike gadgets, too.

I mentioned in a previous column that I have solar rear lights so they never need batteries, but it's worth keeping spare batteries for all other lights, as I recently noticed my front light didn't reach the other side of the road which is pretty bad. Also check panniers and jackets to see if the reflectors are still in good nick.

Another problem we have with keeping our bikes in order is that my son uses the bike pump as a light sabre because he wants to be Yoda from Star Wars.

This wasn't a problem before as I would generally borrow a better bike pump off my neighbours, but having moved house recently, I find that all the quick fixes I took for granted now no longer apply and I might have to search through all the kids' toys before I find the bike pump.

Alternatively, I might even go and buy a foot pump - they are less easy to hide and not so good in sword fights, which means hopefully it won't get borrowed' by my son.