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Did you get some grease on your pads or rotors? Rubbing alcohol not working in cleaning out your brakes? Or are your disc brakes simply not stopping well enough. You’ve checked your pads and you still have some life in them.

Here’s a few simple steps to get you stopping again in no time.

1. Remove the pads from the caliper. This can be easily be done with your fingers or with the help of a pair of pliers.

Check out how glazed my pads are.

2. Take a sanding block or a piece of sand paper and sand off the glazed surface of the pads.

See the difference between the left pad which has been sanded the right that hasn’t. The sanding acts like microderm abrasion for your pads.

3. Final step, sand down the rotors until you get rid of the heat glaze.

Now go test it out, it should be a huge difference in your stopping power.

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Jax Bicycle Center in Fullerton helped put together a picture tutorial on how to increase the travel on a Rock Shox Reba fork from from 80mm to 100mm by removing the internal spacer.

Wayne Kudol has performed this procedure many times over so he is extensively familiar with the ins and outs of this process. He used my Gary Fisher X-Caliber Reba SL (score!) as the subject.

Reba set to 80mm travel

First thing you have to do is to let all of the positive and negative air out of both the chambers.

Next, you unscrew the Positive Air Valve, Negative Air Valve (right side). Be careful as you unscrew the Negative Air Valve as oil will leak out. Have a drip pan ready.

Unscrew the colorful Rebound adjuster on the bottom of the other leg (left side).

Slide the magnesium lowers off the bottom of the fork to expose the sliders and internals of the fork. This may take some finessing, with a mallet.

Remove the C-ring from the bottom of the right side slider.

Then gently remove the Dual Air Piston from the right slider (also may require some finessing) to expose the spacer, black “c�? shaped plastic piece near the top of the Dual Air Piston.

Remove spacer to go from 80mm to 100mm.

Pour some Rock Shox Red Rum over the rings of the Dual Air Pistons.

Reinstall the Dual Air Pistons by sliding them back up the right side.

Replace the C ring on the same right side making sure the gap on the C ring nestles the little dent. It doesn’t matter which way the dent is facing.

Check out your magnesium lowers from the top. Clean out any loose dirt/sand that may have gotten in there.

Add a small amount of Red Rum to the magnesium lowers from the top and apply them (with your finger) around the inside of the seal.

Slide magnesium lowers back up the sliders.

Add a very small amount of fork oil to the right leg from the crown.

Red Rum the cap for the Positive Air Valve and replace the cap. Torque to a snug fit, but not too tightly.

Install the lower nut and again, torque snugly, not tight.

Inflate both chambers to desired PSI.

Install covers and clean the fork with Isopropyl Alcohol and a clean rag. If you want the royal treatment for your fork, apply some Finish Line Stanchion lube.

Attach a zip tie to the fork. Hop on the bike, ride it around the neighborhood, place a lot of weight onto the fork to simulate trail conditions. Measure the travel.

Thanks Wayne for all your help. Thanks Scott for showing off your Salsa Dos Niner. Now get out of the picture!

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Most 29er riders believe that it’s more difficult to endo on a 29er than it is on a 26 inch bike. They claim that because 29er bikes have a longer front axle to bottom bracket distance, you are less likely to endo. Others claim that because the 29ers have a longer wheelbase than a 26″ bike, they are less likely to endo.

Whatever the reason is, they did not try my patented technique for endoing. That is “not paying attention.” For some reason, when I apply the “not paying attention” technique I fall or endo. Even more surprising is that I can do this just as well on a 26â€�? bike and a 29er! This morning, I tried my patented “not paying attentionâ€�? technique and, not surprisingly, it worked again.

As I mentioned in a previous post, the great thing about riding the Fullerton Loop is that it is in the middle of a city. That means I can cut out certain parts of the loop and rejoin the loop by riding the streets. Due to time constraints (I say that a lot) I normally cut out parts of the loop and this morning was no different.

While riding the streets to get back to the loop I decided to drink from my water bottle. As I was putting the bottle back in its cage (practicing my “not paying attention�? technique) my front tire got caught in a little hole in the road, probably 6 inches wide by 2 feet long by 4 inches deep. Of course the hole ends sharply (it would be too convenient for it to gradually slope upwards to connect back to the street, wouldn’t it?) and since I only had one hand on the handlebar, I endo’d.

It was kind of like this but with clips-ins, on the street and without all the protection. Ok, it wasn’t like this at all.

The good news? The Tucson survived the crash. It got a little road rash on top of one of the Deore trigger shifters, but that won’t affect the bike. I carefully inspected the rest of the bike and found that that was the only injury it sustained. Sturdy.

Tucson shifter road rash

The bad news? I added more scratches to my growing collection that began last Saturday when I also fell off the Tucson and now I definitely need a new pair of gloves (is that good news or bad news?). I guess I can thank God that it wasn’t worse than scratches and probably more bruising along my shin. At least there weren’t any broken bones, right? And, as I’m sure you’re all wondering, I did finish the ride. I rode the exact route I normally would, just slightly slower.

Just a quick pet peeve: less than 2 seconds after I endo’d and while I’m still trying to get up a car drives by. That means that the driver must have seen me fall. No “are you ok?�? or “do you need any help?�? Nothing. Is it too much to ask for some common courtesy? Or should I just be happy I wasn’t run over? OK, rant over.

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