A Wobble Cured

My bike, now over twenty years old, developed an ever increasing and disturbing wobble at the front, particularly freewheeling downhill. The net was not very helpful, as it seemed there could be many causes of the "the death wobble". It was Alison's brother who correctly (as it turned out) diagnosed a tyre problem. Well I had had mine from when the bike was new, and the rear certainly looked frayed.

I finally telephoned Buckingham Bikes in Aylesbury and booked it in for Thursday last week. What I had not counted on, given that I would ride the bike to the centre of Aylesbury, was the rain forecast for that day. Fortunately, it was only spots of rain that I encountered having set off at 8.30am. However, the bike shop didn't open until 10am that day, so there was time for coffee and cake in M&S.

I was assured by the assistant that the tyres would be the problem, and I agreed for them to put on new ones. So it was off to the bus station to catch the Number 50 back to Weston Turville, the first time I used the bus from Aylesbury, and the first time to use my bus pass. Only a twenty minute journey, and a ten minute walk and I was back home watching the rain belt down.

A phone call from Buckingham Bikes that early evening to tell me it was ready to collect, so the next morning it was back to the bus stop. The bus was late, but I had a nice chat with the three other villagers waiting there. It was a beautiful sunny day and I arrived in town to pick up the bike, still unsure whether changing tyres had cured the wobble. I was told that the rear tyre was bulging where it was splitting (fortunate I suppose that it did not collapse on my way in the previous morning) and that was the cause. They were right. After a minor detour to take the bike back to have the handlebar readjusted as I had no front brakes, I rode home in the sunshine.

The tyres they had recommended were a road tyre for MTB's which would be fine for trails, canal paths etc. The Schwalbe City Jet (yes, it is considerably faster than the knobbly tyres of a mountain bike) has 55 positive reviews on one website and 17 on Amazon. So I am very pleased with the result. And very interesting journeys to and from Aylesbury over the two days.