As of April 11th I am officially done driving to work and am in need of a bicycle that can get to and from work (16 mile roundtrip) mon. thru fri.. I'm not looking to spend a lot, most likely $300.00 at max and I know that won't get me much. If you have an old, functional bike that you'd like to unload or have any ideas on someone or somewhere that will I would love to hear about it. Ideally I'd like to get one of those wonderful "road bikes" that weigh like 2lbs and go 35mph at an easy pedal but I'm pretty sure that won't happen...again, I'd be willing to listen...Thanks

I would try B-1 Bicycles on E. Long or maybe "Once Ridden" I believe it is called on the corner of Indianola and Hudson. Or is Once Ridden the shop in clintonville? I don't know. I got a old Dayton made Huffy from the Indianola/Hudson bike shop for about $150 or so.

Once Ridden is a scam. Fuck that place.
Go to the bike co-opts, look on craigslists, etc. Don't go to Once Ridden.

I second craigslist.

If you can ad a couple more hundred to that figure, though, you can get a nice reliable new ride from Performance Bike on Sawmill. That place sometimes has stoopid deals...plus it's a bike-nerd wet dream in there.

In general I've gotten a bad bad vibe about the place. I've tried to sell a few bikes there and they wouldn't give me the time of day. I've thought about purchasing bikes there and the prices are obscene. Honestly, the guys that run it have been total assholes to me and my girlfriend multiple times.

Rollie, you got a bike you wanna sell me?

Try Third Hand Bike Co Op on East 5th between summit and 4th.

http://www.thirdhand.org/

is the schwinn le tour a decent bike for a 100?

If you buy new, I would highly recommend one of the independent shops:
1. Baer Wheels in Clintonville
2. Westerville Bike Shop in ...you guessed it.
3. B-1 downtown
4. Bicycle One in Gahanna

However. you won't get shit new for $300.

when buying used, your obstacle isn't so much name brand and model as it is condition and components. Oh, and fit. You're gonna be spending some quality time on this thing, so you really should spend some time with someone who knows how to find one that's the right size. Poor efficiency and bad knees are the result if you don't.

I troll craigslist for bikes all the time, and there are some deals and there are some scams. I recommend it, but you'll have to have a little working knowledge of frame sizes, components, etc so that you can weed the wheat from the chaff.

Can you borrow a bike or bikes for a lil' while to see how you're gonna dig the commute before you purchase? the condition and traffic on your route might influence what style of ride you want.

Oh man, I can't wait for it to warm up so I can crank up the tunes and fly and weave along the Olentangy-Scioto trail all day.

Okay, you bike nerds, I need help:

I was planning to take my bike out for a spin today, and I needed to pump up the tires. The back tire went just fine, no problems.

But the front tire was another story. Every time I tried to push the pump nozzle onto the valve on the tire, the valve would push down into the tire and then the pump nozzle would fall off.

Not having pliers in the house, I finally got a hammer and used the end of it to grasp the valve and pull it out and hold in it place so I could attach the pump.

Tired got pumped up, but now I cannot pull the pump nozzle back off the valve. No amount of force will get that thing to come off.

What do I do?

You're sure that you've got the lever on the pump in the 'release' position? if so, tug harder. there's nothing but friction holding it on. unless you did something else very bad with that hammer.

Yeah, the lever is straight up in the air right now.
I hope I didn't destroy the bike.

For future reference, how the hell do you keep the tire valve from sinking back into the tire?

Okay, well now I just ripped the valve right out of the tire.

Anyone know a good cheap place to get a bike tire?

two ways- best way is if it's totally flat, push with your thumb on the outside of the tire so that you smoosh down any extra space and take away the room for the valve stem to retreat into the rim. way two is a little more dodgy because you can damage the stem, but push the stem at an angle so that on edge is pinched against the hole in the rim, and that should give you enough friction to get the pump on.

you didn't ruin the bike. you might have ruined the pump though. is this a shitty pump? I'm betting that's more to blame than the tire.

Well, I didn't rip it out completely, but I ripped the valve so now if you try to pump the air in, it just comes right back out.

still can't get the pump nozzle off.

Okay, pump nozzle finally came off, but it did require me to finish ripping the valve out of the tire.