Guh, bike part prices
Nov. 1st, 2009 04:10 pmI've been paying about $6 for bike chains, but I haven't bought any for a couple of years; I bought about 5 of them a few years back when they were on sale ($6 instead of $10).
I just went to price them again, and the CHEAP chains are $20 now, and go on sale for $15. Ugh. I go through one every 4 or 5 months.
I still have a couple more new ones sitting in the parts box, so I'll hold off and see if I can't find a sale. Or maybe usable chains at department stores on clearance.
It's almost enough for me to start thinking about running my drivetrain to destruction - I have a dozen old chains hanging in the garage, I could line them up by how worn out they are, and start swapping to the least-worn-out chain once a month or so. Heck, I could probably go for 5 years like that. All it would do would be to wreck my cassette and chainring, so at the end I could just replace the whole drivetrain and start over. I might even be able to just flip all the cogs over and start again (with new chains) - I haven't tried that with the current setup.
I just went to price them again, and the CHEAP chains are $20 now, and go on sale for $15. Ugh. I go through one every 4 or 5 months.
I still have a couple more new ones sitting in the parts box, so I'll hold off and see if I can't find a sale. Or maybe usable chains at department stores on clearance.
It's almost enough for me to start thinking about running my drivetrain to destruction - I have a dozen old chains hanging in the garage, I could line them up by how worn out they are, and start swapping to the least-worn-out chain once a month or so. Heck, I could probably go for 5 years like that. All it would do would be to wreck my cassette and chainring, so at the end I could just replace the whole drivetrain and start over. I might even be able to just flip all the cogs over and start again (with new chains) - I haven't tried that with the current setup.