Bike & Jeep

Chain Suck… Sucks!

I have a Ventana El Padrino an within weeks of building her up I started getting chain suck. I checked it out, run through the gears, it had no issues and shifted perfectly on the bike stand. Back out on the trail I got the chain suck again.

Most of my chain suck happened while I was exiting corners while under torque in the middle chain ring. Back in the garage I inspected all the teeth and noticed that the chain wasn’t seating properly on one tooth of the middle chain ring. The tooth wasn’t bent, but it was ever so slightly cupped.

I replaced the middle chain ring with a spare I had laying around and it worked fine for awhile, but it too started getting chain suck. After inspection I found it too had one tooth ever so slightly cupped. I compared the two middle chain rings and the cupped tooth and noticed that the worn tooth was in the same location on both chain rings.

I left the chain sucking middle ring on and went for another ride so I could figure out where my crank arm’s position was when the chain suck started. On every occasion the chain suck started while my right crank was in the 4 o’clock position while under torque.

Two days latter I had a brand new middle chainring installed (same manufacture as the previous two chain rings). Within a three weeks I started getting chain suck again. I compared all three chain rings and they all had the same slightly cupped tooth, same location and it always happened under torque in the 4 o’clock position.

So I switched to a stronger middle chain ring that could take the torque and stress I was putting it under. Since then the chain suck stopped completely and I haven’t had any issues with it what so ever.

Fix that noisy Jeep Rack with a Fairing
I have a Kargo Master (Congo Cage) rack on my TJ… this is a great rack that is easy to use, strong and looks better than most of the racks out there… but at 30 miles an hour it began to make a low hum, 40 mph and it sound like a wind tunnel and 50 mph and above sounded like you had a set of subwoofers kickin at maximum volume on either side of your head. So load that if you have the top down at 60 mph you had to scream just to hear the person sitting beside you.

I couldn’t take it, three days after I installed the rack I made a little air foil out of a piece of sheet metal I had stripped from an old microwave. I cut it to shape, painted it black and rivited it around the front bar of the rack… this helped and was good for the time being, but there was still a good bit of noise.

You can see my small air foil in the picture below:

I wasn’t satisfied however and began looking for a better solution. So I called the manufacture Kargo Master, but they did not offer anything, looked to Yakima, Thule to see if they made anything that would work, but nothing really seemed to be the right fit. I thought about making a full length air foil like the small I had made.

I finally decided to go with a Yakima Fairing.

So I got on ebay to see if I could find one cheap… I made a bid and won. A few days later it arrived. I tried to fit it to may Jeep, but it was the older Yakima Fairing that was curved slightly on the top and bottom. I wasn’t able to see this in the listing on ebay, but I had a feeling that it may actually be curved on both top and bottom. So I abandoned the idea of upgrading my Jeep and stuck with the small air foil I had made. I ended up installing the Yakima Fairing on my Wife’s Nissan.

Last weekend I finally installed my Yakima bars and basket on my Jeep rack and this was more than my little air foil could handle and there was a good bit of new wind noise from the basket mixed in with the low hum of the rack itself… so back to the drawing board I went. I thought about this for a few days and remembered the Yakima Fairing that I had bought that was now sitting in the corner of my garage because it did not fit my wife’s new Commander either. So I dug it out of the garage corner and began looking at it and how I could make this work.

I took a 4 foot level and squared it to the bottom of the Fairing, scored a line with my knife. I then squared the top of the Fairing with the level and scored it as well. Next I took my Jig Saw and cut the top and bottom along the score mark to square up both top and bottom. Next I took the rubber foot that came off the bottom and fitted it back to the bottom… good it still fit perfectly. I put the Fairing back together and installed it on my Yakima bars and headed for the highway for a road test. It worked great the noise was reduced a good bit and then I hit 30 mph and the thing flipped over the top of my Yakima bar and landed on the basket. So I went back to the garage to figure out what to do next.

While standing in the garage staring at the Fairing trying to figure out how to secure it to my Kargo Master rack without drilling into it, I decided I’d use heavy duty zip ties. But there was one other problem I had noticed before it flipped on the highway… the Fairing sagged between the Yakima arms that fasten the Fairing to the Yakima Bars.

So I jumped in my Jeep, went to Lowes and picked up some heavy duty zip ties and a 3/4″ x 3′ aluminum channel… paid the cashier, jumped in the Jeep and headed back home.

In the garage I got out my drill, pop rivets, and some spare bolts. I cut the aluminum channel to the length I needed to fix it to the Fairing to keep it from sagging in between the Yakima mounting arm brackets. Next I marked the aluminum channel, drilled holes into it and the Fairing every 8″, bolted and rivited it to the Fairing. Next I drilled holes a long the bottom of the Fairing for the zip ties to pass throught and finally I super glued the rubber foot back to the bottom edge of the Fairing. Next, I climbed my Jeep to begin installing it again. I then positioned the Fairing so the rubber boot rested on the front Kargo Master Rack bar. Tighten the Yakima mounting arm braket bolts down and zip tied it to the front rack bar.

In the photo below, you can see how the top and bottom edges have been squared up and where I used the zip ties to fasten the leading edge of the Fairing to my Kargo Master Rack.

In the photo below, you can see how I fastened the aluminum channel to the back side of the Fairing and where the zip tie lock head is positioned.

And below are the final results of the complete install.

So finally I was ready for a road test. I jumped back in my Jeep and headed for the highway. I hit 30 mph on the ramp leading into the highway… nothing to be heard… good. I got to the highway and kicked it… 40, 50, 60… 65…. 70 mph nothing but wind in my face, no noise to be heard other than the normal wind and tire hum you can expect when you’re rollin down the highway with your top down. 75, 80 mph… wow! This thing works great, no vibration, no rack noise, no wind noise from the basket. I fact I believe it is even more quite with the top down than it ever was with out the rack.

I drove for 5 miles, pulled off the highway and stopped in the local park. Dropped the rack back, raised the soft top and re-connected the Jeep rack. Now for the softtop road test. I hit the highway, 40, 50, 60 ,70… 75 mph. Still no noise to be heard and my softtop had less wind slap than it ever has had. Great!!! I headed back home. I got to the garage and installed the side windows, and door uppers… back to the highway, down the ramp, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70…. 75 still no noise! This is the quiestest my Jeep has ever been going down the road. Other than a few wind noises coming from the Jeep and the tires, there is no noise at all coming from the top of my Jeep. This was well worth the small amount of time it took to modify the Yakima Fairing, I’ll finally be able to talk with the wife and friends in my Jeep again, I can actually hear my radio again and my ears are not ringing from the constant hum I had before the Fairing was installed.

If you have a rack installed on your Jeep and have wind noise coming from it, you should definitely look into something such as this to reduce the noise if not eliminate it completely. I hope this helps.

Fabricating a Cheap MTB Hitch Rack for the Jeep

A few years ago I decided to start carrying my mountain bike on the front of my Jeep. There’s a lot of reasons why I wanted to move it up front… less weight on the tailgate of the Jeep, I didn’t like how rear hitch racks wobble around and I didn’t like the tire mounted racks. But most of all, it was the chumps on cell phones and bumper riders who convinced me that carrying the bike in the rear… wasn’t for me.

I spent a few weeks researching various hitch racks trying to find one that fit the bill, but had no luck. So I finally decided, I’ll make my own hitch rack.

So back to drawing board I began sketching out what it would look like, how I’d mount the front fork, how I’d secure the rear tire and what I’d build it from. I did quite a bit of browsing around Home Depot and Lowes for steel, ran through a variety of sketches and nothing seemed to work out financially… everything I came up with was just going to cost way too much to worth the trouble. So I mauled it over for a few months… working it over in my mind and researching tubing options. I finally decided the cheapest solution would be to buy someone’s used rack, cut it up and weld it back to my specs and rack needs.

I then started browsing Ebay for any used rack options. During my Ebay searches I kept coming across “truck Bed Extenders” and they could be had very cheaply. So I found one listed for $24.00 and placed a bid. A few days later I had won it and a week later I had my 2″ square tubing lined up.

With my 2″ hitch tubing lined up, I now had to figure out where to go next in building my bike rack. The Truck Bed Extender sat in my garage for about two weeks while I mauled the design some more and after a lot of thought I had it figured out and on paper.

So I jumped in the Jeep and drove to Home Depot, picked up an 8′ x 1.625″ and a 4′ x .75″ long round steel pipe, some primer paint and flat black texture paint. Next I ran by the LBS and picked up a fork mount and headed back home. Back home I determined how long I needed the 2″ square tubing for the hitch and cut it to length (18″). I then cut the 8′ round steel pipe to 51″ and cut a second piece to 5″. Next I used a saws-all and cut (rounded inward) one end of the 51″ round pipe to except the 5″ fork piece. I clamped the 5″ piece to end of the (51″) piece of round pipe and welding it up for the fork mount. Next bored a (1.75″) hole through both sides of the 2″ square tubing and ground down the rough edges. With my 2″ square tubing prepared, I then slipped the 1.625″ round tubing into the 2″ square tubing and started welding it up.

I now had a nice “T” shaped mount for my bike rack, but I still needed a method to secure the rear tire of the bike. That’s where the .75″ round steel tubing came into play. I cut the 4′ x .75″ steel pipe to (32″) and used a blow torch to heat up the center of the steel and make it easy to bend around my 51″ x 1.625″ round steel tubing. Once the center of the (32″) of steel was nice and hot, I place it under the 1.625″ tubing and bent it around and upward until it was the same width from top to bottom. With the steel hot as it was, it was very easy to wrap around the 1.625″ round steel tubing. I then drilled a .25″ hole through the rear tire mount and bolted it up.

With everything welded up and ready, I covered it with primer and the texture flat back paint I had picked up a Home Depot. The next day I installed the fork mount and used a strap from an older bike rack I had to insure the rear tire doesn’t bounce out of the rear tire mount while going down the road.

All in all I’ve got something like $74.00 wrapped up in the whole thing and it’s stronger than any other rack I’ve ever owned or seen to date. Note: the Yakima Wheel carrier was added after I made this and is not included in the over all Fabrication cost.

About a year ago I came across a guy who owned a Hollywood Pro Rider Rack and after staring at it for about 10 minutes, I figured it may be a good solution for a front mount bike rack too. So I picked one up on ebay and when it arrive, it required a minor modifcation to the hitch tubing and was ready to use within 15 mintues. The Modification I made to it was to take a lenght of the 2″ square hitch tubing I had left over from my “Truck Extender Rack” and mount it to the Hollywood rack instead of the 2″ hitch tubing that came with the Hollywood Rack. I did this because the Hollywood Rack hitch tubing is offset and either set the bike too high or too low once mounted. Using a straight 2″ hitch tubing set it at the right hiegth and worked like a charm.

Here are some snap shots of the rack and my material list:

8′x1.625″ round steel tubing (Home Depot)
4′x.75″ round steel tubing (Home Depot)
Can of Primer and Textured Flat black spray paint (Home Depot)
1 - .25″ Nut/bolt with two washers (Home Depot)
Truck Bed Extender (purchased off ebay)
Fork mount (pick up a LBS)

Pacenti 650b steel hardtail arrived today.
Rust wet paint finish, clean welds… can’t wait to get it built up and rollin!