What Wears and Breaks

The route is pretty rugged and something on your bike is likely to break something on the way. You will most likely want to avoid being stuck in some remote location with a bike you cant ride. To ride any significant portion of the trail, either you need to be able to do repairs, or you need to be with someone who can.

The most reliable bike shops that will carry a reasonable range of spares and do good repairs are at Mundaring, Collie and Albany plus perhaps at Manjimup. In Denmark there are 3 of us doing repairs but no one has enough business to carry a really good range of spares. The camping shop carries a few spares, but not much.

Tubes

The track is not particularly prone to giving bikes punctures. Its best to carry 1 or 2 spare tubes plus a repair outfit. You can also reduce your chance of getting a puncture in a number of ways.

• Thorn Proof Tubes- Super thick tubes which thorns are less likely to penetrate.
• Kevlar Tyres - Tyres made partially with a Kevlar layer so that its more difficult for anything to penetrate and puncture the tube.
• Self Sealing Tubes - These are tubes with some rubbery fluid inside which solidifies into any puncture to seal the hole. 

I am fairly adept at fixing punctures so I just carry a spare tube which I repair it in the evening. If I ever get two punctures in a day then I will have to curse at finding the puncture and possibly repairing it in the rain on the side of the track.

Disk Pads

Particularly in spring or winter there car be a lot of mud and water to go through. The mud acts a bit like grinding paste and then break pads don't last long. They are not difficult to change, and not too heavy to carry so its worth taking a spare pair along. Make sure you have the right ones for your particular brake system.
This can be where a performance bike with sensitive brakes has a disadvantage. The linings may be softer and the mechanism more highly leveraged is great for sensitivity and control but not so much for reliability and endurance.

Touring bikes and hybrids usually have V brakes with brake shoes rather than pads. They suffer from the disadvantage that they can overheat on some of the downhills. So that may mean that you have to take it slower and take more breaks.

Derailleur Hangers and Derailleurs

There are 100 km of track to maintain and with a limited budget, its not easy to keep it all free of forest litter (branches and sticks). It just takes one of these to kick up into your rear Derailleur and (in order of likelihood) you can break: -

• The Derailleur Hanger
• The Chain
• The Derailleur 
• Spokes

There is not much one can do to prevent this apart from being careful. Avoid heavy pedaling going through sticks and get prepared to stop completely at any scent of trouble.

If you want to avoid this danger completely and still have gears you can consider getting one of the German multispeed hubs instead. They can cost over $2000. Then all the gearing mechanism is contained within the hub so there is no derailleur to break.  

Usually it will not be more than the hanger that breaks This is a small aluminium item which attaches to the frame so that the Derailleur can be screwed on. Years ago they used to be a part of the frame itself, but today they are made from aluminium. This is probably so that they can break before too much other damage is done.

Unfortunately in their wisdom there is no standardization and bicycle manufacturers have not been talking to each other. So each manufacturer can have a dozen varieties for various models of bikes they have produced. If you have some strange bike it can be hell out there finding the right hanger for your bike. If you visit the web site http://derailleurhanger.com from Colorado (USA) you can see the full range of hangers that there are in the world. So if your bike is a bit exotic it could be difficult getting a spare hanger and unfortunately they are not cheap! 

A solution to this problem can be to carry an emergency hanger. If you have one of these with you you might also be able to help some other poor character out some time. Usually they are over $20, but I managed to get one on Ebay for around $12. Beware that they do not necessarily fit all bikes so you need to check it works on your particular model.

An Emergency Hanger - Should Fit your Bike

And if all else fails, it can be best to remove your derailleur altogether, shorten the chain and turn you bike into a single speed model. With some difficulty this will get you to the next town. To do this you will need to carry and know how to use a chain breaker. 

Broken Spokes

The two main reasons that spokes can break are: -

• Some kind of accident, stick in wheel.
• Fatigue

Spokes don't last forever. They are what transfer the torque from your derailleur to your tyres and they take a lot of stress. And if you have disk brakes they take on even more stress. So they get metal fatigue and will usually first break near the rear hub. And the awkward thing is that it is most frequently on the right side next to the gears. Then to change a spoke you will also have to remove the cassette which requires special tools.

Apart from carrying all the tools you can consider including some FibreFix emergency Kevlar spokes in your luggage. http://www.fiberfixspoke.com . These clever little things allow you to insert a temporary spoke without even taking the wheel off.

The good news is that its not too bad riding with a couple of broken spokes. You will find that more can break as you ride, but it takes a while. The wheel gets a bit of a buckle, but if you have disk brakes they will still work OK. Using disk breaks on a rear wheel with bust spokes will stress the wheel even more, so keep off the rear brakes.

Bear in mind that if you do get a couple of broken spokes from fatigue, you can get them fixed but the rest will be on their way and you are likely to get some more breakages in the near future. Not so good if you are about to do 1000 km on the track.