As I’m leaving to drop the Clairebarian off at school I suddenly remember there’s one tool standing in the way of me finishing the build on my El Roy. I never bothered to replace my perplexing piece of plastic with a proper metal tool and it’s absolutely not going to do the job of reefing down the lockring on the Shimano XT 1x crankset that I’m running. 

Luckily, I turn wrenches part-time at a shop, so it’s just a matter of stopping in on my way back and I’m golden. From the bottom-bracket installation tool and grease adapter I need for the Chris King bottom bracket that this crankset will be spinning, to the bleed kit(s), cutting cable housing, and so on, I own every tool I need to do the job. 

And I have, for a long time.

From my Chris King hub tool to corresponding bleed kits for every brake system on the premises, to a hanger alignment tool and headset press, my philosophy for a couple decades is that I wanted every tool on hand to work on my bikes myself when time allowed. 1am stubborn tubeless installation? I have a whisper-quiet air compressor. 

[aside] The only exception to my rule of self-sufficiency has been suspension. I haven’t updated my seal drivers and flat-ground sockets since 32mm stanchions were the norm. Space, time, materials, and honestly the folks at SuspensionWerx do a significantly better job. As soon as I’m past a lowers service – which I do keep everything on hand to do – our stuff goes there. [/aside]

But at some point that changed. I don’t own the tools to service a DT Swiss hub, or bleed the SRAM Guide brakes on The Clairebarian’s bike, and as it turns out, since I’ve been splitting crown races forever I don’t have the tools to remove or install those either. The weird thing about all this, again from someone who owns a f***ing King hub tool, is that I find I’m not too bothered about it. 

I’m not getting rid of anything, yet. My King hub tool has paid for itself many times over, I can’t imagine living without a bench-mounted vice, and it’s nice having a bearing press tool even if I punch things out the old way instead of owning a blind-bearing-puller. As I dig through my ‘stuff’ it doesn’t feel like anything superfluous. 

And yes, working at a shop I have access to fall-back tools I didn’t previously. So maybe in a different circumstance, I’d be more interested in buying them? Although, walking into any shop with my XT crankset removed from my bike to have a chain ring swapped is under $10 so maybe I don’t need one. Chain rings don’t generally just fail. 

[Aside] And if I don’t need the tool to swap my chain ring around – especially now that I have a Wolf Tooth Camo spider installed, so it’s just a T-25 for ring swaps and I only need the tool to swap spiders. [/Aside]

Anyway, I promised myself I wouldn’t make any promises but I’m very engaged with this paired-down philosophy and I’m currently toying with taking a hard look at shrinking my little apartment-based bicycle shop. Not giving up my Knipex or Olfa cutter, but when was the last time I used a pedal wrench?