They arrived today from amazon cost me £15ish to buy the two books together I believe.

Cycle Craft

Great book, its a paperback book, contains loads and loads of useful information mainly for the commuting cyclists, includes how to size your bike properly, how to adjust brakes and gears correctly, and some other basic maintenance tips.

Covers everything from "learning to ride" to "Negotiation on A Roads" unless your a fairly advanced rider already im pretty sure you will find something in this book that will help you ride a little better on the roads.

Also covers issues with regards to cycle lanes/paths, helmet wearing and just how useful other safety objects are to be worn (reflective jackets, reflectors, flags, mirrors, additional lights).

After spending a few hours reading it, its definately changed my attitude, instead of panicing and ditching out on the pavement when I want to turn right across traffic, its explained in nice and easy steps with diagrams exactly just what I should do.

Its helped me understand the use of roundabouts, and also given me information on using A Roads as safely as I can, and no that doesnt involve riding on the hard shoulder.

Glad I bought it.

Bike Book

Hardback book, full of information covering any bike from the 70s onwards it seems, explains the meaning behind Reynolds tubing numbers, and gives clear diagrams concerning maintenance.

Ever like me wondered just exactly what a "aheadset" was, no worries... its fully explained including how to fit, change and lubricate them. Worried about how to recable your bike, or doing any required maintenance on the cables, again... the bike book covers it.

Worth the money! definately.

FC9K Did say that the park site covers everything you need. I can say after reading this book that while the "fixing" of certain items may be the same, the way the book is written, and the diagrams and photographs make it a hell of a lot clearer than that site. The addtional benefit of which is that the book shows you how to do the tasks without requiring the expensive park tools.

3rd hand tool... bollocks mate, just buy a cable puller, works better and can be used on gear cables too. Need to remove the bottom bracket lock ring on a cup and cone setup?... you could use a special "C spanner" but if you take a normal adjustable wrench its possible to quite easily undo it.

It covers how to identify parts, freewheel vs freehub, headset vs aheadset, stems, seat posts. It deals with shocks and other ancillary things.

Well worth the money if like me you find the park site good... but just a tiny bit lacking in "newbie speak"

mine did the job its the one thing on the bike i figured out myself before reading it then read in the book and said "ahh... im not a complete idiot ".

Twas a bastard to get it up tight again, but I managed it, just used my foot on the wrench.

It does mention that jobs will be easier with some tools, but it takes into account that you can do them with others stuff like torque wrenches... useful, park say they are a necessity, here.. its "do it up as much as possible." Spose there could be a safety issue in it, but on a bike providing its solidly done up its unlikely to cause a major issue I reckon.

aye true that dont really want to completely crush your bearings when doing them up

But then you wouldnt tend to use a torque wrench to do up locknuts