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Monday 10am - 5pm Tuesday 10am - 5pm Wednesday 9am - 5pm Thursday 10am - 5pm Friday 10am - 6pm Saturday 9am - 5pm

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Cycle Art, 1a Princess Court, Low Prudhoe, Prudhoe (2026)

07/01/2026

Often at this time of year you'll hear people complaining about the apparent interminable duration of January - "Seems like 51 days!" they bemoan.

However, I don't see it like that at all. By January 1st the light is already ten minutes longer in the evening (I always think that the daylight turning is like the tide: slow at first but gaining pace steadily) and there's fresh hope and optimism in the New Year.

Sure you have to pick your moments carefully to get out when the weather is like it is right now - temperature freezing one minute and then popping up to the giddy heights of a healthy fridge... but, you can hold onto the fact that the light and warmth are only going one way.

On that note, don't leave it until Spring is springing to get any repairs or projects into us. The more, might we say, casual cyclists will always leave their bikes until the first nicer days come - which can be April or even earlier - and at that point workshops can go from thumb-twiddling to overwhelmed in a weekend. So beat the rush - those 51 days some feel make up January, actually takes us to March now!

20/12/2025

A very Merry Christmas to everyone from us here at Cycle Art in Low Prudhoe.

Our Christmas opening times are as follows:

Open as normal until Christmas Eve.

Christmas Eve............................ 9am to 1pm

Closed Christmas Day and Boxing Day

Saturday 27th.............................open as normal 9am to 5pm

Closed Sunday 28th as per normal

Open again as normal on the run up to New Year including New Year's Eve

Closed New Year's Day

Open as normal after that.

(Which is just a long winded way of saying that we are only closed for the statutory holidays plus a half day Christmas Eve. :) )

06/12/2025

Yes, it's bleeding Christmas time:

Mistletoe and wine, logs in your panniers and gifts that aren't free.

So what DO you get for the cyclist in your life who already has everything conceivable for his/her bike and plenty that isn't.

We think we can help. Take a look at the following ideas handcrafted like Kirstie's Handmade Christmas (the ideas that is, not the items).

If there's nothing they really need then the secret is to get stuff that they will always use OR that you can never have too many of. Some might seem a little boring, but to the cyclist in your life, sitting in front of the logs on the fire but watching the pitter patter of rain on the window possibly drying up (?) and wondering if they can sneak out for a quickie instead of watching the King's Speech (which mother-in-law is insisting on seeing), they will make their eyes glow at the thought of the cycling to come:

Lights, especially rears. Even decent lights are not at all expensive these days and they are just the sort of thing that they might be currently switching between bikes and then ending up being somewhere and realising they never swapped them back and now it's getting gloomy.... Plus they can leap off, get lost or be borrowed - as they make great torches - but aren't then returned to the bike. Also, many riders are now using lights like our motor-biker friends - day and night for extra safety BUT they only have a set on their second bike not their "good" machine.

Bells. Ok so they won't want one on their TCR Advanced SL and they'd never go get one themselves but for their gravel bike - it's nicer than shouting. As ideas go, it's both fun and sensi-bell. Ahem.

Cleaning tools - even if they have these things, it's always useful as they get mangy. A good one is the humble chain cleaning tool which looks like a mini car wash, but for chains. (We sell all this stuff by the way but this is DEFINITELY not a selling job, honest.) Another good one is the cassette brush - see their little face light up with the thought of really getting stuck into that road grime after tea (which no one wants because they are still totally stuffed from lunch).

Bottle cages and bottles - always getting broken or lost respectively.

Lubricants and degreasers - not the most exciting but also very useful (we have a nice gift pack at the moment...).

A nice new pump - mini or track pump. Again just the thing that gets lost, or borrowed by Mr Next Door and never returned.

A pack of good quality bar-tape. Handlebars lead a hard life. Only problem will be getting the right colour. Cyclists are fussy.

Multi-tools.

Good old-fashioned cycle computer - for those who can't be bothered with Strava. Like me.

A small field mouse called Gerald (ok, just checking that you're still reading this).

Puncture kit and spare tube (read the tyre size though - see previous post!). Worthy but dull, I admit.

A new bike. People do you know.

Above all - do get it all from your local cycle shop, even if that is not us. They need those sales as well as the problems, queries and advice. :)

Merry Christmas One and All.

(And get out on your bike when no one is looking).

29/11/2025

Want an electric bike - something decent, not a "fully built" collection of parts arriving on your doorstep in a damaged cardboard box - but have a limited budget?

We are offering, reduced from £1399 to just £999, the Electric Bike Company (EBCO) Urban 2.

In striking bright blue only, you can have it either with the classic crossbar or the drop frame - what we traditionally called a lady's frame - but many chaps with hip or knee issues (how to confuse a Geordie doctor, tell him you have "knee issues") - like these drop frames too.

What's more, they come fully equipped with mudguards and a rear carrying rack as standard. Even lights are included.

Unlike anything online, these come fully prepared in our workshop and with a free first service to catch everything that settles in, plus of course you get the chance to be sized & fitted to the bike, and importantly, test ride it too.

Furthermore if you have any issues - things can go wrong on occasions - you have somewhere local to sort it out for you.

Want something even better? We have a comprehensive range of higher spec EBCOs and Giant e-bikes in store too.

19/11/2025

Today, a shorter piece (who said "Thank God"?) to try and cut through the confusion of tyre sizes.

We are so used to them in the trade that we forget how obscure the subject is but then I see the blank look when someone asks for a tube for their 700x45 hybrid tyre and I blithely say "700x45? - I'll give you a slim 29er then as the hybrid tubes will be a little narrow. Is it Presta or Schrader ....?"

Firstly, be aware that 700c (and we can drop the "c" bit now as everything 700 is 700c - and no I won't explain the "c" bit as I really am trying to keep this brief) is the same as 29" MTB. You see, mountain bikes have American heritage and they won't deal in mm. The important bit is not the 700mm or 29" but the 622 number that is usually embossed on your tyre in numerals so small you can only read them with the aid of a torch and magnifying glass.

622 is the tyre bead diameter - where it seats onto the rim - in mm and the number after it is the width of the tyre, so, a common road bike size might be 622-25. This is the ETRTO number - a numbering standard that cuts through tyre size chaos. So why is it so much smaller than 700 which is also written on the tyre? Well, 700mm includes the whole tyre. But clearly, for those at the back not already asleep, a bigger tyre - fat hybrid or mountain bike - will give a much greater overall wheel diameter than a slim road tyre so the 700 is just very approximate - which is where the "c" bit comes in but, no, no, I'm not going there, I did promise.

Nowadays - in adult bikes - we have old 26" (MTB that is - there was an older English 26 which was quite bigger) which is 559mm, 27.5, mainly used for MTBs, at 584, and 622 which is road bike, hybrid and 29er MTB.

To really confuse things, many German brands insist on believing that in the UK we call 700 28". We don't and never have. We did used to have 27" (nothing to do with 27.5 MTB) which is 8mm greater diameter than the 622 of 700; so on their reckoning we would be calling a tyre 28" that was smaller than our old 27". Hmm. I've had customers reading this on the inner tube box and returning it as "This is a 28 and I wanted a 700."

You're getting it now I can tell: 622 is 700 is 29er, 27.5" is smaller than old 27", 26" is old MTB and smaller than all of these including old English 26 and 28 does not exist at all other than as a very old English butcher's bike size and in the minds of some European suppliers. So, all as clear as the mud obscuring the tiny figures trying to tell you the actual size on your tyre.

Thus, when wanting to buy a tube or a replacement tyre, forget 700, 29er, etc and always quote the ETRTO number - it's much more accurate - and use the number on the tyre, NOT the tube, as that is a much better guide as to what you need than the tube size as that just tells you what someone stuffed in there sometime ago because it was all they had to hand.

Glad we got that cleared up then!

29/10/2025

So today, brakes. Not a detailed examination of every type of brake ever made as that would be less of an article and more of a large book but some general hints and tips to cover the most common mistakes riders can make or things they might neglect to do.

As mentioned in the last installment one of the easiest things to do wrong is when trying to do the right thing by lubricating your rear derailleur. Sprays will indeed l**e the mech but also send a fine mist right through the wheel and onto the rear brake disc. And if you have rim brakes any l**es can drip down onto the rim. In both cases the pads then get contaminated as soon as you use the brakes. Cover up your discs - or remove the wheels - when lubing near them.

However, if you think you might have got l**e onto the discs (most likely the rear), don't touch the brake lever; take off the wheel and thoroughly clean the disc. You can use car type brake cleaners or a general bike degreaser - just completely dry them off after with a clean cloth. If you're not comfortable taking the wheel off then you can still clean the disc on the bike - it's just a little more awkward.

If the brake pads have, sadly, got oil on them then normally they will have to be replaced - especially disc pads; rim brake pads seem to be more resilient in that respect. If you're unsure, do the cleaning and then try the bike. If you get howling brakes with perfectly clean discs then the pads will definitely need changing. Some people remove the pads and clean them. If any contamination/dirt is superficial then this can work. Buffing the surface with emery cloth helps. But if the pads have absorbed oil or brake fluid, no amount of cleaning will work.

To clean the rims on rim brake bikes just wheel the bike along with a clean dry cloth rubbing on the rim. Keep changing position until it is running clean. Do both sides obviously. Some folded kitchen roll is good for this. It makes a big difference to the brakes if the rims are clean. My old commuter bike has rim brakes and I clean the rims like this quite regularly as it only takes a minute.

With disc brakes, never pull the brake lever when the wheel is off. This can be especially easily done when getting a bike into your car as you might grab the handlebar during the process and pull the brake without meaning to. With cable operated brakes it doesn't matter, but with hydraulic brakes (more common) it can cause the pistons to push out too far - there's no disc there so the pads won't stop until they meet each other. Brake fluid can leak out and require the brakes to be bled - worse, it can get onto the pads and ruin them. So either be very careful when the wheel is off, or pop in store and we will give you, free of charge, a pair of brake shims. These are just a shaped piece of plastic to take the place of the disc while the wheel is off - they often have a clip which goes onto the retaining pin to keep them in place (but not all pads are held in with a pin so then it is just friction).

Keep an ear out when braking. If the note changes and sounds more scrapy than braky it could well be that the pads are worn out. It's harder to see the state of the pads with disc brakes than rim brakes so get in a good light and/or shine a torch on the caliper. If you do this from time to time then you'll see better the difference between normal and worn. Sometimes riders are surprised at how thin the material is on a new pad. I've had people come in to buy new ones and told them that the current ones are not even half worn so no need to change them yet. (Sometimes I'm not a very good salesman. :) ) Discs of course wear too and if your disc is badly scored it will merely chew up new pads - happily, discs last a long time normally.

When buying pads either bring along the old ones or take a picture of them. Occasionally someone will turn up asking for new pads and I'll ask what it is for, to which they might reply "It's a Specialized..." Things are a little better now than when disc brakes first proliferated but there are still dozens of possibilities, just as there are with cars and it is the type of caliper that matters - the name of the bike is rarely much help. And that goes for most other parts too.

We were talking before about taking a wheel off and if you do, be careful when it goes back on. If you have conventional quick release wheels - they have a spindly skewer with little springs at each end - make sure the wheel is fully home in the drop-outs of the bike when you do up the QR lever. It is easy for the wheel to move a fraction as the lever is done up so a little weight downwards helps hold it in place. If it isn't fully located then you can get disc or rim brake rubbing. On the rear it can also throw the gears out a little. Many bikes now have bolt-through axles and these have the advantage of always locating the wheel correctly - but do keep them greased. Also, watch that the disc is going exactly between the pads and not up the inside of one of them - it's easily done. (On that note, many racing teams continued with rim brakes for the very pragmatic reason that the wheels are faster to change when a rider gets a puncture - those few extra seconds really matter when the peloton is disappearing up the road from you at 30mph!)

Like rear mechs, discs are vulnerable to getting bent so be careful lying the bike down that the disc is not taking any of the weight of the bike - again, the back of a car is the most likely scenario. If you're doing home maintenance, check the brake caliper bolts are tight periodically and the hoses are not kinked or rubbing on the wheel. With rim brakes the pads can develop a lip on them (I don't mean they get in a mood) which causes them to stick and drag. If there's plenty of other pad left then these can be trimmed off and the pads readjusted (because as they wear, the pad moves slowly up or down the rim, depending on the type of brake). Cable operated brakes need more faffing about with to keep in adjustment whereas hydraulics are self-adjusting and should only need pads replacing, until the day comes that you need to change the brake fluid - something we tend to neglect, rather like we do with our cars.

Rim brakes need pretty true wheels to work properly - one advantage of discs is that a little wobble in the wheel has no effect on the braking and of course the rim can merely be a rim - it doesn't have a braking surface to get worn and therefore weaken the structural integrity of the wheel.

There's a lot more to say here but as we are getting into TLDR territory (too long, didn't read) I'd best call it a day. If anyone has any special requests for articles then do let us know.

18/10/2025

To continue our occasional series of helpful hints and tips, today we would like to discuss cleaning.

For a long time we at Cycle Art and Giant always encouraged riders to keep their bikes clean. "Cleanliness is next to godliness!" we would say.

Now, however we are asking clients to be a bit more circumspect with their brushes and sponges.

Why the apparent reversal?

Well, it all falls under the heading of "Too much of a good thing can be bad:" Food is good - too much food is bad. Beer is good - too much beer is not so good. A bicycle is good - more bicycles are even better... (ok, so it doesn't work for everything :) ).

First some basic rules that have never changed:

Never use a hosepipe on your bike or pour buckets of water over it. Jet-washing is right out. (Ok so we all know what the cyclo-cross boys do when racing but they just accept that their bottom brackets won't last the season.) Bicycles don't have huge draggy seals on critical bearings like cars do, so if you spray them with water you are not only removing the muck from your bike but also driving it deep into critical components.

Now we come to the more subtle stuff. Degreaser cleaning fluid. Not knocking it - we sell plenty and it's top notch for cleaning dirty chains and sprockets. But slosh it over hubs, bottom brackets or headsets and it can get in the bearings. Being a bit dumb, degreaser doesn't know the difference between a dirty chain and a bearing so it just degreases both. Modern commercial bearings are not overendowed with grease at the best of times so the last thing they need is degreaser to remove the little that they do have - because then they are running dry, with considerable detriment to their longevity.

This has reached such a state that it has almost become the case that a gleaming bike coming into the shop for work actual raises a small red flag. Has it been over-cleaned - will the bearings therefore be rough as chuff?

Ok, you might say - but how can I clean my chain in particular, without getting a load of cleaning fluid on the rear sprockets and maybe into the hub? Well, this is not a selling exercise but you can buy chain cleaning devices which act like a mini car-wash for chains but critically keeping most of the fluid in the device. (We do not recommend chain removal to clean as so many require the use of a new link when refitting and also could be directional - it can all get a little complicated.) Basically, what I am saying here is don't spray cleaning products all over your bike, w***y nilly. As mentioned above, the key areas to avoid are the rear hub, bottom bracket, front hub and headset (steering) bearings. Put your spray onto a cloth to wipe down general areas like frame/forks/cranks etc etc.

A quick better-than-nothing chain clean is to pedal the chain backwards through a cloth, moving the cloth round regularly until the chain is not leaving any grime on it. Clearly this isn't touching the dirt right in between the links though. When doing this, have a look at your jockey wheels (the little wheels in the rear derailleur) - these can get choked with a thick gooey paste of muck and chain l**e. Again, pedalling the bike backwards, put a small flat-headed screwdriver onto these wheels and it will peel off the gunk in a lovely ribbon of dirt.

To get the grime out of your cassette (the rear sprockets) we can sell you a special thin brush or you can even just get in there with a cloth held taut between your hands. It's a labour of love either way mind - do watch your fingers on the teeth - and remember to put the degreaser on the cloth or brush rather than spray it on the cogs where some might get into the hub. Removing the rear wheel makes this job much easier but only do that if you are confident about refitting it.

After all this cleaning, your chain will need re-lubing. Rinse or dry off any cleaning product you have used and apply a small drop of l**e to each link of your chain as you very slowly pedal backwards with your hand again. Little and often is the key to chain lubrication. If you flood the chain with oil it will merely fling off all over your legs and the rest of the bike. Not good. Be super careful using any Teflon oil sprays. They are great for getting some l**e onto the complex pivots and bearings within your rear and front mechs but watch where the excess spray is going - it is all too easy for some to spray through the wheel and, yes, you guessed it, onto the rear brake disc.

On the subject of brake discs, you can use degreasers on them too but thoroughly rinse them off afterwards. However, because discs are close to hubs do be careful - my advice is that unless the discs are heavily soiled just clean them with a clean dry cloth that never sees any lubricants. (In the workshop we remove the discs to do a thorough clean, just as we do for chains and cassettes.)

We will do brakes fully in our next installment. I can feel the excitement already.

16/09/2025

Unfortunately we've had a break-in at the shop early this morning (Tuesday 16th September).

Once CSI have been we should be able to reopen but we'll post again to keep our customers informed.

Update: Just to reassure you - no customer bikes have been taken, only our own stock.

Update 2: We are now re-open.

06/09/2025

To our customers - our sincere apologies but our card machine is currently inoperative this morning (Sat 6th Sept) and we are unable to get through to our card machine provider (which is in itself not a good sign) for support. If you have a repair to collect or want to purchase something then please bring cash or wait until we have put up another notice saying that we are up and running again.

29/08/2025

After a recent sorry procession of brand new internet-bought bikes coming through our doors for sorting out - accompanied in many cases by the client's realisation that they have bought the wrong bike for their type of riding (and, in many cases, the wrong size too) - we feel moved to list the many benefits of getting your new bike from a proper face-to-face cycle shop.

Now, it may be said we would argue this wouldn't we? Being that we are a face-to-face store; but we would always rather a rider went to ANY good local shop for their new cycle than make the mistake of buying online. So without further ado, here are the principle benefits of buying a bike from your local store:

* Advice. The vast experience that a good local shop has will help you avoid the most common pitfalls.

* Test rides - is this bike really what you need as opposed to desiring?

* Sizing - absolutely vital you try the bike for size. It's worth bearing in mind that one brand's 54cm is what another manufacturer calls a 52.5 and one "large" is another's "medium". It gets worse, because frames are measured traditionally on the seat-tube length but a much better measure is the top tube (crossbar) length; therefore getting a "54" because that's what you had before might leave you with a racy frame that is far too much of a stretch. There's not the space here to go into the complexities of frame sizing, suffice to say they must be tried and expert advice sought.

* Bike preparation. It is not possible to prepare a bike and then box it so it is ready to ride for the person pulling it out at the other end. Sometimes "90% ready" or similar is claimed. This is disingenuous at best. Our bikes also arrive in boxes and it takes a skilled mechanic - with all the correct tools and years of experience - a good hour to hour & a half to complete the bike. It would in fact be pointless to attempt a full prep on a bike going out in a box, as, by the time that bike has gone through some transport warehouse, been banged about and then put on another truck for delivery before being slammed down onto the pavement outside your house, most, if not all, that preparation will be undone - as the sorry procession of damaged and ill-prepped internet cycles brought into us everyday can testify.

* Closely related to sizing is fitting. Once we are certain of the size, the bike still needs to be fitted to the client. There is a lot that goes into this - far more than can be detailed here - but it can include a change of stem length or other components to get the fit exactly correct. All bikes come with a free fit here at Cycle Art.

* A free first service. Vital in order to catch all those items like brakes and especially gears that rapidly settle in and need a re-tweak.

* Someone there if things go wrong. No shop is perfect and no mechanical object is either. But your local store will sort out any issues and also handle any warranty claims for you. A warehouse 200 miles away is of little use here. (Their usual get out, we hear, being that "You haven't set it up correctly...")

* There are other more subtle but very real advantages. Like most shops, we'll fix pretty much any cycle but when two last-minute-before-that-weekend-ride rush-jobs come in and a shop has to choose between sorting a bike they have sold as against an internet bike, naturally they will want to reward the customer who came to them.

The only advantage that mail-order can have is price and even that by no means always. If you've seen a good price online, approach your local store - they probably won't want to match a price from what the trade calls a "sell and forget" store (also known as "box shifters") but they may be able to get reasonably close.

There is one final factor: keeping your local store. We love giving out advice, sorting those fiddly issues and doing repairs. However, on their own, these won't keep the lights on. A rep told us cheerfully that between 4 and 5 bike shops are closing per week in the UK. We want to be here for you, our loyal customers.

23/05/2025

Rain. It's that wet stuff that used to fall from the sky - you may remember it.

Well it is back tonight - anytime now really - and pretty heavy too for a while. There's also some much lighter precipitation forecast for tomorrow morning.

We only mention it as after all this dry weather, newly wet roads can be really slippery.

(The roads are now covered in tiny bits of rubber from car tyres and little bits of oil that fall off vehicles when they stop and turn hard - hence roundabouts and junctions are the worst affected. And this invisible gunge has not been washed away for weeks.)

Whether on two wheels or four, take care - leave plenty of gap and tiptoe round those corners.

05/05/2025

Happy Early May Bank Holiday. It's dry and cool today and less windy than yesterday, so pretty good cycling weather.

Just a quick reminder that Cycle Art is closed on Bank Holidays. So we will be back open on Tuesday (6th May).

Cycle Art

07/01/2026

20/12/2025

06/12/2025

29/11/2025

19/11/2025

29/10/2025

18/10/2025

16/09/2025

06/09/2025

29/08/2025

23/05/2025

05/05/2025

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Monday	10am - 5pm
Tuesday	10am - 5pm
Wednesday	9am - 5pm
Thursday	10am - 5pm
Friday	10am - 6pm
Saturday	9am - 5pm