Moseley Jane - Fix your bike: repairs and maintenance for happy cycling

More and more people are choosing two wheels over four to get around town, both for leisure and work purposes. Urban cycling ticks all the boxes, just see what it can do for you.

Its good for you from a freedom, fiscal, fresh air and physical fitness point of view: your bank balance, metabolic rate, endorphin levels and immune system will all go up. You will get more sleep at night after all the exercise, you will reduce the stress you put on your knees if you have been jogging to work, and research has shown that your mental fitness is also likely to increase. Its a win/win and its also a win/lose, as youll be burning not money or fuel but calories up to 600 an hour, depending on your size, speed and steepness of incline. You will save on commuter emissions, personal costs, stress and time (in most places), and whats more (or less OK, thats enough) you wont be adding to the planets sky-rocketing pollution levels. Your upper body tone and leg muscles will firm up and you will get fitter as your wallet gets fatter. Youll be leaner and the world will be greener. Its fun and free. Result.

Theres no need to put yourself and your bike under excessive (tyre) pressure and start by cycling every day. A few times a week is fine (once a week at first) and youll soon get the bug, and not the one from coughing commuters. And if you dont carry a lock on your regular commute, and leave it at work instead, youll resist the temptation to hit the bar on the way home because you cant leave your bike unlocked. Like a Tantalus but in reverse. Once safely parked and locked up (your bike, not you), you might just head to the gym instead.

Cycling is a low-impact, high-reward form of travel. See how it works out as you work out on www. cycletoworkcalculator.com

French mathematician Jacques Ozanam throws down gauntlet to inventors to come up with a horseless carriage in his book Recreations Mathematiques et Physiques.

Eccentric German baron Karl von Drais patents his steerable, two-wheeled Laufmaschine (running machine), aka draisine or hobby/dandy-horse.

Englishman William Sawyer invents a four-wheeled velocipede using foot treadles. Around the same time, Scotsman Kirkpatrick Macmillan designs what is credited (by some) to be the first pedal cycle.

Pierre Michaux (or son Ernest) adapts a draisine with cranks and pedals. Pierre Lallement also credited with a similar invention the first boneshakers.

Michaux forms a company with the Olivier brothers to mass-produce two-wheeled velocipedes.

Jules Suriray patents ball bearings for wheel hubs.

The unfeasibly large high wheel bicycle (aka penny farthing or ordinary) is developed.

James Starley designs the tangent-spoke wheel, used by builders of almost all bikes ever since (and borrowed by the automobile, motorbike and aviation industries).

William Grout invents the first folding bike (possibly).

John Kemp Starley launches his Rover Safety Bicycle with a chain-driven rear wheel and two similar-sized wheels. His company will become the British Rover automobile company. The increased safety is matched by a rise in popularity.

Scotsman John Boyd Dunlop invents the pneumatic tyre, and the bicycle is now on a roll.

Lightweight bikes with diamond-pattern frames, chain drives, pneumatic tyres and brakes are now being mass-produced.

William Reilly develops a two-speed internal gear hub.

The first Tour de France is held.

Paul de Vivie invents the first derailleur gears.

Alex Moulton releases his first iconic small-wheeled bicycle; it becomes a Swinging Sixties trendsetter. Al Fritz designs the Schwinn Sting-Ray, a wheelie bike that resembles a chopper motorbike.

Mountain bikes are developed in California; in 1977 Joe Breeze produces his first Breezer. Children riding wheelie bikes and racing on dirt tracks inspire the development of BMX.

Before you start looking into the different kinds of bike available, heres a brief guide to the major components. Youll notice that for every pro there seems to be a con, and vice versa, but hopefully this review will help you to home in on the issues that are key for you. (For buying a bike the right size, see .)