I can’t really claim there was any pressing need to replace my bicycle stand, which I’ve been using for a couple of years now in the Workshop in the Sky. Its shortcomings are more annoyances than fatal flaws. For starters, the folding action is very stiff and requires a couple of minutes of wrestling each time. As a result, I don’t fold it up often (although I should whenever it’s not in use, so it won’t block the emergency kick-through panel at the end of the balcony).

More importantly, as I don’t have a lot of seatpost sticking out above the frame — my legs are not so long, and neither Kuroko nor Dionysus has a sloping top tube — the saddle nose would interfere with the crank to tighten the clamp. This made for some awkward two-handed lift-tighten-clamp operations, sometimes repeatedly before the bike was secure enough to work on.

Enter the Park Tool PCS-10.2

I’d been watching bike restorers on YouTube with their Park Tool stands with some envy. The small handle on the clamp would surely clear Kuroko’s saddle, I thought, and the swing handle’s stepless adjustment would be useful. (The previous stand has a usable system with a good number of steps, but of course there were those times when I wanted a position just between two adjacent steps.)

I finally bit the bullet and bought the Park Tool Home Mechanic Repair Stand, after confirming the Halfakid would take my old stand. The box was delivered on Monday, four days ahead of schedule, and I arrived home from work to find it sitting in the foyer. I dragged it into the dining room and removed the outer packaging, and then let it sit there until I had some time to put it together.

Today’s the day

I’d originally planned to ride today, but an iffy tummy made me change plans. Kuroko needed looking after anyways, so it was a good opportunity to get the new stand assembled. There were just a few big pieces in the packaging and a number of smaller bits (and a lot of plastic and cardboard packaging). The list of parts on the instruction sheet seemed to indicate a lot of the parts were missing, but I soon realized that a lot of the assembly was already done, and this accounted for the missing parts.

Out with the old and …

Assembly was not difficult. I was working in the dining room so I had to be careful not to ding or scratch the wood flooring. The most difficult part was matching up the part numbers in the instructions with the diagram. Before I knew it I had a completed work stand.

Of course, the old stand is covered with grime after a couple of years out on the Workshop in the Sky with no protection. I cleaned it up before packing it up for the Halfakid.

It doesn’t quite fit into the box that the Park Tool stand came in (at least not without further disassembly).

Debut

With those bits out of the way, it was time for the Park Tool PCS-10.2’s debut. (And yes, I confess to having cleaned up the Workshop in the Sky for this photo shoot.)

The new stand is massive, compared to the old one, meaning it should be a lot more stable. The folding action is very smooth (so far — let’s see after it’s covered in a couple of years’ worth of grime). And best of all, the crank handle to clamp the bike in the stand clears the saddle nose.