A good quality workstand isn’t essential for looking after your bike but once you have one you’ll begin to wonder how you ever managed without. One of the main problems with them has always been the price
Workstands worth buying tend to cost around £200. Anything nearer £100 is fine in the short term, but experience has shown that they just won’t last, be strong enough, stable enough, or will simply be superseded by a new model in a year’s time, leaving you short of parts should you need to repair yours. So just a fiver over £150 is a good price for a stand – so long as it works.
The Sport-Mechanic does work well and there’s little doubt, if used properly, it should last you for years. The main tubes – the legs and the two sections of the upright – are constructed from good quality black anodised aluminium alloy. The legs fold out to a wide and stable triangle nearly 1.4m in diameter, and there’s an impressive height adjustment range, from 107-166cm.
The clamps for securing the legs and the two sections that form the main upright feature easy-to-use wingnuts rather than the dearer quick-releases used on Feedback’s more expensive stands, and we found the whole workstand very solid and stable in use. Our only concern is with the clamp on the head. The jaws open to a huge 48mm, and close right up to hold a 20mm diameter tube tightly enough, but we’re not keen on how the clamping is achieved.
Opening and closing the jaws is done using a T-shaped bar at the front of the head – it’s just a threaded bolt that moves the jaws closer together or further apart. In the wrong hands, it would be all too easy to overtighten this, and it’s easily strong enough to crush a lightweight tube. This is still a very good stand for the money, just make sure you take care when using it.
This article was originally published in Cycling Plus magazine, available on Apple Newsstand and Zinio.