Bike Manufacturers Are Making Bikes Less Repairable

Don't get me wrong, there is something there. Everyone can be trained to fix older mechanical things. This is true. And I, for the life of me, cannot understand why people get bikes that need apps to run. That is just baffling.

So, change this to "ebikes are not being designed with repairability in mind" and I think I lose near all of my complaint. I do have worries about people not realizing how powerful ebikes are. Reminds me of early dirt motorcycles you could work on back in the day. Didn't take too many kids getting hurt before people took those seriously, I don't think. Odd to see us go right back down that path all because a lot of parents assume the battery tech is the same as it was a decade or so ago.

Otherwise, doing routine/basic maintenance on a car, such as changing the oil, requires a means of getting under the car (ramps or jack and stands) and of handling large amounts of fluids (drain pan and funnel) neither of which you need to do the equivalent work on a bike.

A torque wrench is much more important for car maintenance than for bike maintenance (and you'll need a bigger one!). Depending on the condition of your car you may want a breaker bar.

Obviously doing anything with the suspension requires a spring compressor, and troubleshooting certain engine problems requires a compression tester, but those are needed infrequently enough that they can be rented or borrowed.

And that's before getting into the model-specific specialized tools for something like a timing belt change, or anything electronic (though I recommend anyone with a car should get a cheap Bluetooth OBDII reader).

A torque wrench is a specialized tool...for torquing a fastener. I use the torque wrench to torque fasteners on my truck, my motorcycle, some random piece of equipment I want to repair, etc.

I have seal drivers for driving seals on my motorcycle. I also can use them on hydraulic cylinders, or any other random seal I want to drive in.

The only truly specialized piece of auto repair tooling I have is a tool that is cast and machined specifically to fit inside the engine head to remove a portion of the valvetrain for maintenance. It's a very boring once you understand how it works, but I'm not using it for anything else.

As for a spring compressor, I've been doing suspension work for about a decade now and used one zero times. You just don't need it for routine maintenance. I guess if a spring breaks, you would need it in some weird circumstance possibly.

And a chain whip, and a lockring bit for brakes/cassette, and another bit for the bottom bracket, and some pin spanners maybe, a derailer alignment gauge, maybe crank puller, tire levers, chain breaker, and master link pliers. Hydraulic brakes? Bleed kit, piston press. Pneumatic suspension? Shock pump. Tubeless? Better get a syringe to refill sealant through valves (and don't forget the valve core wrench) or reset your tires every time you need new sealant.