This topic is related to the origins of Blue Liquid Labs. Solving creaky CSU’s with loctite. I thought I’d post about this here because if I don’t, this topic might fall victim to historical revisionism. It all started with my 2002 Rockshox Psylo SL. After only a year of riding, it began to creak horribly. The internet was still in its early period so there was no good information about this type of thing. Bike shops were still the main source of information and at the time, the people working there preferred to pretend like creaking issues didn’t exist. You were essentially a crazy person if you started pondering aloud about what this mysterious creaking might be linked to. It was almost as bad as if you came in and started contemplating where bigfoot might live. Getting help was hopeless.

This is pretty close to what you could call the genesis of Blue Liquid Labs. If we’re being honest, it all came about due to a form of North American poverty. Not the type of poverty that’s necessarily an immediate threat to your life, just the type that’s going to insure that you’ll always be on sub-par equipment.

This is probably what I’m best known for, with bushing sizing tools specifically being at center stage. Although strangely, the sizing tools weren’t the first thing I came up with. The first mountain bike tool I actually ever thought of was the bushing removal tool. I worked at a shop in 2010 and I had to remove a set of bushings using their tool. The bushings were stuck in the lower casting and the slide hammer on the bushing removal tool just wasn’t enough to get the bushings out. As I was slamming the slide hammer, I immediately designed my bushing removal tool in my mind. Obviously it was heavily inspired by the Park Tool headset punch but it would be many years until I actually made the tool.

I hardly sold any of these but I thought this was a cool project. It all came about because my rear shock sealhead unscrewed itself and spewed all its oil. While I was rebuilding the shock, I put in the only other shock I had, which was 7.875 inches eye to eye. That was much shorter than the original 8.5 inch eye to eye. It turned out to be an eye opening experience. The bike suddenly became low and slack. The cornering improved massively. It felt stable and planted.