The Life Cycle of a Re-cycled bike . . . where there’s a wheel there’s a way

A little clarity is needed; when we say ‘re-cycled’ some folks think ‘re-used’ and that is, of course, what we want to happen. But what ever we call it, what is happening is we are breathing life back into old machines, preserving their embedded energy and their long bicycle memories of all the lovely rides they have been on. Some bikes will have given as many as 50 years of good service to their owners and will be up for maybe another 50 more when we have done a wee bit of tinkering with their internals. Others, sad to say, are not made of such sterling stuff.

So . . . we collect unwanted bicycles from waste sites throughout North Yorkshire, and we receive donations at our depot from individuals who are kind enough to bring them to us. Then, bikes are sorted into those we can re-furbish and those we will strip for parts. Each bike that is re-furbished will go through our workshops and receive new parts and a full service from our team of mechanics. Where possible we use second hand parts, and we keep a stock of parts that are now obsolete to keep older bikes on the road. The final part of the process is that all bikes get a test ride and a clean and a polish. We do our best to return them to their former glory, they are then put on sale in our showroom with a three month warranty or they may be donated to needy individuals or projects.