You are reading a single comment by @Matti and its replies.
Click here to read the full conversation.
London Fixed Gear and Single-Speed is a community of predominantly fixed gear and single-speed cyclists in and around London, UK.
This site is supported almost exclusively by donations. Please consider donating a small amount regularly.
@Matti
What started as a relaxed budget project for my female-partner has now become a nerdy full-on secret birthday project for her
Last fall we started planning a build for her. She doesn't know much about cycling, and building a bike is somewhat a lost cause for her. She doesn't really want to build the thing, she just wants to know how it feels to ride a smooth bike. She wants gears, and she definitely has a certain opinionated taste for the bike aesthetics, so i think i will have some luck in pushing some bike culture her way.
Right now she drives around on a rusted piece of junk, so to speak.. Its my responsibility to get her rid of that thing, and i will gladly do so. I've begun planning a cute little steel bike for her. Hopefully she will end up happy with the result, and she will begin riding around herself and experience the joy of bike riding.
I recently stumbled upon a Gitane frame in her size. It's a fine frame with a nice paint job in a marbled-blue style with yellow lettering. Tubing is columbus cromor. A true race frame, without any fender mounts. She will have to do without.. Like most of my other projects, i can't control myself, so i ended up buying a used Dura Ace 7700 group set for the bike. I want the group to run on down tube shifters, and have the bike fitted with a more relaxed milano-style handlebar. She recently had a bad case of scleroderma inflammation (i google translated that one) in her wrists, and needs a more comfortable riding position. So it will be a pseudo racing bike with a more touring minded-setup i guess..!
Setup so far:
Gitane Colombus cromor sz 50
Dura ace 7700
Suntour downtube shifters
Mavic open sport wheelset
Cinelli 1a 110mm + Belleri handlebars (and a can of coke for the fitting)
no name polished seat post
Regal saddle
Yellow tressostar bar tape
gatorskin 23mm tyres
I have already started building the thing slowly, and i expect it to be finished by the end of next week. As all bike builds, unexpected things do happen, and i don't think that this will be any different. Lets see how it turns out! I am quite excited to reveal this one to her. She literally has no clue that i am building it for her
More pictures to come.