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@DFP
Found some stelvio tyres on planet-x for £10 each. Probably my best bargain. May by another as a spare. Hopefully the bright yellow looks ok with the more neon-pastel yellow on the frame.
Finding adequate shifters was a bit of a headache, but in the end I settled for bar end shifters. I have no experience of these and I hope they work! Got them bundled with the levers on ebay for just under £40. Very well used, so not exactly a bargain. But I think they will be less clumsy for the small handed person this is for, plus the friction left shifter will be compatible with triple or double. I hadnt decided on the chainset/gearing at the time to this was useful. The seatpost is a really nice aero tricolour 600 one from my own bike which has the full group. I do not have it on emine because it is too short. I tried it in the fontana and it was infuriatingly too tight. I started to force it in like an oaf, but stopped myself just in time to realise I was chewing it up. Seat tube probably needs a ream. I ordered a new set of miche brakes from wiggle for around £18 which seemed great value. They were long drop, which means good re-usability if this bike doesn't work out. Bar tape was just £2 a roll from CRC, got 2 sets. Cream colour, hopefully similar enough to the other yellows to not look ridiculous.
My next big challenge was choosing a chainset. This proved to be the biggest pain in the world, for the life of me I could not find what i wanted. 160mm chainsets didnt really exist and I couldnt find any 165mm ones. I trawled every classifieds and asked everyone on ebay. The main options I was choosing between was:
160mm triple compact from spa cycles:
http://www.spacycles.co.uk/products.php?plid=m2b0s109p2000
Or these 165mm 105 octalink chainset from ebay overseas:
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/260972269793?ssPageName=STRK:MEWAX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1438.l2649#ht_2450wt_1165
The triple didnt appeal because it was a compact and would look out of place on a racing bike. Too utilitarian. After going through gear calculators many times I decided that a big double up front combined with a wide range cassette on the back would give by far the best ratios. This option would also allow me to re-use good quality long cage derailieurs I already own.
But adding in the cost of the octalink tool which I dont have, and the very specific octalink BB required. It seemed too expensive.
In the end out of frustration I went for an oddball solution. I gambled on a shimano 600 chainset auction I saw finishing on ebay. Getting it for around £27. I found out later it was 170mm. I own a 165mm tricolour crankset (without road rings) that I used to use on my fixed bike. I will transplant chainrings over and sell the 170mm crank arms. I also get a free BB. Hopefully the chainrings are in good shape, then this may work out well.
Yesterday/Today I got fed up with the bike not having a headset to hold the forks in place. I got the hammer out and bashed a 105 headset of a broken frame I have and started to go about getting it on. Again I ran into problems. The crown race never seemed fully tight against bottom surface no matter how much I hit it. I tried to control my frustrations but ended up bashing away. Thankfully I never damaged anything. But there is still a hairline gap.
Later, I realised that the top nut needed a spacer underneath as the steerer was slightly long. I had to go salvaging of yet another unused frame to get one, which turned out to be too tight. Again silly me bashed it on. Which left it stuck, cannot imagine getting it off again! The annoying thing was that now not ENOUGH threads where showing. So I could only screw on top nut halway, and it seemed to go on cross threaded too. FUCK. Everything is going wrong.
Need to use less hammers! And be patient enough to go to LBS and get things reamed, threads chased etc. Even if I wanted to get new headset now, going to have to get spacer in a vice to get it off again.