Bike Anti-Porn - When Things Go Wrong

Yeah, yeah, I know it was a brave choice of colour, but I like it. I believe it's called raspberry and not pink ;oP
I get that roadbikes should stay as roadbikes, but 531tubed single speed frames are way too expensive for most starters (well, too expensive for me anyway).

My first bike was an S&R Free Spirit, but it was a rip-off of a Schwinn stingray. But with a very gay, rainbow paint job. Decent bike, though, I guess. But it probably weighed a ton....

Ideally I'd like roadbikes to stay as roadbikes

Some of those old steel road bikes were spaced 120mm, most were 126mm. Staying as a roadbike involves stuffing a 130mm hub into a space which wasn't designed to take it. I know you can spring it, or even get it cold set, but if I found a road frame with 120mm spacing and long slot dropouts, my first thought wouldn't be maintaining its spiritual purity by squeezing a cassette full of sprockets in there :-)

You don't have any knowledge of Sears in the UK?

S & R = Sears & Roebuck = the retail chain Sears once famous for their catalogs?

I realize you mean the bikes: by my understanding Free Spirit was Sears' house brand... and they varied widely in quality, from low price kids + utility bikes (think low end Columbia, not sure what this translates to in the UK) to pretty nice European-built racing bikes... I've only seen their fairly crappy bikes in person (my parents had Free Spirits when I was a kid).

loving the top tube on that yamaguchi

loving the top tube on that yamaguchi

It's pretty light and everything, but where am I going to put my Pengy® top-tube pad?

at least you can do that gay thing that bmxers do when they put their bent leg sideways over the top tube while coasting

Some of those old steel road bikes were spaced 120mm, most were 126mm. Staying as a roadbike involves stuffing a 130mm hub into a space which wasn't designed to take it. I know you can spring it, or even get it cold set, but if I found a road frame with 120mm spacing and long slot dropouts, my first thought wouldn't be maintaining its spiritual purity by squeezing a cassette full of sprockets in there :-)

Who said anything about sticking a 130mm hub in there? If its 126 then it was designed for 6/7 speed cassettes so stick one of them instead. As you say you can 're-purpose' it to 8 or above speeds by stretching to 130mm if you so wished.

Likewise if its 120mm and was intended to be a road bike then stick a 5 speed or ultra-6 speed cassette in there. If its intended for a track hub (then it'd likely have track ends) by all means fit one of them.

Of course this is all in an ideal world where we all have the luxury of not having to use old geared road bikes as single speed road/track bikes. But as its not that world I don't have a problem with ppl doing it. Just saying it'd be nice if bikes were kept as their original purpose. Just a personal opinion though.

I say all this despite having recently considered respacing (by cold setting) a 531 Raleigh road frame I have to 120mm for a single speed project I had in mind. As I say its not a perfect world.
NB. For the record I've decided (for now) not to mess with the frame and just get a 126mm single speed hub (or put some spacers on a 120mm seeing as I have a few spares).

BTW I came to this thread to post this too.

I quite like that..

Built for purpose not simply for the way it looks

is that purpose riding, whilst wearing a dress, on the track?

is that purpose riding, whilst wearing a dress, on the track?

The purpose would be to make it as aero as posible (while wearing a dress). Although dresses can't be very aero come to think of it.

YouTube - Fixed gear bike with Jerry shot in Orlando

anti-porn movie

You don't have any knowledge of Sears in the UK?

S & R = Sears & Roebuck = the retail chain Sears once famous for their catalogs?

I realize you mean the bikes: by my understanding Free Spirit was Sears' house brand... and they varied widely in quality, from low price kids + utility bikes (think low end Columbia, not sure what this translates to in the UK) to pretty nice European-built racing bikes... I've only seen their fairly crappy bikes in person (my
parents had Free Spirits when I was a kid).

I know who Sears are, just couldn't find out much about the bikes as stated.

On another note... WTF is going on with the rugger buggers on that bike???!!! Wrong in so many ways. For starters, they only have a mudguard on the front, leaving their arses free to get a good soaking!!!! Whatever floats your boat I guess?!

YouTube - Fixed gear bike with Jerry shot in Orlando

anti-porn movie

That just sucks.
Alot.

I can't believe I just watched that clip! what a waste of my life.
I can't get over the bars let alone the animal head thing!

Not even a could have been. Disgusting.
http://i40.tinypic.com/2w5okf7.jpg

can't see anything wrong with that myself, looks like a good honest singlespeed build.

Nothing at all is wrong with it, it's fixed, it's got one sided spd's for foot retention, good bars and mudguards. It works perfectly well and is a useable, useful bike. It's no Pengy.

It just looks fucking disgusting.

Oh, and

Oh my,
oh dear lord

Maybe it isn't shiny and tarty, but it looks like a decent bike all the same and pretty well thought out. If i could have 2 fixed i would have a nice one for posing and one like that for riding to work / when the weather was wet

Not even a could have been. Disgusting.
http://i40.tinypic.com/2w5okf7.jpg

Maybe it isn't shiny and tarty, but it looks like a decent bike all the same and pretty well thought out. If i could have 2 fixed i would have a nice one for posing and one like that for riding to work / when the weather was wet

http://www.londonfgss.com/post630255-3124.html

Ok, and now for some real, awful shit.