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If you want it to be cheap then I'd find an old second hand mountain bike with horizontal dropouts and convert it, would be very cheap if it had a screw on freewheel rear hub cos you could just redish and screw on a fixed cog. Other option would be to get something with enough meat around the dropout to file a bit of horizontal action and tension the chain. Personally I wouldn't go for a road frame because your choice of tyres will limit how much bumpy stuff you can ride and your much less likely to be able to fit V brakes, which I would also recommend.
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Being stingy and poor I want to spend as little money as possible
gt doesn't quite fit that..
pick up any old 'appollo' out of the local rag and follow momentum's sage advice
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where do you live?
There is the oldest shittyest supermarket style 'mountain bike' locked up outside my appartment, technically it belongs to me, but i gave it on permanent loan to my housemate who is an arsehole, so i would have no bones about telling you the lock combination,
has wheels and brakes,
birmingham
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Cheers guys.
Momentum - MTB with horizontal drop-outs would be ideal, but I won't hold my breath for finding one cheap. I thought as much about the road frame (plus I'd probably feel a bit guilty caning a 30 year old frame into the ground over a couple of weekends in the mud)
Jammy - Yeah, that bike would probably be perfect but when I said cheap I meant Lidl cheap! I suppose if it came complete I'd be saving some on parts...I'll see if I can spot one on Ebay.
Barber - Thanks for the offer, I'm in London though so the train ticket would probably be more than a bike.
What about parts? I'm guessing 165mm cranks would be a good idea. Ideally I'd want to avoid buying wheels, but if I have to build some cheap which fixed hubs would stand a beating?
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I saw a really cheap-and-nasty mountain bike in a skip on my way to work. If it's still there on my way back it'll be coming home to my garage...
Sounds interesting...would that be for your own enjoyment or would you be willing to spread the love?
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on-one 29er.. it's over budger but like all things in life you will want it and find the money
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Take a look at the Retrobike website. There are often cheap bikes on there, sometimes ss. One just went for thirty quid!
Cheers, I'll have a look now
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Momentum - MTB with horizontal drop-outs would be ideal, but I won't hold my breath for finding one cheap. I thought as much about the road frame (plus I'd probably feel a bit guilty caning a 30 year old frame into the ground over a couple of weekends in the mud)
I'm talking Lidld cheap! A lot of apollos and stuff still have horizontal dropours and if you look on gumtree you might fins something nicer but still really cheap from a a few years back. There's a lot less fixie skidding hipsters looking for MTBs so there hasn't been crazy inflation as there has with road bikes.
I wouldn't worry about cranks for two reasons. Firstly because you might well decide to go SS instead of fixed and so it won;t matter and secondly because if you are fixed you'll pedal strike anyway so it's cheaper to use whatever's on the bike when you get it!
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Well, I'll take a look, if I get it. I'm in Norwich, though - so it would have to be a hell of a freebie to warrant the journey. I'm after something off-road myself as well.
Fair enough, Norwich is a bit of a trek! Glad to see someone else is having the same idea as me. If you get the bike sorted stick some pics up and we can compare notes.
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I'm talking Lidld cheap! A lot of apollos and stuff still have horizontal dropours and if you look on gumtree you might fins something nicer but still really cheap from a a few years back.
Really? I used to have an Apollo when I was a yoot - buckled the tyres and let it rust into a solid lump in the garden. I'll keep a look out then
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I was thinking of getting an old bike and splashing out on a nice fork, front wheel and brake. Say, £300. This would give me a weird bloody bike, with v brake and shoddy old wheel on the rear, and a snazzy front end.
When I'd saved some more cash up, I could do stem/seatpost/bars/saddle. Then the final round would be frame/rear wheel/rear brake. Failing that I could keep a ratty old single speed MTB and get a geared MTB later on Cyclescheme.
Who knows? My bike-buying plans change weekly/daily/by the minute anyway. I'll check the skip on the way home.
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Seen plenty of XC bikes with V-brake rear and disc front. I imagine its a good set-up once you get used to it.
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Cheers guys.
What about parts? I'm guessing 165mm cranks would be a good idea. Ideally I'd want to avoid buying wheels, but if I have to build some cheap which fixed hubs would stand a beating?
I think any old fixed hub is fine for that: miche or whatever should do the trick, I would worry too much about short cranks either, mtb's have quite high bb's
chris
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SJS do a thorn crank triple - that comes in so many lengths - that's what's on my off road fixed... stick a bmx ring on there and you're away.
Although over budget my set up is:
A freshtripe single speed saracen
NS Bikes single speed disc hub (rear) to use a velo solo bolt on cog - this gives a much more convenient 46mm chainline and has much more scope for chainline adjustment
Thorn 160mm cranks (gearing's a bit low as the max chainring I can fit is 40 and the smallest bolt on cog is 16 - 15 clips the chain) so this helps
Hope front hubbits and bobs etc.
The thing is if you buy a good wheelset as above you can stick it on an old style mountain bike for now then build up the frame etc. whilst you're riding that - then swap them over.
Hope that helps
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Pulled the frame from a skip 501 tubes the rest of the bits came from boot sales etc the only new part was the saddle
1 Attachment
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nice find^
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Theres been an old steel, triple triangle (not GT though), MTB/trekking bike parked in exactly the same place (not locked, just standing), for a week now. By the nusery my nippa goes to. 90% sure its been dumped.
Really want to to take it home and corrupt it into a fixie mud bike. But its blatently way too big for me :(
Kinda sucks that no-one esle round my parts has bothered to do it TBH.
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Pulled the frame from a skip 501 tubes the rest of the bits came from boot sales etc the only new part was the saddle
Any idea what it is? Frame looks exactly like a Claud Butler Saragoza (I think that's the name) that I had.
Old rigid steel framed MTBs like this cost peanuts and are easy to convert to ss.
Momentum
jammy
rive_gauche
barber
Sparky
Greasy_Slag
Wheelnut
Smallfurry
Mr.C
Psychobikin
scott_free
TheBrick(Tommy)-
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About
Building an Offroad Fixed Gear on the Cheap
Posted by
Hello hello,
I've been thinking about putting together a fixed off-road setup, not for anything too hardcore but just to skid about through the muddy trails up in Hertforshire.
Being stingy and poor I want to spend as little money as possible, so a conversion of some sort is probably going to be the way forward. A shitty mountain bike with magic gear is one option - which would give me the best clearance for cross-tyres, mudguards etc. But I was also reading some stuff on 63xc.com suggesting an old racer could also do the job (?!)
Which would you go for? Anyone riding anything similar?
Cheers