Gideon's bike life - Genesis, Graham Weigh, Cinelli, Land Shark & Ritchey

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Paul-donohue-853-Graeme-Weighs-52-Top-Tube/254274780719?hash=item3b33f53e2f:g:4c4AAOSwi6tdESLZ

About a foot smaller

Ha, yes, it is quite similar at a glance, though as @TM points out, is a fair bit smaller. Would even be surprised if that was as much as a 52cm top tube.

Would fit a certain someone tho.

Mavic track nuts are made of cheese. Got properly stuck on & rounded with a spanner, thankfully, it wasn't too tough to saw it into a shape I could wrench off with some mole grips. Least I don't have to worry about getting punctures on this as much now.

1 Attachment

Turns out, Mavic use 9mm nuts on their wheels & I didn't have any lying around so had to swap wheels. Put drops on & I quite like this setup.

1 Attachment

Is that 9mm front and back?

Yep, looks like it.

niccee!

whats the rims on the new wheels?? I just bought a pair of suzues hmmmmm

These wheels are usually on my Graham Weigh, just a temporary switch really, but the Ellipses are knackered, so ought to replace them properly at some point.

Woo, the Suzue hubs are lovely - super smooth. Not sure what the rims are, there's no information on them. They look like pretty basic box section wheels, not got a machined braking surface. I bought the wheels from @ldphotoworks originally, they might know?

Picked up my Croix de Fer on Monday & rode it to Manchester on Tuesday via the Transpennine Trail to see my mum for her birthday. Turns out it was an awful decision as I'm pretty sure I ended up with heatstroke, there being scant few places to get water on the canals & old trainlines of the route. Was bleedin' hot, but also very pretty. Here's a shot of the Woodhead reservoir.

Rode the bike again on Wednesday & I'm not sure the original issue has been resolved. The front brake still doesn't feel anywhere near strong enough. I took the pads out & they've got plenty of life in, & are bedded in, it's just when I pull the lever the pistons don't go in anywhere near enough. Getting mighty sick of this now, as it's cost a fair bit of money & eight weeks & it's still not resolved. I'll be taking the bike back to my LBS next week.

In the meantime, it's payday & I'm hovering over the buy it now button of a Ritchey Swiss Cross disc frameset on eBay. Paying for maintenance is no fun, getting new bikes is much more fun. Proper umming & ahhing.

1 Attachment

So I've ended up buying a Ritchey Swiss Cross frameset this morning, & my cheeky Ultegra R8020 offer has quite surprisingly been accepted. Guess it's new bike times.

Ruminating over how to build up this new bike. I've got a spare set of wheels which should work, & I reckon I've got enough spare parts lying around to play with the fit before I invest in some nicer stuff. Hopefully should be here around next weekend. For the finishing kit I'm considering Ultimate USE since I liked the stuff I saw in a bike shop the other week.

In the meantime, I've been riding my MASH in a different guise again - setup for a pretty hilly ride on Sunday (this road in the wet was not messing around) in road fixed mode. Threw some levers I bought from @TM on a spare set of bars I had lying around. Definitely need more compact bars & to play around with the position a bit, but think it'll work well for winter.

1 Attachment

That looks great! I think I've got some compact Cannondale bars you can borrow to see if you prefer the fit if that's any help?

Looks fun, thinking of putting some drop bars on my vigorelli for some fast laps of regents park

Wow, Spenny Mc Spen Spen.

My justification is that I've just bought a house & the solicitors charged me stamp duty, however, being a first time buyer, I'm not liable for that, so I'm in the process of getting it back. It's going to take like three months to get the money back, & I've mentally waved goodbye to it, so when it does come back, it can recompense me for my new bike. The only way I've been able to justify it anyway, aha.

Cheers, Loz. I'll have a looksee what we have in stock in the house's bike room & maybe get back to you. Any idea what model they are?

Frameset came & I chucked some wheels on - it's proper lovely. Excited to build this up!

1 Attachment

Nope! Sorry! I'll have a dig in the shed tomorrow and see if I can unearth them.

More Saturday morning playing around with building with some old finishing kit I had lying around (position not final!). I think it's looking a bit too all-black-everything, & it could do with some colour/lightening up a bit. Maybe go jazzy on the bar tape.

Turns out the wheels I'd previous managed to squeeze an eleven speed cassette on for my CdF won't fit an Ultegra casette, so looks like I'm going to have to get some different ones & perhaps faff around with the freehub body. I do quite like the idea of some silver Hope RS4s on H+Son Hydras, but that's potentially quite spendy. Going to see what I can get through trade via the various friends I have who work in different bike shops.

1 Attachment

The 11 speed cassette on your cdf was MTB, so would fit 10 speed freehub. Road 11 speed is wider.

There’s a new ultegra 11-34 cassette which will fit on your existing hub, but I know you don’t want to hear this.

Spend spend spend! New wheels!!!

Ah, that's great as I'm not quite full on #buyer!

Ordered one of those & a few bits more last night. The only bit of putting this bike together which I can't/don't feel comfortable trying is bleeding the hydraulic brakes. Had a thought though, since the hose routing is totally external on this bike, I could just take off the levers & calipers & drop them off at a bike shop for them to set them up without being on a bike, couldn't I? Would save the faff of getting to a bike shop with the bike.

I gave my Croix de Fer to my LBS earlier in the week to resolve the front brake issue again, & got it back on Thursday. Rode it on a gravelly road ride with a good few hills & the brake issue has returned, grr. Must be a leak in the system somewhere. Very frustrated. Guess I'll have to investigate myself.

Oh & this morning I realised that the driveside pedal thread has debonded from the carbon crank, so had to do a last minute swap before the ride at six this morning. Honestly want to throw that bike in the bin at the moment.

1 Attachment

Urgh, seems I've fallen foul of the numerous different types of disc brake mount, & ordering new ones based on the wrong catalogue model of the frame (can't figure out what year this frame is). There doesn't happen to be anyone after a pair of flat mount hydro Ultegra R8070 disc brakes reading this, does there?

Ordered a set of post mount Hope RX4s since all the Shimano post mount ones were ugly. Ideally wanted silver but they don't seem to be available anywhere. Hopefully I can get it right this time.

#buyer

You could have just ordered deore callipers.

Your idea is an interesting one but really you’re asking for trouble, just get a shop to fit and bleed them on the bike.

If they haven’t replaced the caliper, then it’s either that or the hose.

Just get them to fit a new caliper and hose.
Or set fire to it and get GRX 1x.