Varonha Frameworks winter bike / FW Evans 650b conversion rat bike fun

Put them together fairly fastidiously, googling exactly what position the chainrings should be in relation to the arms, and where the arms should be in relation to the spider. Then spent ages trying to figure out what spacers I need and having a mild freak-out that I'd have to order some for £20. That's £20 for two thin circles of aluminium! Happily, I don't think I need any at all.

Then I had another mild freak-out thinking I'd lost one of the bottom bracket's dust seals... but found it still attached to the other cranks in the spares box.

I don't have a torque wrench that goes past 25 nm so they're not 100% correct, but they're good enough for me to get on with cabling if I feel the inclination.

Now I'm stuck on my own for xmas I might be glad of the diversion.

1 Attachment

The colour is more dark grey than black so they look slightly out of place on the bike... eventually I might polish them up but for the meantime I'm happy enough.

Silver bolts made a bit of a difference.

Serious bike envy here, it's just too good.

Wow this turned out so good!! More pics!!

If they’re like my 3D+ rotors the torque requirement is “square taper style”. There’s a lot of margin for error.

If you need spacers I have a bunch, no need to drop £20.

can I say something bad .. I dont think they 'work' with the bike .. it might need these:

Of course you can say that : )

In terms of looks I completely agree WI would be the dream. But I wanted to keep the indestructible TA chainrings, and Rotors have a nicer Q-factor; 148mm as opposed to 157.2mm for WI.

I also don't want to sell my kidneys!*

*Yet... (I will need them for the Saffron build).

Cheers man, according to the chart in the little booklet I don't need any for BSA 68mm.

Btw, was about to message you about your polishing man.... how much do you reckon he would charge to do these crank arms?

I was reading up about anodising and learned that the quality of finish depends on what's underneath - it hides nothing - which is why the last ones came out quite rough and ready after being shot-blasted... so anyone wanting an attractive shiny finish would have to polish the surfaces beforehand anyway.

Meanwhile, I bought these from Condor the other day.... I had originally ordered a new set from bike-discount but as we now live on Plague Island they cancelled the order and refunded me. Luckily, the only other place with any in stock was London's very own Condor, so I payed my £5 posh tax and went to pick them up an hour later.

1 Attachment

As you can see, they are a proper pair - in a box and everything!
With my extralong hacksawed bolt I can get more turns on the allen key than anyone really needs.

Merry xmas to me!

1 Attachment

Glad you got sorted in the end, strange that they wouldn't deliver to UK.

Yup, that's my understanding of ano.

Reckon he'd be about £30 to £50. Not sure how much work it is to get the black off mind. Pop him an email with photos and ask for a quote.

Wrong place for this, but certain German couriers have suspended shipments to Plague Island.

I've been doing a bit of research into the idea of making this rather uninspiring chainset sit better with the build - the longer it stares at me looking grey and boring, the more unacceptable it becomes.

Happily, it turns out that removing the anodising is much easier than I thought - you don't have to spend hours sanding it all off by hand, but can instead just pop it in a bucket of oven cleaner, put your feet up for ten minutes, then give it a rinse with warm water. Why did no one tell me this when I was renovating my girlfriend's bike 8 years ago?!

The first stage is to remove the extractor bolts, as per this video
...then follow the instructions laid out in this video
(or hundreds of others like it)

...and then probably to spend hours polishing it up anyway until it looks shiny and new.

Not sure if I can be bothered with the risk but it does seem more tempting all of a sudden. If I do, I'll probably wait until after the build is finished to make sure I have a functioning bike for my appointment with Sherritt on the 9th.

But I must say I like the idea... that's what projects are all about!

Seabass has no service slots until the new year so fuck it, I'm polishing these cranks!

Step 1:

1 Attachment

Step 2:

This is the bit when life started to feel interesting again.

1 Attachment

Step 3:
Kettle on

Step 3 (and a half!):

After a few minutes it started to go very gunky and odd.

1 Attachment

Then after another few minutes it's basically done. Rinsed off in warm soapy water and given a quick once-over with a scouring pad to remove the last of the ano:

1 Attachment

Quite happy so far, although not keen on the shot-blasted finish so have decided to sand it down and polish them by hand (at least the front surfaces). I think I could have left them in for longer but didn't want to risk eating into the metal itself.

I might also do the extractor bolts and hardware... let's see how it looks with them black first.

Ah yes, how stupid of me to forget!

Looks too easy to be true... Not sure if it would have worked on the thick black powered coating of my Sram crankset, which I patiently removed with a few dremel rotary wire brushes and two sanding stages (180 and 400)...

polish them by hand

I'd offer access to my polishing machine but with Covid (my mother in law, in the vulnerable category, is in our support bubble) you'd need to come pick it up. You're welcome to do so, if can be bothered, and have access to a car ideally...

It kind of is too easy to be true... I did a test run on an old headset spacer which had quite an intense dark finish and it came off like a dream.

Very generous of you to offer your polishing machine - thank you! I just started sanding a bit by hand to see what happens, and I think I should be okay. I'll let you know if I start dreaming of a machine to do it for me!

Also, I have no car : (

Car's for convenience, I did cycle back home when I bought that machine. Bit heavy, but nothing a galaxy with a rear rack couldn't handle!