cfkb's garage: mostly steel (ft. surly, paul donohue, rourke)

Problems I identified:

• shifting is crap because it has some terrible shimano tourney shifters. The choice of shifters was restricted due to the 6 speed freewheel
  
• creaking sound comes from an ancient loose bearing BB and warped chainrings. Teeth are 52/42 which is just wrong on a bike like this
  
• very heavy, partly because of 531ATB tubing, but also because of a surprisingly heavy cockpit and an unused rear pannier rack. These things probably added 2kg.
  

Things I did:

• my 1st time wheel building
  To resolve the shifting I needed a modern freehub. 26" is quickly becoming a rare breed and to find one at 130mm spacing with 8-10sp compatibility is unlikely. I happened to have a used set of 5700 hubs taken down from a pair of tubs which used to be on my PD, so I thought what better time to learn wheel building. Keeping things retro (and cheap), I chose the silver box rim of kinlin ADHN (at just £18 each) with some alpina spokes. Plenty of tutorial online for 3x 36h build, and the process was surprisingly straightforward. True and dish using the frame itself and some zip ties, tension by hand feel. Took me a weekend and overall I find wheel building a calming and meditating activity.

• new cockpit
  Nitto Olympiade 115, Shimano 105 8 speed (1056 series) downtube shifters in a bar end housing with Tektro RL520 levers on a no name silver stem. I much prefer the mechanicsm in downtube / bar end shifters over the flat bar trigger shifters - the indexing seems to be more crisp. Canti hanger is to stay as I don't have the right sized wrench.

• drive chain
  Apex 10 crankset which I did not use on the Orbit. It's 1mm away from hitting the chainstays, so hopefully external BB cranks are as stiff as they claimed (I didn't understand the point of high Q on mtb until now). Gearing wise it has a 38t front and 13-26 rear. Finished with another vintage shimano 1056 RD.

Initial thoughts

It rides great! Still feels heavy when going up slopes / carrying the bike up stairs, but not as noticeable when just cruising around town. Shifting is now nice and smooth, but bar end shifter location is a bit odd to me, often leaving my hand searching in mid air; I think I prefer downtube ones for now.

Work in backlog:

• upgrade to 10 speed
  I have a spare 10sp 11-32 cassette, but need some 7900 shifters/ mid-cage RD (I heard 9sp deore/xt stuff works great).

• compact bars
  My brother is complaining about the longer reach, and the classic shape of the nitto definitely didn't help

• silver finishing
  To complete the retro look, I already have a silver seatpost. Maybe crank arms and chainring can go the oven cleaner route? Fellow forum member seems to have great success...

When I locked up the bike, it reminded me what attracted me to the bike originally - the colour (I'm shallow like that). Why do modern bikes have such boring colour schemes? Perhaps I have an odd taste in colourful bikes?

Gave in to lockdown and put together a budget indoor cycling set up:

Elite Ghibli Parabolic Rollers
Garmin Speed & Cadence sensor Mk1

There were a good number of elite / tacx rollers on classified a few weeks ago. Got the elite because it would match the red of PD...

I have been using it for 2 weeks now. My take:

• Balancing was easier than I thought. Day 2 I can shift my FD; Day 3 I can grab my bottle; Day 5 I can do look-ma-no-hands cycling. When in doubt, pedal faster!
  
• Resistance was harder than I thought. My big chainring is only 48t, but more than enough for cadence training
  
• Standing up pedalling is possible - but needs more resistance
  

Reason why PD goes indoor is that I needed the excuse to use Orbit, which I have done sparingly over past couple weeks due to the poor weather. Few things I learnt:

1. I could do with a shorter reach on PD
   
2. I am comfortable with the bigger drop from seat to bar on Orbit
   
3. I could not get on with SRAM doubletap
   

As such I got new toys... hands have got pretty itchy after a whole month without tinkering

nitto m109aa

This was the original bar I wanted as opposed to the Deda Elementi. I just couldn't find a good price for it. narrower (42 vs. 40), compact drop vs classic drop, shorter reach (76 vs. 80)

zenith GC quill

Shortest quill I can find in terms of both height (130) & length (60). Current deda stem is 150 tall and it's bottoming out the butted section of the headtube.

Dia-Compe DC-139 Guidonnet

Going on Steamroller with its current nitto rb010 horns. I dislike the in-line brake as it's quite a deviation from the clean lines of the horns. Reviews said these don't give great stopping power, but I mostly only use my brake to reset the pedal position (still could not track stand)

had another lesson of 'if it ain't broke dont fix it'. bars and stem went onto PD, and now rear mech (ultegra 6600 GS) won't shift properly. tried new cables, different shifter, different cassette. can only index correctly from cog #1 to #5, and then #6 to #10 seem to take an entirely different cable pull. So it's either the mech or the hanger. Already got a 6700 mech in the mail now, though that "ice grey" ultegra colour won't match anything on the bike :(

aside from that, combo looking great on PD!

Tiny reach for tiny arms. drop is much more comfortable than classic curve

any lower would require cutting the fork. I don't think I can be bothered for such marginal gain

so much effort for that bar-lower-than-seat-look

I'd love to see a drive-side photo of this.

I got quite excited about the snow last few days and was waiting for today when the sky clear up so I could had a go at cycling in snow in Epping Forest.

Knobby tyres, flat wide bars, what could go wrong? (aside from the hideous colour combo)

Well, I got left hooked by a van just 8 minutes after I departed. Straight to A&E and came home with stitches on my face. The snowy gravel adventure will have to wait for another time...

it deserves a drive-side photo indeed. I hate to do another pic in my hallway though, will snap a decent pic when taking it out for spin.

Shit! Hope you're ok (relatively). Obviously it's not as important but did the bike get damaged at all?

I was sent to A&E and have a few stitches on my face. Something to tell my grandchildren one day when asked about my battle scar I suppose...

Bike seems to be fine from the outside. But I will bring it in LBS for safety check regardless. Garmin edge is smashed, shakedry jacket torn apart, cracked helmet. I will be pushing the police to prosecute the driver for dangerous driving. I have witness and accident also happened right under a TFL camera, so I like to believe I have a strong case here

mini upgrade during my recovery - I finally got my hands on my dream cranks - FC6750 in 165mm silver. paid stupid ebay money on it but 165mm silver cranks is just a rarity. All there is left are the brake calipers before a full 6600/6700 ultegra group!

Glad you found the cranks you were after, and good luck in your case! The red tires on the Steamroller give it a Y2K mtb vibe that kind of works. Also, it may be a good idea to get somebody to fuck around with the gears on the PD, maybe they just need a little adjustment? When I was changing cockpit parts around on my Pacer the indexing would sometimes get thrown off.

Thank you! I have tried swapping every component on PD at this point. I have pretty much narrowed it down to a bent hanger. just not quite sure how it happened as it was working just fine before I swapped the bars. more money goes to parktool...

2 months update:

• Orbit is sold (still on forum). The original reason for purchasing was to kill lockdown boredom. Coming (close) to the end of lockdown, it's time to go too.
  
• PD gets the archetypes vacated by Orbit. However I couldn't let go of the mavic heliums yet. The colour matching combo looks too good, but they will be a strictly summer wheels as replacing the front rim (26h) will be expensive.
  
• Steamroller hasn't seen any action since the crash. I have (my first) track sessions coming up next month so drops will go on and brakes will come off.
  
  

The switch to HT2 means I finally get (relatively budget) power meter. Pretty essential for training on dumb rollers. Only silver option is 105 hence the mismatch

Hour long roller sessions made me realise I have wider sit bones than the cheap saddle I was sitting on would allow. Cushion-y brown spoon acquired to resolve the PITA.

n+1 vacancy quickly filled up...

sworks venge, 9070di2 group, archetypes on powertap. all acquired from @Acliff. Absolute legend for allowing me to raid his shed for freebies.

First ride review:

• losing 2kg on the bike is massive! acceleration is effortless
  
• never thought I could climb anything on a 39/28 (34/30 on PD)
  
• di2 is OmG sO aMaZiNg
  
  

Most importantly, beating PRs has never been easier

Great stuff! Glad you’re enjoying it!
It’s a rapid bike.

Preparing for my first hilly ride outside London this Saturday (really anywhere is hilly relative to London).

Pricey rings but mismatched chainset would not do Venge justice.

You might be alright with the 53/39.
But shiny new rings are shiny.

Minor update to steamroller. Drops are on, matched the tape with saddle, though I find the deda tape pretty cheap looking. might have to invest in some brooks. They are also quite thick and makes wrapping a bit difficult on the curve.

Now just need some silver rims / hubs to complete the neo retro look I have been trying for a long time.

Back to commutor mode: gatorskin 32mm / 48:17. When the track sesh comes around next month in Herne hill I will swap to 25mm / 48:15.