Marcootsee's self-indulgence odissey (aka this bike will be the last one)

Quite a few things are moving here, but for now i'll just post here a couple of shots from some lovely september mountain rides. The Fairlight is slowly creeping to its first big overhaul, but it served me more than well these two years

p.s. In the third photo we had to (unfortunately) buy 4 water bottles because we forgot our bidons at home, 90 km away from the starting point.

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New(ish) bike day, i suppose? A couple months ago, quoting, i said i'd build up a MGOOF'd frame i had laying around. After doing the math, i realized i could just sell all the components and try to find a second hand complete bike without spending any more money. Having had a Caad 12, which was very good but with a couple of shortcomings (at least for my riding habits), i started looking around and settled for his chillier sibiling, the Synapse.

Lo and behold, our local marketplace offered me a basically pristine Synapse Disc, bought new in 2020 by a guy who kept it immaculate inside an air-conditioned garage. Compared to the CAAD in size 60, the size 58 Synapse has a slightly shorter reach and a slighly higher stack, just what i was looking for. Add fender mounts, bigger tyre clearance and a much more exposed seatpost, and the recipe for comfort and all-around use is served.

As it stands in these picture (the day after i bought it), it sits at 9,4 kg. Not light, but not heavy in any way. My plan is, right now, to get a decent fit (BDHU already in the books), swap a couple parts to ones i have already available (carbon bars, Shimano Freeza rotors, SI cranks, King cages and the DT 1400 wheels from the Fairlight), do a tubeless conversion and buy a SAVE seatpost.

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Looks like you live in cycling heaven

I live in Torino, in northern Italy. We're very lucky to have a lot of different choices for riding, between the Alps and the Langhe. Unluckily, as always, the biggest problem is the car-centric mentality of this place, which leads to a great amount of dangerous and underqualified drivers.

This era of Synapse is so underrated. My riding partner has a bright orange one and he adores it.

You mean Felix? His in-depth review on bike radar was a very useful source of information! Did he manage to put any mudguards on? I'm looking at Gilles Berthoud ones, but i'm afraid that their 700x40 might be too big (at least at the front)

Ahh! He's thrilled – "what an ego boost". Yes, he runs mudguards on winter rides. Generally, he's used Bluemel 35s with 28mm tyres mounted to ENVE Foundation 45s (so wide-ish). They're pretty damn tight with that setup. I've spent many a ride listening to them fizz when he rides through leaves.

First round of upgrades went by, shaving half a kg with king cages, Si cranks and Deda carbon bars. As it sits, around 8.9 kg (without saddlebag).

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Managed to upgrade all the parts i wanted and ended up at 8.3 kg on the scale (with pedals and gps mount). As it stands:

• Shorter 100mm stem (still fettling with lenght and spacer stack)
  
• SAVE seatpost
  
• Prologo Nago saddle
  
• Spare gold KMC chain
  
• Dt Swiss PR1400 21mm wheelset
  
• Tubeless setup w/ stock DT valves
  
• Shimano XT rotors
  
• Shimano 11-34 Ultegra cassette (spare one i had laying around instead of the 105)
  
  

Did the first 100k ride with it and I'm very pleased with the result. The bike is snippy, comfortable and a welcome upgrade from my previous Caad (weighting the same but with bigger tires and disks).

Right now the only thing missing is a nice pair of fenders, but i want to be sure with the clearances before buying anything.

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Hmmm.....👀

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While I'm waiting for the frame bag to come to life, I started experimenting with the bottle cages on the fork legs. Lo and behold, so far I'm really liking it! The bottles are easy to reach and they look like they get less dirt and grime from not being in the line of fire. I've clocked a couple of 100k rides this month and I can't get enough of this bike (although it's time for new chain and pads)

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Well here it is

This frame bag has been made by a local bagmaker here in Turin, called Garu Fa Bags. Aside from being completely waterproof, it's also customized with a couple of smart gizmos.

On the right side, the double zipper makes life easy when loading; on the left side, there's an external pocket to fill with slim stuff like the wallet or the smartphone. Meanwhile, all the inner perimeter of the bag is lined with a mesh net, to strap tools and other things. In the end, the entire bag weighs less than half a kg and it bolts onto the frame with very handy 3d printed quick release clamps.

This is the first time I've ever commissioned something with this kind of customization and i feel spoiled af. I really hope to make the most of it.

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Looks very good!
Do you have any pictures of the interior?
I'm keen to see that mesh you mentioned

Yes indeed! This web serves also as a reinforcement to the external one to keep the bag close to the frame

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Awesome! You can bit an entire camping kit in there

Ooh, nice. Not at all what I thought it would be, but looks like a very neat solution!

A little fleet roundup for the start of the year:

• The Fairlight is staying as it is. It still needs a new chain and a brake bleed, but nothing that would block me from riding it.

• The Synapse, as well, is in tip top shape and there's nothing to be done (except fenders? I'm not in a hurry aswell)

• The Brompton is alive and well. I haven't used it much lately, but mechanically is sound and it's just shy of a couple little add-ons that i already have waiting in a box (easy wheels extender and metal frame patches/levers)

• The Geometron is unchanged, more so after september’s service. I’ll send the EXT in for a service at the start of the season.

• The Bianchi lock up bike just inherited both racks from the La Cabra, since the older rear one started to collapse on itself and the front one proven itself handy more than once. Another “free” but welcome upgrade is a cheap shimano crankset, scored for free from a rotten bike and completely plug&play with the stock bottom bracket (replacing the old and bent no-name crankset). I would love to put a dynamo on this bike, but i’ll wait for a new wheelset up until the current one is completely trashed.

• The BMC La Cabra has seen a couple of small jobs, but it's doing fine. After removing both racks to put them on the daily beater, i just swapped the brakes for some refurbished SLXs, the deore cranks for some e13 Helix ones (i already had the chainring and the needed tools from the Geometron), removed the wheel decals and filled up the tubeless juice. I still would really love to put some dropbars on, but i’m not willing to spend more money on it ATM.

• The road fixed is under surgery right now, because i made the mistake of riding it for a couple years in the false hope that it would not rot away when stashed in a humid garage. Since the seatpost is stuck and the inside of the frame is almost completely covered in rust (thank you completely enclosed bottom bracket shell, really nice of you), i’m taking the olmo road frameset i previously mentioned here and convert it to a 100% road fixed (this means dropbars, F&R brakes and road pedals). I just scored a double sided miche pista rear hub, which will eventually replace the single sided that’s on now. I’ll upload some photos at the end of the month, as soon as i get everything togheter.

• Last but not least, the frameset pictured here (which is also the reason why i’m changing the name of this thread). I’ll write something up about it in the coming days, but the premises are very good.

Happy 2024 LFGSSers!

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Well a month has passed and a lot of things happened in the meantime.

After a bit of luck I've found a complete Cinelli Gazzetta for sale at a really tempting price, so i snatched with the intention to keep only the frameset and flip the rest of the parts. This frame will replace the green fixed, taking away all the old and unusual standards nobody of us really wants.

About the red Cannondale...it's been a little bit troublesome, but the next weekend i should sort everything out. In the meantime, here's a couple of (bad) photos from it's maiden voyage

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Even though my cycling life has been pretty chaotic (in a good way) the last couple months, i'm finding it increasingly difficult to keep track and update this thread with everything I've been doing. Having 8 bikes scattered across different places, i often find myself collecting photos but without the ability to merge everything in a "good storytelling" for this thread.

Hence why i'm thinking about splitting this CP thread in two different ways, keeping here all my disc-equipped bikes and putting all the rim brake ones in a different place.

This way i think i'll find it easier to organize and streamline the content in both threads without dumping everything here in a randomic way.

Makes sense?

I'd rather have one single thread. But whatever format gets you excited to share stories and pics is perfectly fine!

I do like your cannondale, a similar frame but completely different build is regularly locked at my work and I just find myself standing staring at it. No idea who owns it but they’ve probably passed a few times and just kept walking on spotting me.

Dumping randomly sounds good to me

Well let's dump everything randomly i guess!

Let's start from the Cannondale Synapse. The main change compared to the last photos in this thread has been the wheelset. I removed the aluminum wheels from DtSwiss for these Carbon FSA K Force Light. These wheels were born as cross country wheels from a few years ago like 2015/2016 and have all the period correct classic standards (i.e. 23 mm internal widht, straight pull spokes, non Boost spacing and Shimano hg+ body).

After some lathe work i managed to turn the front quick release adapters into a 12 mm through axle, making these wheels de facto a modern road bike set.

Although the system weight is not that different from the previous wheelset, I noticed a big increase in stiffness and precision. The bike is more snappy but not necessarily less comfortable. I've used it for several short spirited outings, like lunch breaks or fast paced after work rides, with great satisfaction.

The only doubt I still have concerns the aesthetics. Even though it's a pleasant bike to look at, it's as flavorless as it gets. I was thinking about putting adhesive graphics on it, like the classic 90s cannondale logos on the downtube, but i'm afraid it might be too overstated or, even worse, a botched job on an otherwise ok looking bike.

At the moment I don't have many ideas, any suggestion is welcome!

Ps you'll also might notice a new handlebar bag, but that's for another time!

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Get the frame painted in a nice oldschool Cdale paintjob;) Blue yellow Volvo perhaps?

The synapse is a connoisseur’s bike. Those who know, will know.

But it’s still a black bike with black components.

Try gumwall tires?

I like what Specialized are doing these days with just an oversized down-tube logo on a unicolour frame. That might work