Panasonic City Cat

Greetings of the day (as the IT support would greet me every time), I am going to put here some pictures and text of a recent project: make a Panasonic City Cat out of a Mountain Cat. It is I guess nothing that special, and such convertions seen very often – and as always – I am too late for something or too early (like selling my ~6 bitcoins for buying a –small– lawn mower). But its fun!

I got this Panasonic MC 6500 bike really cheap for its good condition, not rusty, seatbolt is still easily removeable, the bottom bracket too, some scratches.

What I did already:

✓ cleaned here and there
✓ removed parts like brakes, cranks, handlebar
✓ installed Maxxis DTH tires (close fit in the back, but OK)
✓ installed as a test the new handlebar (Nitto HiHi-Bar)
✓ got new/old cranks and test-fitted to measure the needed size for a bottom bracket for an 1x11 setup (=113 mm bottom bracket width for a Shimano 600 crankset and a 130 mm 40T chainring)
✓ the Shimano 600 road cranks fit, it is close, but there's 5 mm at least on each chainstay side
✓ replaced the bottom bracket with a nice almost OG Shimano one
✓ replaced the 7 speed freehub with a new Shimano HG freehub & re-centered the wheel afterwards
✓ ordered fenders, cables, shifter

There are missing some parts and details how to do:

❒ should I really try this fancy Dynamo that lazy me don't have to make a new dynamo wheel? It would maybe look very mysterous and retro when mounted on the cantilever brake mounts, and no cable from the fork going upwards, saving some grams (that would be not needed), I think I am 98% sold on this solution
❒ front rack needed: I have a Wald basket and great bag for it, but no front rack. I saw this here for example
❒ the spacer stack: having a golden Chris King GripNut 1" headset, maybe some Rasta yellow-green-red vibes?
❒ how do people work with threaded forks and then 'ahead set mounted style' stems? Now I use a 1" to 1 1/8" adapter and fill the bottom 1" part with 1 1/8" spacers
❒ what kind of saddle – maybe a Brooks B17 or similar style

How can I embedd images which are uploaded here into the floating text? For now I reply and work with images as attachement.

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I found & bought this bottom bracket mostly because of the package ♥︎ (and it still has a sticker of the old Austrian currency on it, before the € came)

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The 7 speed freehub is changed now to a new Shimano HG freehub, and I mounted a 11 speed XT cassette. I had to re-center the wheel ~2,5 mm to the driveside. The rim looks more or less OK and still is thick enough, so I thought I go this route instead of using a totally new wheel – and it looks cool to use the old freehub body!

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Rad!

Home made trying stand and dishing gauge?

Great already. Subbed

Yes, I’ve bought this PDF and followed more or less his whole process: https://www.wheelpro.co.uk/wheelbuilding/book.php

Ha! Doing something similar at the moment with an obscure Japanese name frame, including freehub upgrade, dths, albeit dropbars and 1x10 srampagnolo.
The freehub thing is very satisfying right?

I think @JacqueLucque could provide you some feedback on the dynamo setup!

That's lovely!

Unfortunately I had no time to proceed with building up the bike, a new baby arrived which is now almost 2 weeks old, some parts arrived too, like fenders, a serviced Chris King headset part (that was really fast and cost only 1x shipping to the US and A), and this unbelievable small dynamo.

Now I want to mount the dynamo to my Paul Cantis, but as unbelievable as the size and weight of the dynamo is, is the price for these two bolts! To be able to setup the brakes I guess screws like this are definitely needed?

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Relevant ↓

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Very cool. Alee Denham covered these new bottle dynamos, they seem really nice, from memory. I think the only way to do the threadless in your situation is to extend the steerer, but that needs joining, idk if you can do that. But even then, you're with a 1'' steerer again, dunno if shims would work. Spa do a clean looking adapter. Velo orange tall stem with removable face plate is nice.

Go nitto on the rack, fuck it.

Surely these will work velo orange rack mounting bolts ?

Unfortunately not, you need the step on the Paul ones to fit inside the spring tensioner cup.

Ah yes! Could you not hold spring tension with a spanner and tighten the VO bolt up? £40 for some bolts is crazy

Probably, but the step down will centre everything.

Ha, yes, a M18? Or the cheaper Wald / BLB option which looks similar. Maybe I will just get struts and a bracket and make something in a DIY style.

I got a stem adapter now on which on the bottom again is an adapter and then I can use 1 1/8" spacers and a 1 1/8" stem. I was just wondering how all these #26inchaintnotdead builds were made. Hopefully the transition from the 1" threaded headset to the 1 1/8" spacers will look OK!

I think centering / adjusting these cantis is important, I used them on my crosser a while and they were pretty easy to set up and worked very well. But if there’s another option than these as you say @packet crazy priced bolts. If not well, I will get them. And I only need one lol

Re threadless, a lot of 90s 26in frames have 1 1/8 threaded steerers so you can stick a threadless fork and headset in. Or extend the existing steerer and make it a diy threadless, but that's brazing (or is it welding?). With a 1in you're kinda stuck.

I fancy M12, just seems a bit more solid attachment than M18, since you have the bosses might as well. Looks cleaner too. But I'm sure either will do. An M12 will come with its own mounting bolts, btw.

You got me thinking of the steerer size, and I thought do I have a 1 1/8 steerer? It was the first thing I measured when getting home from work today! Thanks for the explanations. The 1 inch headset I have fits. I will install the stem adapter, spacers, stem and cockpit this weekend.

The golden headset is definitely too much too add, but I have it, hopfully it will hide more under all the black parts (lol) or even pop more out. Maybe I get sometimes another color and mix and match – question is if I could use an ahaed bearing cup instead of a grip nut bearing cup?

Great is that I got an offer here at LFGSS for a Nitto M18 rack today. The struts of the M12 would be too close to the dynamo nevertheless I guess.

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Finally the crankset is installed, if a-n-y-b-o-d-y ever asks if a Shimano 600 road crankset and a 113 mm bottom bracket and 40T chainring fits to a Panasonic MC 6500: yes, it does. Close fit. Spinnnnnning the cranks is nice!

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Blinging!

Very very nice

Modern chainrings (and 1x setups in general) on older square taper cranks are the bee's knees