due ruote 

First and maybe the only important rule of tandems: the stoker must be happy!

himespau 

seat_boy

This is pushing the edge of "vintage," what with the disc brake and threadless fork, but here's my '98 Rockhopper drop bar conversion:



with my oddball shifter setup:


I was just too lazy to run new shifter housing for bar end shifters after I moved over from a flat bar.

I have some more pictures on my blog.

kingston 

My stoker asked me to swap out the drop bar on our tandem for a cruiser bar. I compromised and gave her a bullhorn bar.

simmonsgc

Well, the drop bar conversion I did on my friends '88 "Pinkasonic" MC-6500 is no more (paging @Pemetic2006). At the risk of being booted from the thread, here's how it wound up -- gone are the Noodle and Tektros, and a VO Porteur bar with city levers in their place:

due ruote 

I like Porteur bars, and they do in fact have (a little bit of) drop.

Squeeze

Wait, can this be right? The last three bikes posted in this thread were:

1. A tandem only half-converted to drops...

2. A MTB with a threadless fork and a disc brake...

3. A bike that had the drop bars removed in favor or porteur bars?!

Ya buncha scofflaws!

cooperryder

I also have gone with upright bars like the Nitto Albatross or similar
on some of my vintage rigid mt bike conversions.

My, I think a 1991 model,
Rockhopper just had way too sensitive steering
for my likes with the road bar cock pit pictured.

I have since installed some upright bars (Sunlite North Road) and that cockpit setup works really well for me.
I can easily ride it no hands now. The sensitive steering was eliminated.

A 1990 Trek 7000 with similar road bars and stem as pictured worked great on it.

From what I read the geometry, fork trail and other factors come into play.

Plus the more upright position is just working well for me as I have gotten older.
My take is these great old vintage mt bikes can work well in a variety of configurations
upright bars included.

If it's road bars or upright bars or whatever gets your vintage mt bike working well for you
it's all good in my estimation.

If the concensus on this thread is to keep it a pure road bar conversion theme, I am cool with that.

If that is the case perhaps a thread for upright bar conversions on these bikes is in order.


As they say YMMV(Your mileage may vary.)

loubapache

Really like your setup. Is that some kind of (tall) quill to threadless adapter? What model is it?

I had to do something like that to a Trek 520 Touring bike and used the Soma adapter. It is too long. Yours looked perfect.

cooperryder

Thank you loubapache.

I had one of the tall Soma adapters for a while and also found it too tall.
Most of the ones I have seen online are too short for me.
I finally cut my Soma to the correct length and got it to work.
A buddy uses it now.

Later I located the one you see pictured on my Rockhopper from this ebay vendor.
I think they are out of Taiwan. It was just right for my desired height.



https://stores.ebay.com/speedolium/
They did offer it in black or polished silver.

Just now I searched and did not see it still listed.
Perhaps you could send them a message and ask.

When I bought it they listed it like this:
Bicycle Threaded Headset Quill to Stem Riser Adapter 1" - 1 1/8" 22.2 x 240mm


I also tried the Velo Orange one and it is nicely made but a bit too short for my purpose.
It might work for you.



Good luck and safe pedaling.

loubapache

Thanks, cooperryder. That one cannot be found but there is a German seller who has one that looks like yours. However, he did not list the length.

I have tried several, they are either too short or too long.

MeatloafOvadose

I bought this Mongoose ATB from ebay back in late august this year, it arrived with damage to the driveside dropout and mangled the seat and chainstays where they are welded to the seat tube/BB, I got it rideable, the widest tire i can fit now is 1.95, anything wider and it rubs the left seat stay, so its still out of whack, tracks straight though.

What made me buy it to begin with was the awesome fork and full braze-on's. I'll end up stripping the paint to get full chrome underneath!

I bought a 1989 Mongoose sycamore for 20 bucks over the weekend for the Deore shifters , FD and RD and the wheelset.I put on the Soma rack, 5 dollar basket from antique shop and a m1945 U.S cargo pack.

I plan on changing out the tires and putting fenders on it.

2016-10-18 03.40.01 1 by Ryan Silva, on Flickr
2016-10-18 03.43.55 1 by Ryan Silva, on Flickr
2016-10-18 03.42.00 1 by Ryan Silva, on Flickr

OTS 

Interesting hack on those shifters.

How are they ?

MeatloafOvadose

Pretty good! its a different feel but I can get use to it. The only adjustment I need to make is to turn them a bit counter-clockwise so I can get to the lower gears easier.

gate28

I know this probably isn't the place to ask but I sub to this thread and was pretty sure that there is a thread similar for Bridgestones? But for the life of me can't find it?Is there a 'Show us your Bridgestone' thread please anybody?

illwafer

eom 

Now that is some serious bike porn. Very well done.

mstateglfr 

What model is this? Love the dimensions- doesnt look wonky with an absurdly long stem or anything like that. Its like your geometry was made for a 26" drop bar conversion.

illwafer

Early Stumpjumper.

Kobe 

A fun way to spend half a day....

https://www.bikeforums.net/classic-vi...ne-thread.html

hankaye

illwafer, Howdy;

Down right jaw droppin' beautiful. Did you do one of those mike drops things after you hit the enter key?
Would you care to elaborate on the particulars of the build? Sure would like to read about it.

hank

illwafer

thanks, hank! i don't own the bike any more but have fond memories of it. i commuted roughly 40 miles/day for over a year on it, and it treated me well.

started as a 1983 stumpy frame/fork. rear was 126mm and i spread to 135mm. stripped and resprayed (rattlecanned by me). ended up with 2.1" big apples with VO 60mm ? 26" fenders (these were great). wanted that bike so i could use 1" stems like the technomic. drop bars with shimano 8spd bar end shifters and 8 speeds in the back. xt throughout mostly. lx crank.

loved the biplane fork but didn't care for the weird geometry. definitely strange to ride when you first hop on but you get over it in just a few minutes.

hankaye

illwafer, Howdy;

Thanks for the response. Still new (returning after a long absence), to the bike
World and wanting to modify a bike I bought to modify ('95 Stumpy), into one of these
nifty mtn drop conversions.
Rattle canning tubes is difficult, ... you did extremely well. Especially it being Black.

hank

bengreen79

Funny you should ask. I was just about to assemble my post and I was reading through some of the more recent pages.

My dad picked one up from a family member's rummage sale and it mostly rotted in a shed. I think it's somewhere between '95-'97. It's kind of an ugly duckling - I think it's the triple triangle frame and stupid built on bar ends. I fixed it up, put new tires on, and moved over some fenders I had and started riding it. The brakes had a habit of freezing up in the winter so I eventually put on a new fork with a disc brake.





This summer I put some less aggressive tires on it and found that I enjoyed riding it again, particularly on wet days where I would get dirty and soaked on my road bike. I then started researching touring bikes and thought I would rather try touring on something I already had before I invested a lot of money in a new bike.

I bought a 46 cm bar, a short stem, and some $70 tourney brifters from Amazon. The rack is a Bell Wal-Mart job but has proven to hold 65 lbs without even a creak. I fixed my fender lines and put on a used Brooks saddle. The last thing I did was to replace the rear cantilever with a mini v-brake. The combo of canti's and these tourney brifters led to NO rear braking power.

Overall I like riding it though it is no road bike from a handling and acceleration standpoint. I need to find a used triple road crank to put on it because the FD doesn't reach all the way up to the biggest cog, though the 34-11 combo is adequate for cruising up to 17-18 mph. It doesn't like to go much faster than that anyway, even with a good tailwind.

MrK.

This 1995 Fuji Discovery had been languishing on Craigslist for a couple of months.



At 50 bucks I guess it was overpriced. I decided to make an offer on it and picked it up. I planned on using some Gary bars and a dura ace bar end shifter set I originally purchased for another build that never panned out. When I got the bike home I expected to replace the seat and consumables, add on the aforementioned bars and shifters, swap on a Sora rear mech and 9 speed cassette I had in my parts bin and start riding. Turns out that the bottom bracket was toast but I found a complete Deore crankset with bottom bracket on clearance. This swap alone probably shed five pounds off the bike. It started as just a quick parts swap but ended up a complete strip down and repaint definitely a fun project. I bargain shopped for a couple weeks and the only original components left on it are headset and front derailleur. I added a set of rear rack mounts and some more water bottle bosses. In hindsight it probably wasn't the best frame to spend the time and effort on. The frame with headset weighs over 6.5 lbs, and there are some alignment issues. Nothing critical just the rear brake bridge and bottle bosses are a little wonkey. Anyway she handles like a dream and turned out lighter than I expected. Weighed in right at 29 lbs as pictured. Read somewhere that the Deda brown bar tape is supposed to match the Brooks brown saddle. Entertaining ideas on how to darken it. Here are some pics from the shakedown cruise this afternoon. Did about 10 miles on broken blacktop, gravel, logging roads. Even a stopped by the local watering hole for a pint. Hope you enjoy the pics.