corn on the cog 

Virtually every discussion ever of upgrading a vintage bike assumes that the net result will be a set of younger parts hanging off the older frame (the image of the mythical twins Romulus and Remus, suckling from the teats of a she-wolf, which is part of the legend of the founding of Rome, comes to mind, but I digress...).

I get why it is so. There are lots of reasons, too obvious to recite here, for why “upgrading” usually involves acquiring either more modern parts than the frame or, if not, better parts that are at least roughly contemporary to the frame.

So I invite C&V’ers to make a case for the opposite: when and why can it make (functional or aesthetic) sense to put older parts on a more modern frame? What examples can you share of this? How extreme can the chronological divergence of newer frame and older parts be, while still making a certain kind of sense, even as conceptual art or contrarian joke?

Pics welcome!

scozim 

My Cannondale fire bike restoration last fall was a 9 Spd triple Ultegra 6500 set up. I took it back to 7 spd triple and indexed downtube shifters. My brother loves it.

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corn on the cog 

Barrettscv 

My Simoncini Cyclocross Special was probably built in 1994. It features 130mm spacing between the dropouts and it lacks downtube shifter bosses. I purchased the frameset without any components. I had most of the parts on hand to build a 3x7 Shimano drivetrain using Suntour Barcons. The first rebuild looks like something from 1980, especially with the non-aero brake levers and the high flange hubs.

scozim 

When my brother found out the bike was a 50 cm he was finally willing to trade for it and give me my 84 Peugeot PSV back. He really likes downtube shifter so I sourced a set of downtube 105's. I also got some 6500 brakes so it would stop well and then used a tri-color 600 rear derailleur so the indexing would work. Overall, it was more of a time crunch and to figure out what I could slap together quickly to get my bike back. It didn't hurt that my brother wanted downtube shifters. From a wheel perspective we used the wheelset he had on the Peugeot which already had a 7 spd Shimano set up.

The other driving factor was I can't stand the look of the Shimano brifters where the cable comes directly out the side. I was spoiled for years with my 97 Bianchi and Campy ergo shifters where the cables were tucked nicely under the bar tape for a much cleaner look.

non-fixie 

Some of my favorite parts were introduced way before the frames they are on was made. An example: mid to late eighties Roy Thame touring frame that I built up with the best my parts bin had to offer. The MAFAC Criterium brakes were introuduced right after WWII, the TA cranks in the early sixties. The Brooks B17 saddle was introduced in 1888 ....

Giacomo 1 

^^That Simoncini is one of my favorite bikes on this forum. Very tasteful build.^^

Below is my 91 Pogliaghi that is a mix of old and new.

The wheels and drivetrain are modern, although the Velo Orange crankset has a decidely old school drillium look. The bars and stem are vintage ITM and 3TTT and the tape is cotton Newbaum. The saddle, while new, is a copy of the old Cinelli Unicanitor, which I find quite comfortable. Pedals have clips and straps.

BritishV8

I chose Suntour Command shifters (circa 1992) for my 2018 Soma Smoothie. Combined with modern short-and-shallow handlebars and aero brake levers, they're ergonomically excellent. I can comfortably shift either derailleur up or down from the drops, the hoods, or even from the bar tops!

And, generally, I can shift any number of cogs with a single one hand motion too. (Long fingers help, I concede.) I use my shifters in their "light index" mode. The detent's are so light that they're really just haptic feedback for friction shifting. In other words, they have no effect on cog selection at all. The shifters are nominally designed for use with a seven-speed Suntour Accushift freewheel, but I use them with a nine-speed Hyperglide cassette. That combination works just fine - most shifts are smooth and silent. I expect with ten or eleven cogs, I might have problems with ghost shifting... On the plus side, being friction shifters, no readjustment for cable stretch is ever required. And they're certainly more robust than "brifters". (An accident that destroys your brake levers is unlikely to damage your Command shifters at all.)

RiddleOfSteel

The frameset isn't C&V by a long shot as it is a 2015/6 Trek Emonda ALR (aluminum), but the 9-speed SILVER Dura-Ace STIs are about 15 years its senior, to say nothing of all the 7800-era Dura-Ace parts that aren't much younger. Wheelset is from a same year (newer) Raleigh with a Campagnolo freehub, thus making the cassette as old as the shifters!

I really liked the silver-on-matte-near-black look. Anything to break it up--I've done white bar tape and saddle with a full 7800 suite and it looked stellar!

corn on the cog 

rhm

My main ride in 2017-8 was this custom frame I had made in 2016. The frame builder was Lance Mercado, SquareBuilt Bikes, Brooklyn NY. The frame geometry was copied from my 1948 Raleigh RRA that I sold just after placing the order for the frame. So the frame is basically conservative 1940's frame geometry but with modern dropouts, 28.6 mm threadless steerer, vertical dropouts, &c and (here's the good part 26 x 2.3 inch tires. Compass Rat Trap Pass tires.
The build is 10 speed cassette with indexed bar end shifter for the rear, an early 70's Stronglight 99 crank with 28-45 chain rings, SunTour Superbe fd with a simplex retrofriction down tube shifter.
Many thousands of miles ridden, no complaints.

smallpox champ

lasauge 

I have a few examples of such anachronisms, but none of them are photo-worthy. They all belong to the same general category: parts that are technically older, but not functionally any different/worse than what was made later or visually out of place.
1. 90's handlebars on a 2005 touring frame
2. 80's Shimano derailers on a 2005 touring frame (8-sp drivetrain)
3. 70's Campagnolo hubs on a 80's bike
4. Simplex Retrofriction shift levers on a couple bikes
5. 90's era cantis and hubs used on a mid-2000s CX frame

The only really weird thing I do is use old Shimano SPD-R type road pedals on newer frames. I just happen to like the way they feel, the fact that they're all but impossible to unclip from unintentionally, and that they use metal cleats that don't wear out quickly.

The Golden Boy 

There's old parts that are still among the very best examples of those parts. Partially because in some cases they lowered the profit margin to make really, really good parts- partially because those parts wouldn't be made or not made as commonly in the future.

So, for example- the aforementioned Suntour Mountech front derailleur is one of the very best front derailleurs ever made- A durable, good looking, well engineered, derailleur that was capable of doing a 24 granny as well as at least a 53 big ring as either a double or triple- and STILL weighs almost 10 grams less than a Dura Ace 9070 front derailleur!

A lot of the cantilever brakes made in the late 80s and early 90s were designed at a time when there wasn't a whole lot of standardization regarding the distances between canti posts- as a result, a lot of the brakes have incredible adjustability to make for allowances between different frames. As a bonus- a lot of those brakes are finished exquisitely and come styles like the wide/medium profile that was abandoned for 25 or so years and is now making a resurgence.

Then there's some items like the Suntour Barcon and the Simplex Retrofriction shifters that were just never really improved upon as friction shifting fell out of favor- but is still viable in different situations...

I was going to get a Rivendell (yes, a decidedly "retro" modern frame), and the old parts I had planned for it were one of 3 pre 1994 cantilever brakes, Suntour Command Shifters, a Suntour Superbe seat post and a Suntour XC Pro crank set.

clubman 

Bad picture here but I never liked the RSX brifters on my '97 Lemond just because of the way bike fit. I liked being in the drops and on the ends of the bars so I went with Suntour barcons, a road triple crank and a 3 pulley Cyclone for wider gearing.

ollo_ollo

Early last week we had some sunny days and I rode some of my fenderless bikes. When I came to pump up this one, a valve stem broke from age. I put in a spare tube that had 5 patches, but let it set due to rain the next day. Saturday, I went to ride it and found flat again! So took a pic for this thread. Ignore the 2nd front derailleur, it's a replacement, just found, for the SunTour 7 below.

edit: Bare frame was a 92 Trofeo according to seller at Seattle Swap meet. At the time I was collecting NOS or VG parts while looking for a "vintage" frame. Rear DR is patent 83. crank is Triomphe. NOS Cinelli stem, Randnnr bar, SunTour SL hubs and Stronglight Delta headset. Brakes are Shimano 600. Still watching for a better brake set.

Had not heard of Dedacciai steel at that time, but it has a great ride. Don