no67el

Beautiful. What's the front rack you are using? I like the idea of not having to attach your front bag to the handlebars--- I hate losing hand positions....

no67el

Update on this bike: added Deore 1x 32t crankset on a Hollowtech BB. Deore M6000-GS rear derailleur. 11x42 cassette.

I had to do some judicious filing to the DiaCompe Silver shifter to get the range needed to cover the 10 spd dynasys-whatchamacallit...

This derailleur shifts beautifully, though no doubt everything has gotten uglier since 1996.... and I like how light this bike is!



Before finding an 8-speed rear wheel in my stash which could take a 10-speed cassette...



Not so pretty, but really only needed to remove a few mm.



Glorious friction shifting over 10 cogs!



I'm old enough that this 11-42 cassette just looks so, so silly to me. But of course there are 50 tooth cogs out there!

no67el

Whoops I see now that this is Wald basket-- what size Dark Realm bag do you have in there?

Ishamael

Loving this thread! I have an mid-80s Kuwahara that I'm fixing up. It's in pretty rough shape, and I'm just working on getting it ridable first, but eventually want to do a drop bar conversion.

Rooney 

Are partial builds acceptable? This has been slowly coming together over the past few weeks. I've got front and rear derailleurs that'll work for the time being, as well as brake levers. Still need cables, a saddle, pedals, tubes and tires, and a new bottom bracket. The Super Maxy's non-drive arm grazes the frame — I'm not exactly sure what spindle length I need.

clubman 

[QUOTE=k2blt;22150867]


Looks purpose-built and so fine by me. I need something like this.

imcorn

Do you know the seatpost clamp size of your Kona? I just got a same era Explosif and the one on there was completely wrong. I measured 29.5mm OD on the seat tube itself and it seems not many companies still make it in this size.

thumpism

Welcome! We love photos so get your ten posts and deliver!

mike_in_nyc

Just finished installing a Carver 26 inch rigid fork to my 2001 Marin Hawk Hill, replacing the old insync 327 fork. First time I did a major upgrade to a bike. I had already replaced to handlebars from the original mountain bars to an alt bar with about 40 degree of sweep. Running Schwalbe Marathons 26x1.5. I’m going to ride it like this for a remainder of the summer and fall a d college more parts for the drops. Newbie here so I can’t post pictures yet.

gis_guru 

Love this Moser, looks like a fantastic ride

seat_boy

Surfing CL the other evening, I came across an ad for, "Free Trek mtb, needs 6'+ rider, painted, new tires". No pictures or other details. I was the first to respond, so I ended up scoring this free bike:

... dang, I lost my "before picture." Anyway, picture this bike with (painted!) riser bars and (painted!) stem to go along with the (painted!) headset and (painted!) front badge. And cheap Wal Mart tires:



Based on the parts that look original and comparing it to the catalogs, it looks like an '89 Trek 800, their bottom of the line mtb, in the 22" sizeway. Aside from the, er, enthusiastic painting, the previous owner had put on decent wheels and new CR720 brakes. I swapped out the cockpit, pedals, crank, and tires, and was ready to roll:



I would have looked down on this humble bike when I started mountain biking a few years after it was new, but it's a nice riding bike that will make a great bike for riding around town. I couldn't get the (painted!) headset to stay in adjustment, so I just swapped that out with something from parts bin. I'm not sure the drop bars will stay--I think it might be overall more useful and comfortable with Jones bars or something similar--but I love the way it looks now. It's fun to get all John Tomaccy and slide around corners on dirt trails in our neighborhood parks.

davidbrowne89

Fellow converts, please see attached for your leisure. Took some time to source parts and aspects of the frame needed restoring but overall I'm pleased with the result.

mike_in_nyc

Very nice project. Thanks for the photos and information on your build.

pcons713

Here's my second dropbar mtb build - 1993 Trek 950. Almost all original aside from the conversion. Great handling and fit using a threaded-to-threadless stem converter. Using the MicroShift 3x7 brifters everything works well, though the FD indexing is a bit off due to the mismatch of road-mtb pull ratios. I have a barrel adjuster to make this manageable, but needing to stop before a big climb and make adjustments to use the small ring is a bit annoying. Any suggestions or tips aside from replacing the original Deore LX FD with a touring FD?

fishboat

I have a '93 970 that I did a drop bar conversion on. I run Tourney 3x7 shifters into the stock top pull XT FD. The Tourney and FD match up perfectly...at least it shifts like you'd expect on any road bike with a triple. I've read here on BF that any of the DX, LX, XT series FD work well with road shifters. My only experience is with XT/Tourney combo. I'd either continue to tweak in your LX(I suspect there's a sweet spot there somewhere) or look for an XT.

Nice bike. Mine is now a dedicated touring bike and it's a wonderful ride. Doing a 55 miler on it today..shakedown ride for an upcoming tour.

partyanimal

Just finished this build. Picked up this 80s Peugeot Orient Express for $10 on FB Marketplace. Did an acid bath to remove the rust, everything new except the wheels and cranks.

davidbrowne89

Very nice job. Many of the 80s MTB frames were based on road frame geometry so converting / upgrading / refurbishing is ideal!

nintando

Nice bike!)

nintando

Are road shifters compatible to the mtb derailleur? MTB derailleurs are made to be compatible with shifters which pull cable on a top tube

nintando

Cool colors)

imcorn

For Shimano, road/mtb components are interchangeable for everything 9 speed and below, I believe.

tricky 

Cable routing doesn't affect derailleur/shifter compatibility. It's all about the amount of cable the shifters pull each time you shift vs for which cable pull the derailleur was designed.

Here's an article I reference occasionally for inter-brand compatability. https://www.bikeradar.com/advice/buy...r-derailleurs/

There are cross brand combos that work (google Shimergo to experience the dark art of combining Shimano and Campagnolo, for example) and there are also cable pull ratio tables where you can compare the cable pull of the shifter to the cable pull ratio of the derailleur. You can even run combos of different speed derailleurs and shifters (some 10 speed shimano with some 9 speed shimano MTB, see the article above)

Of course, friction shifting opens up a whole new world. As long as the friction shifter can shift the full range, you can use it. I've seen a few folks here using friction with 10 speed cassettes and derailleurs and even modifying friction shifters to open up the range to accommodate 10 speeds or more.

This is probably more than enough for this thread. Do some googling and once you have them, post more specific questions about your specific combo in a new thread here or in the mechanics forum so that your question doesn't get buried.

frogger72

What brake levers are those? Thanks

no67el

Cheap imitations of TRP levers--- about $20 on the big auction site... I was trying to be cheap as I'd never tried the "drop-bar-mtb" thing before. But it's quickly becoming a favorite bike, whether for bombing around city streets careless of potholes, or ripping past guys riding dual-suspension monsters on the local (very easy) single track...

The quality of these levers seems pretty flimsy--- the plastic and rubber of the hoods feels cheap, and the aluminum of the levers has lots of rough spots from the mold-- but so far they've worked fine. Search for "road bike brake levers coffee" and you'll find what I bought. I might upgrade these someday, but like I said, so far they are giving no cause for complaint other than feeling like what they are: cheap brake levers.

Bike is sitting next to me as I type--- just rode it home from work.

frogger72

Thanks! I actually have a late 80s Miele road bike that was given to me by a neighbour with one broken aero brake lever. Since I won't be keeping it or selling it for anything more than $300 I am on the lookout for cheap alternatives and that would probably do the trick vs spending double or more on tektros.