romperrr 

Awesome, it arrived! Enjoying reading your musings about the direction to take it in. Either way, you're going to have a great bike on your hands. Thanks for the thorough explanations. Looking forward to your ride report.

jamesdak 

Hey , SLM!!! (Stem Lives Matter) :-)

The plan is a proper silver stem to match a silver seatpost and then white saddle and bar tape. Made need a Techtronic stem though to save my old back. Time will tell, LOL!

Jazzyg72

Excellent - I shall now be on a mission to track one of those nifty tools down!!! Thank you!

billytwosheds 

One of these passed through my workspace a few years ago, albeit in a much less attractive colorway.

Jazzyg72

Regarding the colorway. I can only share as someone who spent years of my career in product development and marketing that colors are so subjective and personal that arguments would break out when it came to these decisions. You are trying to use what little tools we have access to for the next year which is basically a fake crystal ball. You are trying to meet the appeal of the demographic that would buy this bike first. Secondly the shop owner / buyer and thirdly my boss and the executive team at KHS. On this colorway I was fine with the base color and lettering. It was the mistake color of the accent orange that ruined it. often times there was literally something lost in translation with the factory on a specific color description and I believe this orange color was one of those examples. I believe this was intended to be a brighter version of Merckx orange. Frustrating to say the least.

billytwosheds 

Wow, this sounds like perhaps you worked for KHS or oversaw the design of this model? I agree that the orange color stands out and a way that detracts from what could be a visually pleasing color scheme. I bet you have some good stories.

Jazzyg72

Yes that is correct I was one of product development team members and also did R&D. There are more posts on this bike with the initial ad link in the classifieds.

jamesdak 

Usually don't mess with the bikes after work but I decided to tackle the BB tonight. I sort of figured it would give a fight like the crank. Nope, came off super easy. Looks pretty clean inside the shell, always glad to open one of these up and not find a mess. Bearing and races look good. The grease was dirty but not that bad. This BB had seals on it and one the non-drive side they were a little chewed up. That's the only real sign of wear.

Jazzyg72

Thank you for posting that pic. One thing I will never stop bragging about was the quality of the bike builds and the finish at KHS. The engineers and our production team were obsessed with weld quality and precision tolerances in alignment. One of the reasons the owners felt confident offering lifetime warranties on our frames. We also did fatigue testing on everything we built typically to 4x that of standard industry requirements and all of our products were tested in real world miles on the road and trails all over the world before release to the public.

jamesdak 

Well....it's -3 f. outside right now which means even the garage is going to be maybe in the 20's.

So time to go old school and work on the KHS in the nice, warm living.

Today I'll attack the paint. It's been well cleaned to get all the grime off of it so time to see how much shine I can get back into the paint. I'll hit it first with some rubbing compound and then follow that up with polish. Then I'll clean it good again and attack the few major paint defects. Dime size spot of tire rub inside the one chainstay. I've got a purple paint pen that seems a pretty good match to the purple paint. I need to source something for the darker blue though. I'll also touch up the few other areas where the paint is down to the pink undercoat or metal. The worse area is inside the front fork. I want to make sure all defects are squared away even if it's just clear fingernail polish to seal them and keep the rust at bay. It may be a few days but once I'm done she'll get a good coat of wax and then the rebuild will begin.


This morning's workshop, just need to pic a movie to put in.

This is the worse area on the whole bike.

The potential is there for a nice shine. This was just with a clean and then hit once with just polish. Hard to see the real shine in this picture.

jamesdak 

Turned out pretty good for just hand polishing. Hard to capture the shine with this snapshot from the cellphone. But it exhibits a nice, deep shine now and all the sweat corrosion marks and such are gone.


Pretty happy with how this is turning out.

Jazzyg72

Check out the finger nail polish color from Sally Hanson color #013 called Blue Steel - I think I bought it at Walmart. I held the bottle up to your pic and it looks like it might be close. Its a nice metallic blue but in Matte so would require a clear coat after words. You can darken it up on the forks by adding a few drops of metallic black.

jamesdak 

I think I'm pretty dang close on the dark blue section. Took some French Blue paint I had from another project and started mixing in some Testor Gloss Grape paint. Took more purple than I expected but I finally got it pretty dang close. Only bad thing was it started trying pretty quick so I had to be sloppier than I prefer. Still most of the blue damage was on the inside of the fork and right by the dropouts.

I repaired two pea size areas below and two the right of the "S" on the headbadge. They're in the bottom where it's sunlit in this picture.


You can make them out but once I put a clear protective film piece there and have the cable housing running it will hardly be noticeable.

This started this morning with me pulling the fork off. I was going to service the headset and then take the fork with me to work tomorrow. Figured on walking into Hobby Lobby with it and trying to match the paint. Then I tried mixing mine own and got close enough. I'm still going to swing by tomorrow for a lilac paint to see if I can get a better match for the purple half.

Headset was in great condition. So I'll just regrease it and put it back together.

I also went over the RD-7402 I'm planning on using. Both jockey wheels were chewed up bad on the one I want to use. I've got red Bullseye on one of the other ones and yeah....that ain't happening. So the RD-7400 had an aluminum upper wheel with float like I'll want with the STI shifters. So I grabbed it and then used a new replacement Shimano jockey wheel for the bottom. So that's ready to go now. Still leaning towards the old Dura Ace ball and cup BB with loose bearings over the modern cartridge one. I just like how they feel.


Weird that there's no sign of the pink undercoat at the top of the fork but is on the bottom where there were chips.

So the inside is passable now. I prefer to build up several light coats but the mixed paint was drying to quick in the little container I made.

The aftermath of this morning's efforts.

jamesdak 

Still playing around with this while watching the Bengals/Chiefs game.

I've got a brand new silver Nitto stem that appears to be the right length. Just need to decide on the bars. It'll probably come down to what's the most shallowest ones I have.

Then the wheels. I've got the originals I could put back on but I really am thinking something silver vs these grey ones. So that means either the Dura Ace/Open Pro's or a set of Kyserium's I've had handing around for a long time. Or if I want lighter there's a set of Kyserium SSL's available. No matter what I go with there really isn't much room at the front fork if running a variety of 700 x 25 tires. Don't seem to have any good 700 x 23's to match either my Veloflex's or the Continental GP 4000s II I have. Plenty of new 700 x 28's but no 700 x 23's....it figures, LOL!


This is about the typical clearance in front no matter if using the Conti or the Veloflex tires. May need to source a smaller 700 x 23 for the front.

I do like the look of these on here but it'll probably come down to which wheelset feels the best out on the road.

Jazzyg72

Paint color match turned out great. I use a clean brush dipped in acetone to drip a few drops in when it starts to get to heavy on fingernail polish. Same on Testors enamel with paint thinner. I tend to get more polish than Testors since I dont have a Hobby Lobby anywhere nearby. I dont think anyone thought in a million years road tire tech would change from 23mm!!! The close fork blade clearance was so much better aerodynamically. Looks like its all coming together nicely!

jamesdak 

Yeah, I've got several that can only run 23mm. I'm just getting old and despite all the taxes we pay our roads suck up were I live. Smooth pavement is a rare beast that does not live in the mountain valley I live it. I do have a set of Conti Force/Attack tires in a small 22/23mm. I plan to mount those on the stock wheels to see how that combo rides as I sort out the bike. Probably more than a month away from me taking any of the good bikes out though. I don't like exposing them to the winter road chemicals.

So I'm curious, what was the thought process for the frame height being so much shorter than the length? Was is to get the rider down really low in the front? I set it up with my normal saddle height and setback and that's a lot of seatpost now. Tall Nitto Techtronic stem in front has my reach right but even with the long quill section that is an aggressive saddle to bar drop.



It is an odd frame but hey.....I've got a few of those so this fit's in just fine.

Jazzyg72

Do you by chance have a set of Scott aero bar clip ons? I think a LOT of the wind tunnel testing was done using various aero bar configurations to get the best drag coefficient numbers possible. With aero bars configuration you will see the fit will look almost normal as the arm pads are above the bars slightly and the arms would be directly angled in front of your face raising the overall upper body position up from where your stem sits now. Lower top tube and compact frame is the best way way to reduce drag on the frame other than tube shapes.

jamesdak 

Yeah, sorta what I figured. Unfortunately for me I had my AC joint in my right shoulder tore all up in a bike wreck in 2018. So while I've recovered enough to ride normal setups I can't get tucked in on aero bars. When I try the shoulders pops and grinds around. It was never surgically repaired but two of the three ligaments that hold it all together were tore.

I'll be giving it a try as an odd looking road bike and if I decide not to keep it I've got a new Bullhorn and aero bar setup I can put on it. Or I may still have some clip-on aero bars somewhere in the parts stash.

Jazzyg72

I just wanted to give you an idea with the aero bars how much different the fit looks vs a std road bar / stem combo. I think once you play around with it you will get it dialed in quickly. One of the guys I did a lot of R&D miles with was on the USA Natl Track Team - Big guy and he used a riser stem on his build to get a bit more upright and comfortable. He and I rode 5 days a week at lunch time on a course in the industrial park where the KHS corporate office was. Ironically we were less than a mile from the original 7-11 Olympic Velodrome!

jamesdak 

May have to adjust the build on this after all. I wanted to use the dual pivot 7403 brakes but then realized the front caliper was missing the insert for the adjuster. Not sure if this is something I can take from another caliper as I don't know how they come out. Trying to figure out how to solve this little issue before I swap them out for one of the sets of 7400 single pivots I have. Seems my parts stash is getting a bit low so no other 7403 brakes available.

Jazzyg72

Looks like a std flat sided barrel adjuster should work. I glanced at Ebay and there 1 complete caliper for sale $45 w/ free shipping and another seller has 2 for $55 + shipping. Old Campy record are also flat sided

jamesdak 

Yeah I have the actual barrel adjuster. There's just a plastic insert that is missing from the caliper. Without it a barrel adjuster just turns freely never adjusting. I was worried about breaking the insert from another caliper while removing it but wound up getting it out ok. So I can stick to this one. Now I'm on to trying to clean the old housing liner and gunk out of those nicely done BB cable guides. The old liner sort of fell all to pieces as I tried removing it.

Jazzyg72

Wow I have zero recollection of any additional plastic part with the adjuster but I will admit its been 15 years since I have had one of those apart!

jamesdak 

Still hacking away at it. I didn't like the feel of the Dura Ace BB once I got it installed. Felt like one of the caged sets of bearing were off. I usually ditch those for just the free rolling bearings but these had looked fine. Grabbed my tin of 1/4" ball bearings and opened it back up. Then I decided to just use the cartridge BB I had. I seriously doubt I'll keep this one so that BB will be easier for someone else to deal with. Swapped on the 12-26 cassette this morning too. Realized I'd better make sure the RD can handle it before I cut the new chain though.

Still not sure on the stem. Here again I need to think down the road for future owner, maybe. I've tried several combo but some are just fugly. I can use a stem adapter and run a silver Thomsen threadless I have but to me it just looks all fat and clunky on this. I also have an old silver quill stem that 0 degrees so give me more rise to get less drop on this for me. But it's really fat and ugly too, like a lot of the current Profile Design stems. Just can't do it. I know Nitto makes some old Dynamic 2 stems that are 0 degree but I can't find on in the length I need. The Techtronic on it in the picture has a 225mm quill and is as low as it can go. It works for me but a shorter or more flexible owner down the road may want it lower. I do have a Nitto Pearl I could use also. Hmmmm.....

Toyed with the idea of running dark blue housing upfront and purple in the rear. I could find the right colors for the brake housings at Porkchop BMX but not shifter housing. Guess I'll stick with the black as planned. Currently I'm still working on getting some stuck pieces of line out of the guides on the bottom of the BB. The braze on guides for the FD some curved sections of tubing about an inch long. It's a sweet setup but the plastic liner appears to have been greased with installed and the old grease is working as a pretty good glue. I've got stuck liner inside on section of the tube to still get out.

I also found some silver Look Keo compatible pedals so those were ordered. Realized yesterday that I was out of Look Pedals....again....

How it sits this morning:

Jazzyg72

You might try squirting some WD-40 in that stuck liner on the BB. I like the way WD-40 lubes but also works as a solvent and might break up that sticky grease and break the teflon tube free. I have been having a much harder time finding colored break and shifter cable sets since covid - frustrating. I am about to place an order from the UK to get some back in stock.