capnjonny 

I have been playing minor weight weenie games with the 54 cm 1988 Iron man Master.

It came into my shop complete weighing 21.8 lbs .

Swapping in some killer aero spoke DT Swiss wheels and tires (with tubes) , a lighter Specialized seat post , and a Stella Italia Racing saddle has brought it down to 20.4lbs.

My next weenieness is going to be weighing some brakes to see if anything I have(Suntour supreme?) is lighter than the Shimano tricolor. Switching to 1x9 might also take off a couple ounces.

I have some light bars and a couple other things I am going to try that might even crack the 20 lb. barrier without going bat **** crazy.

I am thinking about going to 9x1 with flat bars and thumb shifters for a hipster bike.

I checked out the values on the internet and based on the paint condition and the market , don't think i am going to do a restore on it. With the mods It should make some one of smaller stature a killer city bike though.

Has anyone else moded an Iron man ? what did you do?

T-Mar

Swap the frame for a Centurion Prestige and put Ironman decals on it.

tiger1964 

9x1 means shifter, singular, not plural, no? Thus even more weight loss?

nlerner

How about a pic?

Carbon seatpost and bars would take a bit off (assuming you could find bars that work with your existing stem, which I would guess has a 25.4mm clamp). There's always Ti hardware bits to drop some weight though not a less expensive route to take.

ThermionicScott 

Cool, I love weight-weenie projects. No matter how futile they may seem in some eyes.

Got a full build sheet we can pick apart?

icemilkcoffee 

Did you use an adapter sleeve for that seatpost? It's pretty hard to find carbon seatposts in sizes other than 27.2. I have a 25.4mm carbon seatpost in my Ironman with an adapter sleeve but I don't recommend it- it slips.
What handlebar are you running? If it's plain ole Nitto/SR type untreated aluminum then you can easily save 120+g by switching to a 200g 7075 T6 aluminum bar, or like me a 180g carbon bar (although I don't recommend 26.0mm carbon bars neither -they slip). Likewise the stem. A typical Nitto 'forged' aluminum stem probably weighs 300-330g. A CrMo quill stem could knock 100g off of that. My HL crMo 90mm quill stem weighs 220g.
Another one is the bottom bracket. A typical Shimano UN55 type BB is probably 300+ g. A chinese titanium BB is about 150g if I recall. I have one on my Nishiki Linear and it works just fine. Going to lighter Ti quick release skewers can save you close to 100g. But unfortunately they don't work with our 126mm rear dropout space. If you've spread it open to 130mm (which I will never ever recommend) then they would work.

seypat

For mods, check the Ironman thread. Plenty of ideas there.

https://www.bikeforums.net/classic-v...aint-jobs.html

+1 to what T-Mar said. My 54 Prestige came to me weighing 19.94lbs.

davester

Skip breakfast for a few weeks and get twice the weight savings of your current efforts.

rjhammett

I love it when weight weenies claim that they got their bike under xx pounds without pedals. I haven't tried riding a bike without pedals but I don't think it would work too well.

DMC707

My IM , size 54, was almost 24 pounds with pedals- dont know how to get it down sub 20 without an exotic pair of wheels --- but some bikes just seem to work even if they are a bit porky

scarlson 

What's your freewheel/cassette situation? DT Swiss wheelset suggests a cassette, but maybe they made threaded hubs? If you've got a cassette with individual cogs not on an aluminum "spider" type carrier, you could reduce weight by getting a cassette with the bigger cogs on such a carrier. If it's a freewheel, then modern ones are usually lighter than older ones, although they may be underbuilt and not last as long. Or you can foray into aluminum-cogged exotica, but that's $$$.

An American Classic seatpost may be lighter still than your Specialized. And for a stem, you can try to find a Cinelli with the aluminum hardware. There are a few options if you go this route, but the weight may be offset if you then have to carry around a 7mm allen wrench in your toolkit!

Ti BB is an excellent idea. Hollow pin chain may shave off a few grams, and they can be had quite cheaply in the form of Chinese knockoffs. For extralight sidepull brakes, how about a Dia Compe/Suntour alpha 5000? I have found these to be extremely light. I think you can get aluminum recessed nuts to cut the weight of these down even more!

Here's a useful list of C&V component weights, if you haven't seen it already. It may help inform your decisions.

Chombi1 

Try out a tubular wheelset and you can easily lose over a pound from the bike.....

scarlson 

Back in the day, for sure. When wire beads were your only option for clinchers, it would have been a pound.

However, you will have to carry around an extra tire, instead of just the tube, if you want to be able to fix flats in the field. And that weighs something.

And with kevlar beaded tires and modern clincher rims, the advantage isn't so much as it used to be. Fiamme ergals at 280g are about as light as tub rims get, while the lightest weight clincher rim I know of (Kinlin XR200) is only 380g - 100g more, each. A pretty light clincher tire (Vittoria Open Corsa, 220g) and tube (Schwalbe Extralight, 65g) weigh similar to a pretty light tubular (Vittoria Corsa, 280g). So the advantage of tubs so far is 200g.

But here's the kicker: a spare tubular is also 280g. A spare Schwalbe extralight tube will weigh 65g. So the tub toolkit is around 200g heavier. So comparing apples to apples (lightest rims, tires, tubes), if you include your toolkit you basically break even with a clincher.

Of course you can tweak this - take for example if you went with Clement Seta Extra tubulars, which are purported to be under 200g each. But then, I am sure I could find a 40g latex tube and a 150g clincher, and the equation is still the same: splitting hairs.

Back before kevlar beaded clinchers, of course, this wouldn't have been the case, tubs win hands down over wire beads.

John E

Point taken for steady climbing, where total weight matters, but acceleration response will be better with the tubulars, because of moment of inertia and rotating weight.

mstateglfr 

I love it when this gets brought up in 90% of weight threads.

Removing g pedals from the equation helps equalize things across bikes since so many people who care about weight would also want their own pedals. The Venn diagram would almost be one big circle.
Of course the argument could be made that saddle weight should also be excluded since so many who care about weight would also have their own saddle.

But this is to compare bikes with one another so if shop bikes are weighted without pedals, then home builds being weighed without pedals makes sense.


To be clear, I have never weighed a bike without pedals.

icemilkcoffee 

Speaking of pedals... I use Wellgo MG-8 SPD pedals with magnesium bodies. They are about 240g and have really crisp engagement. They are not as light as the lightest SPD pedals, which is the Ritchey Micro at 210g or so, but I've had Ritchey Road Logic pedals though and I am very unimpressed with Ritchey's mushy engagement. The ubiquitous standby Shimano A525 SPD pedals are relatively heavy a 330g.
Or if you are into toe clip pedals, The $25 Wellgo track pedals are the bestest deal on earth ever. 235g. Lightest quill pedals bar none. Puts MKS pedals to shame.

squirtdad

city bike.... see if you can save a bit with a short wrap of handlebar tape instead of grips

tendency

kinlin rims/extralight hubs/alloy nipples/berd spokes or super light double butted stainless depending on your budget and level of fanaticism.

titanium skewers.

latex tubes.

1x drive train with SRAM RED 1 1x crankset/BB.

Dura Ace 9/10/11/12 cluster. KMC superlight chain.

Personally, I don't care for carbon fiber on vintage bikes so I'd go w/ a Thompson Masterpiece seatpost.

Titanium quill stem.

Titanium egg beater pedals.

ThermionicScott 

Do they? The few times I've lurked on weightweenies, it seemed like people generally discussed full rideable bikes. It's more impressive to build a sub 12-lb bike *with* pedals than without. Often it was Speedplays of some kind, but some folks went the extra mile with Aerolites or whatever.

Chombi1 

Tubs are still lighter than even the most modern foldable tires.
I have both tubs and foldable clincher wheelsets and zip never had been able to even match the weight of my tubupar whedlsets, even with my thinnest section and lightest climchers.
Plus the better ride that tubs have, compared to clinchers.

scarlson 

Show me the numbers! We want numbers!

Also, I didn't say clinchers are lighter, I said tubulars are lighter comparing apples to apples, but it's offset by your heavier toolkit.

They do ride great.

seypat

Back to the original post. Is this a bike that will have all of these mods for the purpose of selling to another owner? If so, you might be better off keeping it as is and letting the next owner do the mods he/she wants. Or not.

Chombi1 

Here's my own weight weenie "experiment".
My Vitus Plus Carbone 7 at just 16.73 pounds. And this is with one of my heavier tubular wheelsets (Rovals) on it.
​​​​it.
I can still get the weight lower if I change out the BB to Ti. And change out the Mavic crankset to maybe a Stronglight 106.

Classtime 

If you insist on counting a tool/repair kit, you need to put more than one tube in the clincher kit because clinchers flat more often.

davester

Not necessarily. If we're talking real weight weenie you shouldn't be carrying around extra tubes at all. Get rid of the one tube and use a patch kit instead. Win, win!

(of course the same could be said for tubulars...carry a patch kit that includes needle, thread, razor blade, casing glue).