Post by willie on Jul 11, 2012 16:40:40 GMT 1
Apologies that this post is a bit from the norm, but I wanted to post this online so I could send a few interested people the link. It's long winded, so apologies if it bores you.
A while back I posted in the Buy&Sell asking for any old wreckers or cheap bikes; to use as a commuter bike. I posted in a few places and got 3 very kind offers. Obviously I only needed 1 bike and said I would only take the first...but all 3 people were very generous I ended up agreeing to take the 3. My theory was there should be enough parts in the 3 to build up 1 decent bike and have a few spares for winter maintenance.
So big thanks to Steve Boyes for the Pegueot mountain bike, Alistair Cairns for the Dawes racer and Melvin Poque for the Peugeot racer.
The Peugeot mountain bike (In cracking order) will likely be used in snow or as a turbo bike. I haven't quite decided yet, and I don't like modifying anything until I've my mind made up...so that one is still to come.
Dawes Shadow:
The Dawes is a Dawes Shadow and I couldn't believe it when I saw it. I'm a sucker for old school stuff and the lugged steel frame, down tube shifters and classic mudguards really appealed. With it's wider tyres (27 x 1.125") than I'm used to, I decided to start using her to work. It's racked up a few hundred miles already.
I had plans to modify the frame to take disc brakes, but I've got too attached to it and don't think I can bring myself to strip the paint from it. I may still go disc by making bolt on adaptors, but I'm going to try and modify the existing brakes first (Stronger return springs...I hate rim brakes in the winter for seizing up).
We reckon it's about 30years old, is running the original tyres and the bar grip stuff (Similar to pipe lagging) was starting to break up; so I decided to give it a make-over. New grip tape, saddle and a bit of paint work on the mudguards and she's looking the ticket. I've never had a bike that made me feel like a WW1 pilot before...
With 2 x 5 friction gearing, a 40t front granny ring and 14-24t on the back, I began to see the benefit of pushing a bigger gear up hills rather than spinning, this has a bearing on the following project.
Peugeot Racer:
First run out on the Peugeot showed that the rear wheel had a huge flat spot in the rim, but aside from that the frame felt real nice, and being me, I got all attached and felt that it needed some love. Paintwork was "used" and stickers were peeling a bit.
After a bit of deliberation, and not wanting to build a bike that wouldn't get used, I decided to overhaul it and build it up as a single speed/fixie. I'll be able to use it as a training bike, and it'll double up as a commuter when the Dawes is undergoing any work (For which the gears and mechanicals will all come in as very handy spares).
Stripped it down to the bare metal, removed a couple of cable braze ons, the d/tube shifter mounts and fixed a deep cut (I do a bit of brazing, so filled it up and filed it flush).
Removed the mech hanger and carefully filed the dropout to match the non drive side. That was perhaps the biggest dilema overall, as I felt a vandal, but I decided that I could always braze in a new rear dropout if I wanted to, so I went for it.
The crankarms were already 170s, but had some scratches which I wanted to tidy (Interestingly, both bikes had big frames, equivalent to a 54/56cm modern bike based on TT lengths, and both had 170mm crank arms. Most moderns have 175mm). The arms also had alot of flash marks from production, so I removed these.
The front wheel I cleaned up and polished, then got a great deal on a set of deep rim wheels with a flip flop hub, so the polished front wheel will remain a spare. I'm going to try fixing the flat spotted rear as a separate project. New wheels were rubbed up and painted satin black, although I left the brake track on the front...'cause I'm a wimp.
Bars were flipped over, cut and painted satin black, along with other bits like the 42t granny ring (Seriously, what kind of wheatabix did people eat 30years ago?). I got TT levers from Zak and will run with a single to see how it goes. After taping the bars I didn't like the look of the ITM lever, so I modified a BBB plug and fitted it to the recess to finish it up.
The old saddle had a cut in it, and I found a charge spoon in the correct colour scheme on sale, so bought it to finish it off right.
Black chain and 16t freewheel finished it off.
Colour is Plasti-kote Super Orange Gloss.
The main purpose of this post was to describe and show the guys who very kindly gave me these bikes, what I have done and why. I assure you, both will be well used...but also well looked after.
The Peugeot mountain bike project is still to come when I make my mind up on it.
Willie
A while back I posted in the Buy&Sell asking for any old wreckers or cheap bikes; to use as a commuter bike. I posted in a few places and got 3 very kind offers. Obviously I only needed 1 bike and said I would only take the first...but all 3 people were very generous I ended up agreeing to take the 3. My theory was there should be enough parts in the 3 to build up 1 decent bike and have a few spares for winter maintenance.
So big thanks to Steve Boyes for the Pegueot mountain bike, Alistair Cairns for the Dawes racer and Melvin Poque for the Peugeot racer.
The Peugeot mountain bike (In cracking order) will likely be used in snow or as a turbo bike. I haven't quite decided yet, and I don't like modifying anything until I've my mind made up...so that one is still to come.
Dawes Shadow:
The Dawes is a Dawes Shadow and I couldn't believe it when I saw it. I'm a sucker for old school stuff and the lugged steel frame, down tube shifters and classic mudguards really appealed. With it's wider tyres (27 x 1.125") than I'm used to, I decided to start using her to work. It's racked up a few hundred miles already.
I had plans to modify the frame to take disc brakes, but I've got too attached to it and don't think I can bring myself to strip the paint from it. I may still go disc by making bolt on adaptors, but I'm going to try and modify the existing brakes first (Stronger return springs...I hate rim brakes in the winter for seizing up).
We reckon it's about 30years old, is running the original tyres and the bar grip stuff (Similar to pipe lagging) was starting to break up; so I decided to give it a make-over. New grip tape, saddle and a bit of paint work on the mudguards and she's looking the ticket. I've never had a bike that made me feel like a WW1 pilot before...
With 2 x 5 friction gearing, a 40t front granny ring and 14-24t on the back, I began to see the benefit of pushing a bigger gear up hills rather than spinning, this has a bearing on the following project.
Peugeot Racer:
First run out on the Peugeot showed that the rear wheel had a huge flat spot in the rim, but aside from that the frame felt real nice, and being me, I got all attached and felt that it needed some love. Paintwork was "used" and stickers were peeling a bit.
After a bit of deliberation, and not wanting to build a bike that wouldn't get used, I decided to overhaul it and build it up as a single speed/fixie. I'll be able to use it as a training bike, and it'll double up as a commuter when the Dawes is undergoing any work (For which the gears and mechanicals will all come in as very handy spares).
Stripped it down to the bare metal, removed a couple of cable braze ons, the d/tube shifter mounts and fixed a deep cut (I do a bit of brazing, so filled it up and filed it flush).
Removed the mech hanger and carefully filed the dropout to match the non drive side. That was perhaps the biggest dilema overall, as I felt a vandal, but I decided that I could always braze in a new rear dropout if I wanted to, so I went for it.
The crankarms were already 170s, but had some scratches which I wanted to tidy (Interestingly, both bikes had big frames, equivalent to a 54/56cm modern bike based on TT lengths, and both had 170mm crank arms. Most moderns have 175mm). The arms also had alot of flash marks from production, so I removed these.
The front wheel I cleaned up and polished, then got a great deal on a set of deep rim wheels with a flip flop hub, so the polished front wheel will remain a spare. I'm going to try fixing the flat spotted rear as a separate project. New wheels were rubbed up and painted satin black, although I left the brake track on the front...'cause I'm a wimp.
Bars were flipped over, cut and painted satin black, along with other bits like the 42t granny ring (Seriously, what kind of wheatabix did people eat 30years ago?). I got TT levers from Zak and will run with a single to see how it goes. After taping the bars I didn't like the look of the ITM lever, so I modified a BBB plug and fitted it to the recess to finish it up.
The old saddle had a cut in it, and I found a charge spoon in the correct colour scheme on sale, so bought it to finish it off right.
Black chain and 16t freewheel finished it off.
Colour is Plasti-kote Super Orange Gloss.
The main purpose of this post was to describe and show the guys who very kindly gave me these bikes, what I have done and why. I assure you, both will be well used...but also well looked after.
The Peugeot mountain bike project is still to come when I make my mind up on it.
Willie
