Cycling UK Forum

If you're willing to spend big bucks on a headset there is this that could enable you to use your fork with its short steerer

http://chrisking.com/headsets/hds_gnut

I would stay away from the really cheap sjs panniers and any others that have stamped metal hooks on the top rail - my sister and a friend had these and the hooks bent out a bit with regular use, allowing the panniers to jump off the rack on bumpy roads. Bending them back didn't work, they just bent straight out again.

Also corrosion is less likely if you use marine boat trailer grease in your bearings

pubrunner wrote:

fatboy wrote:How many gears does it currently have? Is it currently friction or indexed shifting? Indexed shifting uses different rear mechs (I think).

SJS cycles have some thumb shifters which seem quite cheap. Personally I don't think that grip shifters are terrible just there are better options out there.

It currently has 6 speeds and friction shifters; but presumably, it could be 'coldset' to take a cassette - which would mean new wheels, of course.

This is perfectly possible and do-able, but expect to spend a lot of time fiddling about trying different things to get it to work. I have done this on plenty of old road bikes. They work perfectly well, but never as well as the same equipment on a modern frame. You would be able to use the bars, stem, possibly gear shifters and derailleurs, and possibly brake levers, from one of you mountain bikes, but not the brakes as the pro am frame won't have cantilever bosses.

I don't recommend spending too much money getting it all to be correct- putting new parts on old frames that weren't designed for them can be a bottomless pit. You could get a 7 speed freewheel as opposed to a cassette, meaning that you could get away with using the same rear wheel. You might have to add a couple of washers under the driveside overlock nut in order to get the chain to clear the seatstay when on the smallest sprocket, and you might end up with a wheel that was off centre by one or 2 mm (which you could rectify by dishing the wheel if you really wanted to), and not get a great chainline, but it still could be perfectly usable.

You would need to use a 7 or 8 speed rear mech with this, (get a cheap used one on retrobike forum - you can also ask for advice there - plenty of experience with old bike tech) and you could use 7 or 8 speed thumb shifters (over bar variety) (get from same place), or 7/8 speed trigger shifters. If you get the trigger shifters as integrated units with the brake levers then make sure you get cantilever compatible ones - v brake levers pull twice as much cable at half the power so would probably be insufficiently powerful for use with old road calipers. The same goes for any flat bar brake levers you use with this bike - make sure they are canti rather than v-brake compatible.

Also if you use trigger shifters (also known as sti shifters/paddle shifters etc) the front shifter will be indexed only which will probably mean getting a new chainset, bottom bracket and front derailleur.

Thumb shifters that are mounted above bar are better all around in this case- as a previous poster said, the front derailleur can be shifted on friction setting so you can use the existing front mech and chainset, and use the shifter to trim the front derailleur to overcome any problems associated with chainline.

Some grip shifters are also not indexed for the front derailleur, or have lots of tiny clicks so that you can trim the mech, so would be ideal too. Many sram shifters - grip shift type and trigger type - have a different pull ratio of 1 to 1, in this case you would have to make sure you bought a matching rear derailleur.

You will also need to buy or bodge some gear cable stops to mount where the down tube gear levers are now.

As a first step you could keep the entire gear set up as it is, just fitting thumb shifters used in friction mode on flat bars. If your son liked the bike enough you could then think about upgrading gears for indexing as above. To do this less involved change you would need -
1. mtb quill stem to fit 1" steerer, or your quill to ahead converter and ahead stem (whatever you do don't use the original road quill stem as is a different bar clamp size and therefore dangerous. I have done this in the past and cringe to think of it now.)
2. Flat or riser bars
3. Down tube cable stops
4. Cantilever brake levers
5. Thumb shifters with friction mode

You'd also have to get a pair of down tube cable stops - or bodge something that does the same job -
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3368/364 ... 0c36_o.jpg
Your best bet would be to work out what you need and then get it second hand on this forum or classifieds at retrobike or singletrack forum

I used trekking bars for a bit, but would not go back to them after trying other bars. Some of the reasons that I agree with are talked about here on the Thorn website -
http://www.sjscycles.com/thornpdf/Thorn ... oHiRes.pdf
I didn't mind them when I used them, but I only ever ended up using two hand positions that would have been replicated by flat bars with bar ends. You also need a very long stem if you don't want the primary hand position to give very twitchy steering. I had mine set up similarly to this bike -

http://lh3.ggpht.com/_8BZqOcjsG20/SfysY ... B14%5D.jpg

You can see from this photo that in the primary hand postition the effective stem length is about 40mm or so - giving very squirrely handling. Handling is more stable when holding the bars in one of the other positions further forward, but if you need the brakes you need to be in the primary position. My brake levers couldn't go anywhere else on the bars as the clamps wouldn't clear the bends, although someone else on this thread managed it.

Now I like On One Mary bars for touring - only one hand position but it's a really comfy one for me. Really good angle for flats and pulling on the bars for climbing, not quite so good for descending, though this isn't too much of a problem on road.

Having said that it is of course personal choice and loads of people really like them.

+1 for Halo Twin Rail - these are 2.2" wide and come in interesting colours too.
I also use conti travel contacts, which are a bit thinner at 1.75" and bought new come with inner tubes as part of the price. You will be able to use your current rims with either.

gregoryoftours wrote:
This is a very long time after the last post, but I am surprised that no one has mentioned using barrier cream before doing work on bikes. Once it's dried (a minute or two) you can't tell it's there. Dirt washes off much more easily afterwards, and your hands are much less affected by whatever you use to clean them with. I use swarfega barrier cream and then swarfega to wash after. Before I started to use barrier cream my hands would get very quickly dried and cracked from swarfega, but not since. A small dispenser refill pack of barrier cream - eg - http://www.qualitycycles4u.com/Swarfega ... n=products

is relatively cheap and lasts ages. By the way I don't sell this!

Nice one. I've used vasaline but it's a bit slimy. Is this cream just a moisturising cream, or something different?

I'm not sure really - barrier creams are marketed as different from moisturising cream but it certainly shares some properties. The stuff I use is slimy for a couple of minutes but if you carry on rubbing your hands together it dries out completely. Moisturising creams such as E45 seem to stay a bit oilier which is a bit of a pain to use with tools, and are probably more expensive by volume unless you are buying barrier cream in small tubes. Barrier cream does condition your hands as they don't get dried out half as much when washing with harsh cleaners after work.

Not really, if somebody posted saying they'd been using them offroad for years on stem faceplates without problems it would be good enough for me. I'm happy enough using them for pannier racks after realising that Tubus use them.

This is a very long time after the last post, but I am surprised that no one has mentioned using barrier cream before doing work on bikes. Once it's dried (a minute or two) you can't tell it's there. Dirt washes off much more easily afterwards, and your hands are much less affected by whatever you use to clean them with. I use swarfega barrier cream and then swarfega to wash after. Before I started to use barrier cream my hands would get very quickly dried and cracked from swarfega, but not since. A small dispenser refill pack of barrier cream - eg - http://www.qualitycycles4u.com/Swarfega ... n=products

is relatively cheap and lasts ages. By the way I don't sell this!

I've used automotive grease for bearings for a few years now with no noticeable difference in lifespan of grease or components from using bike specific grease. The only change I've considered is using marine or boat trailer bearing grease, which I haven't got around to trying yet, but still plan to. I do use dedicated suspension fork grease, but not the tiny and outrageously expensive bicycle specific versions.

hubgearfreak, I'm a bit worried about using them as brake mounts or stem bolts where the consequence of failure could be catastrophic! I'd like to use them in these places though as these locations are usually quite exposed to rain or dirt.

I agree with the last poster that frame design is the main factor in determining the lifespan of an aluminium frame, and aluminium frame design has come on a lot since the early ones. Even if failure is ultimately inevitable I think that the lifespan of a decent aluminium frame is likely to be longer than 7 years (for road use, at least). There are plenty of planes that have been in service for about 30 years without failure, although the stresses will be different. I think that if someone advises otherwise it could be to cover their own back, or possibly to get a sale, or because they like steel and are instinctively biased against aluminium! If you're talking off-road use then steel frames also regularly break. If it's a decent aluminium frame the reinforcement around the head tube area will make failure at this point less likely than around the bottom bracket shell, where a break would have less catastrophic consequences.

Where would you risk using these on a bike? I bought some A2 stainless socket cap screws to use as pannier rack and bottle cage fitting bolts, and A4 to use as v brake mounting bolts. I then got a bit worried as they don't have the same strength as hi-ten bolts. But then I noticed that all of the bolts and fittings that come with Tubus racks are stainless, including the load bearing bolts down at the rear dropouts, and presumably Tubus know their stuff well enough.

Thanks for that, it's a really interesting article from a guy who obviously knows his stuff. It's also put some of my concerns about the plus fabric to rest, although I'd still be interested in someone with direct experience of using both over a prolonged period. Mainly I'm wondering about the coating on the inside of the plus being subject to constant rubbing of hard objects placed inside the panniers on a sustained long - term trip. Think I'll get hold of some of that repair material he recommends!