1992 Off Road Toad

[Warhorse]

Back in April I happened to acquire a bike I never thought I’d have. After a trade with a friend that has ended up with the bones for one of my most desired bikes to build!

Here are a few pictures I received before we started to make arrangements.

#207 20” Off Road Toad built by Chris DeKerf. By all the accounts of other Toads I would place this as a 2nd version Toad built in 1992.

 

[Warhorse]

The white paint job was something I found really appealing. Truth be told I always hoped to find a early Derek Bailey built brazed version with a Camo paint job… but I loved the looks of this Tig frame in white, and the rear u-brake was something I was t used to seeing on this era of Toad!

I couldn’t wait to see it in person and jumped at the first opportunity. A deal was made, my kid loved it as well… and home it came with us!

 

[dirttorpedo]

Cool. I don't think I've every seen one in white.

 

[Retro_Roy]

Agreed. Only white one I have seen. But it seems the more Toads I see
the more odd colours I see as well. Toad green is not the norm it appears.
We will have to do a Toad ride before end of summer.

 

[Warhorse]

This is a bike I didn’t waste much time with, I wanted to ride it!
Generally when I get a new bike I tear it all down, start cleaning and building again. though I already had a builds worth of parts stashed in case something special came my way…
It cleaned up quite well minus a few small marks/scratches and a bit of decal damage.
There wasn’t a lot on the original build that I intended to keep, I believe the XT headset, thumbies, and u-brake were the only hold outs. I wanted to go rigid for the build, and while an Accutrax would probably be standard approach I had something else on hand that may be a bit out of left field but I figured would suit perfectly.

 

[pw_pw_la]

Excited to see this one finally getting the thread it deserves!

Such a perfect bike.

 

[Warhorse]

I just sort of jumped into the build at this point with bits I had on hand…

The front end lending itself from another local legend of the MTB world in the form of recently built fillet brazed unicrown straight blade fork and a fillet brazed ICR stem both from Paul Brodie. A Brodie u-brake booster/brace also complimenting the XT u-brake.

I generally build my bikes not very flashy in terms of now much cnc parts, nor flashy anodizing. I initially rounded it out with some XT hubs laced to Sun rims I near mint shape, sporting Ritchey tires. XT canti up front, with a pair of XT brake levers. XT Thumbies and headset held over from the original build along with some Tange Prestige bars with a nice sweep and ODI Attack grips.

XT Derailleurs front and rear paired with a set of BOSS USA MTB cranks, I thought these unique cranks were really cool sporting sort of an amalgamation of Syncros and Bullseye. Turned out they needed an exceptionally long crank bolt to hit the BB spindle which I sourced from a local hardware shop.

A first gen Syncros seatpost, the original Ringle skewers and a Turbolite saddle rounded out this primary build…

Not too bad, but I knew that once it was cabled and off of a few initial rides it’d be a process of tweaking and changing things here and there as I could deduce what would make it just right and an ideal build for myself.

 

[pw_pw_la]

So you're saying you wanted to perfect the already perfect bike?

I can appreciate that!

 

[Warhorse]

Quickly cabled it up, wanted to get out for a spin to feel the bike, test the fit, and confirm that this was “the one”.

It was. I knew that changes lay ahead, but first ride felt great minus slight tweaks and adjustments needing to be made… I had been concerned the 20” frame might be large but the reach felt perfect.

Honestly I could have just stopped here and been satisfied but this bike came to me at a time where I was trying to downsize and streamline the collection, I’m moving a few bikes out I had kept various parts I liked aside so as to not have to find them again if the time came… well the Toad was deemed 100% worthy of any parts I may throw at it.

I wasn’t out to build the ideal ORT everybody else might expect to see, at this point I knew I had the frame to build the ideal bike that I would want to ride. Now to figure out what changes I had to make to get it there…

 

[raidan73]

That’s a real beauty Nick