1996 16" Kona Hot Stars 'n' Bars HT0127

[KHot Fan]

Hi all! I'm new to the forum but have lurked a little bit here over the years. I am the original owner of the Kona Hot Stars 'n' Bars described in the title. I ordered it from Kona through friends that owned a bike shop in Kalamazoo Michigan in early spring of 1996. I bought it as a frame and built it up with a custom kit. The reason I am posting this thread here is after owning the bike 23 years I am going to sell it. I am putting it out here to see if there is any interest in this frame and the original components from the build that I still have.

I rode the bike for a little over 10 years and then made some changes to to the build but after late 2006 it has not seen much riding time. Obviously I replaced chain rings and cassettes over that time and took very good care of the bike. I traveled with the bike and rode it all over North America including Whistler in the old school days just as the bike park was getting started. The Hot was a great bike and served me very well as back country trail and sometimes xc race bike.

I have it taken down to the frame and have most of the components as I said earlier. I originally treated the frame internally with J.R. Weigle's Frame Saver and it's never had a spec of rust. The frame has some scratches and chips in the paint and it had chain suck a few times but overall it's in very good shape. Kona even supplied us original owners with touch up paint on these custom paint jobs. I still have the red, white and blue touch up paint. I also have the original seat post clamp and rear brake cable routing guide that slides down the seat tube below the seat clamp.

I am going to list my original build that I ended up with after I massaged and tweaked the build over the first year. I still own most of the components with a few exceptions which I will list below.

Here's the original build:
1996 16" Kona Hot Stars 'n' Bars
Specialized Judy FSX with Englund Air Kit and carbon fork brace
Mavic 217 rims/ Hugi Sulver Hubs/ DT DB 14/16 spokes, Now Bontrager Valiant Asymetrical Ceramic rims/ Hugi Hubs DT SG 14g spokes
Ritchey WCS Z Max 2.1 tires
Shimano XTR 12-32 Cassette
Specialized Ti black skewers
Shimano XTR RD M-950 w/ Avid Rollamajig
Shimano XTR FD M-950 w/ Carbon E-Clamp on BB
Grip Shift Attack 8 spd shifters
Specialized Direct Drive Ti Bottom Bracket (made by TnT)
RaceFace Turbine LP, Silver 110/74, 175 w/ Race Face Silver chainrings 24/34/46, Now RF Black chainrings 24/34/46
Chris King Silver Headset
Kore Silver 120/ 0 deg Stem
Answer Hyperlight Flat Bars then Specialized Thermo Plastic Flat Carbon Bars (I have both and a brand new Hyperlight bar)
Marinovative Cheap Trick, Silver Brakes, the original long arm brake designed by Ben Capron in 1989
Real Brake Levers, Silver, Long Pull
Onza CWA Black/ Silver bar ends
Answer Rocker seat post 27mm
Avocet Ti 40M saddle


I still have every component except the Specialized FSX Judy, Kore stem and the Real brake levers. I rebuilt the Ti BB once, it has 4 cartridge bearings and I upgraded them the Abec 5 bearings when I rebuilt it. I's still butter smooth. The RF Turbine LP cranks are in great shape and have seen a few chainring replacements. It currently has RF black rings. Unfortunately I put the FSX fork on my ex-wife's hardtail and lost the fork in that split.

I will post some photos of the frame and components when I get a chance but here's a shot of the last build it saw with a Fox Float RL, an a Avid BB7 front brake, disc brake DT front wheel, Paul Love Levers and Fizik Nisene saddle.

Let me know if anyone has any questions and if any body has any interest in this frame and the components that I have.

 

[Pipmeister]

Re:

Hello and welcome,

That is a great story regarding being the original owner. You probably realise that there are many Kona fans on here - particularly the Hot.

There is another member on here who was supplied with the little pots of red, white and blue touch up paint when he imported his S 'n' B Hot!

I would appreciate some more pictures if you are able to post anything else up like details of the Dropouts, Cable Stops and a shot of the Serial number for my records. You can have my e-mail address if you have problems uploading decent sized pictures on the site.

I am sure that you will receive a lot of interest on here in your frame and components.

Pip

 

[KHot Fan]

Thanks for the welcome Pip! Like I mentioned I would always end up at this site when looking for anything Kona related, especially with regards to the Hot. I like the passion I see here with regards to these older Kona US Made steel frames.

The Kona Custom moniker was definitely the choice of a custom paint scheme like the Stars 'n' Bars and not any choice of custom frame geometry. Since they made the Hot, Hei Hei/ King Kahuna, Explosif and other HT's in 14, 16, 17, 18, 19 ,20, 21" it was easy to find the right fit. I also own a 1997 Waterford 2200/ Henry James lugged, silver soldered 853 Reynolds frame that truly is a custom frame made to fit with custom geometry and paint. The Waterford is still my main road bike and built with Campy Record 10 speed is and Bontrager Race Lite wheels is an 18 lb. steel road bike. The paint on the Waterford is Candy red with black smokey marble. When Reynolds initially licensed a builder to use the new 853 tubing, the builder would have to submit a test triangle to Reynolds for evaluation before they received the 853 license and tubing orders. Waterford's test samples were the strongest that Reynolds had ever tested in the process. I also have a custom made FTW/ Frank The Welder/ Frank Wadelton steel 29r with Paragon machine Works sliding dropouts, that I bought new from a shop in New Hampshire that commissioned Frank to make 5 prototype frames back in 2010. The interesting thing with these frames is they were designed for plus tires both 27.5" and 29" but use a 73mm BB and 135 or 142mm rear spacing. I have 29x3.0 Maxxis Minions mounted on some custom I9/ Velocity Dually 39mm IW wheels on that bike. Frank built these frames in 2010, way before the plus tire trend started.

Back to the Hot! I love the 853 Reynolds tube frames, they are typically light, stiff where needed but compliant and lively frames. The Hot frame fit that billing and was a fun trail bike to ride. The 16" frame has an especially deep sloping top tube that makes it look like a BMX bike and gives it good vertical stiffness but a fun lively feel carving single track . It is an intuitive riding bike and a very capable bike. The build pictured above with the 100mm travel Fox actually rode better than the FSX 80mm travel fork build. Kona offered the builds in either 80 or 100mm and from my experience the 100mm fork on this bike was better all around. My Hot as spec'd above was around 23-23.5 lbs. depending on tires, tubes, pedals. I used Shimano 747 pedals back in 1996-1998ish but switched to Crank Brother Egg Beaters, then Candies after that.

I'll take some photos of the frame and components shortly and post them up here. My bike has the investment cast stepped/ Goathead socketed dropouts with the Kona barking dog motif. I see that even the Altitude built bikes seemed to have a couple different dropout designs that were used. Do the HT111, HT121 and HT123 bikes all have flat dropouts? If so my HT127 must have been one of the first few with the Goathead style dropouts.

I've seen some comments on this forum about the cable guide alignment on the Kona top tubes, where the front guide is farther outboard than the rear. This was done to create more clearance for the cables housing around the head tube.

Cheers!

 

[Pipmeister]

Re:

Thank you for your very interesting reply.

There are a couple of points that you mention, which I wasn't aware of. Particularly regarding the builder would have to submit a test triangle to Reynolds for evaluation before they received the 853 license and tubing order. Blimey, that adds an odd twist to the story of Alititude frames allegedly failing!

The Hot serial numbers that I now have documented do indeed show that your frame is the first (lowest number) to use Goathead Dropouts. I have HT0111, HT121, and HT123 listed as "old style" flat Pre-Goathead, and then your HT127, HT0192, HT209 listed as Goathead. Note the extra Zero in two of those Altitude HT serial numbers - I don't know what that is all about! Then the earliest Altitude 1997 Hot is an 18” Rasta Green & Yellow Flame with serial number H09607048 - welded in July 1996.

BTW, the Kona barking dog motif (K9?) that you mention on the Goathead Dropouts is supposed to be exactly that - A Goat's Head, representing Jeff Lindsay's former company Mountain Goat.

These two pictures may show it better.





Pip

 

[KHot Fan]

Well I learned something about the Goathead. I don't know why I never knew that before now. Thanks! I had not heard of many of the >1996, 853 Hot frames breaking at least not the main triangles. Where have the failures been that you are aware of? I could understand some failures at the dropouts, more so of the flat style dropouts and the slightly less robust 753 rear triangles.

My SN is actually HT0127. Here are pics of my frame.








I take some photos of the components and post those when I have them ready. I keep detailed spreadsheets of all my bike builds so I'm going through the list now and should have these soon.

 

[Woodsie]

Lovely frame KHot. 16" too, hmm....

*Pip, just for your records HT0111 is mine and has the goat dropouts not flat ones as you mention above.

Cheers.

 

[Pipmeister]

Lovely frame KHot. 16" too, hmm....

*Pip, just for your records HT0111 is mine and has the goat dropouts not flat ones as you mention above.

Cheers.

Thanks for that, I'll correct my records. I had been studying a picture of it for a while that I believe Al sent me, and couldn't quite decide which type of Dropouts it had. Eventually, I made an incorrect assumption based on the sequential number. Mind you it does begs the question what was going on at Altitude at the time, but I think that has been well covered now!

Cheers, Pip.

 

[mk one]

Welcome to the forum. Lovely frame and a shame its not a 17/18" as i would have been interested.

You should put it up in the for sale section and im sure it wont hang around for long. It will need a fixed price on it though if you are tying to sell it

Mark

 

[Pipmeister]

I had not heard of many of the >1996, 853 Hot frames breaking at least not the main triangles. Where have the failures been that you are aware of? I could understand some failures at the dropouts, more so of the flat style dropouts and the slightly less robust 753 rear triangles.

We are still trying to piece the rumours together, and come up with something nearer the truth, but here is something written back in 2015 by a knowledgeable chap on here. Scroll down to the last post Wed Dec 02, 2015:
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=337664&p=2523205&hilit

....and here is something more recent, where I popped up a couple of pictures:
viewtopic.php?f=6&t=85041&p=2930277&hilit

We have also heard of the Stays popping out of the Dropouts, which would suggest the Cast Investment Goathead type, but I've never seen a picture of this.

Pip.

 

[KHot Fan]

Thanks Mark! The frame and OG build kit that I have is all original period stuff and all in very good shape equal to the condition of the frame.

The Marinovative Cheap Trick brakes are very rare and great stoppers especially combined with the DT/ Hugi/ Bontrager Valiant Ceramic rim wheels. The Cheap Tricks predate the V-brakes, first made in 1989 and are the brakes Shimano used as a target when they developed the V-brake. They were popular with trials riders because of their power. Combine them with some new Paul Love Levers which look the period and they're about the best period style brakes you can get. The full M-950 XTR drive train with Gripshift is in excellent shape. I clean and re-packed the bearing in the jockey wheels regularly and even thought there are a few scratches on the rear mech it's pretty much flawless. These very first ver RaceFace turbine LP cranks are very clean and the Specialized Direct Drive Ti bottom bracket is solid and spins like new. It's the same BB that Ned Overend used on his bikes with square taper cranks.

Anyway I'm just trying to gauge the interest here. I'll post some pics of the groupo shortly. Then list the frame and groupo for sale in the classifieds.

Cheers!