After some TLC, here's the finished SS Orange Clockwork urban assault.
Some build details:
- I was concerned that the rear hanger had thread damage, but it was fine.
- Original Wellgo pedals removed and trashed; cages were hanging off them. Replaced with some donar XT SPuDs.
- Original worn BB UN5? 110mm E-Type removed....always a good feeling to get a +10 year steel BB out of a steel frame
Replaced with a NOS UN53 107mm; Made in Japan without the bloody plastic cup
- Worn small and middle rings removed and trashed. Kept the STX-RC MC36 chainset because it's really a very nice Pista chainset! Kept the 42T big ring cos there's a season of life in it. A bit of wirewool and autosol did the trick to get it in a good shape.
- Replaced the worn and abused Sedis Sport chain with a mildly used HG73.
- Removed the STX-RC front, rear mech and cassette altogether in favour of an unworn 18T Uniglide sprocket plus some Velosolo CNC spacers. Great surprise to have my preferred gearing bang on the Magic Gear!
- Cleaned up and kept the original Orange Stem and Hot Rod flat bars and STX-RC brake-levers, but put on some chunky Lizard Skins lock-on grips plus Tioga Power Studs 6 bar-ends to help me man handle my way up some of the steeper climbs.
- New set of brake cables, brake-pads and cleaned-up the original STX-RC V-brakes but had to replace the noodles. They work a charm; although I would have preferred the cable guides to be on the top of the top-tube for a cleaner look.
- Totally re-built the head-set including re-greasing the "sealed cartridge" bearings (sounds more impressive than it was....the whole headset including bearings fell to bits all over the floor, so I actually had no choice since I didn't want to start smashing cups out)
- Unbelievably when I removed all the tat from the seat-post was a nice Thomson Elite logo....this has since been sold on for approx. 50% of the whole bike purchase price :!: I found a more appropriate off-set seat-post from a dumped road-side wreck, cleaned it up and shimmed the missing 0.2 inches to 26.8 with a beer can (which I had lying around... ;-))
- Kept the original Orange saddle; good enough for short distance untill I find a suitable Rolls (Union Jack version would look patroitic in the land of the Vikings)
- Cleaned up and tweaked the STX-RC hubs, Mavic 221 rims with DB DT Swiss spokes, new Velox rim tape, new Conti tubes, and finally got round to using some white allen key skewers from a wrong CNC order.
- Decided to keep the mammoth 2.35 Schwalbe Big Apples since they had plenty of tread on them. Sweet jesus they are fat and comfy! Just enough rolling resistance / weight so I'm not spinning out on the flats and simply no need to bother avoiding pot-holes! I'm pretty happy with them. Skinny tubes and fat tyres seem to go reasonably well together IMHO.
- Cleaned the frame, removed all superfluous and tatty decals. Just kept the Orange on the down-tube plus the Orange logo on the front of the forks to make it more discrete.
All in all I'm chuffed with it. Nice ride, looks smart but not too flashly to get stolen. If it does get stolen, financially it's no big loss but it's certainly a keeper and I like some of the quirky details.
Best of British!
Some build details:
- I was concerned that the rear hanger had thread damage, but it was fine.
- Original Wellgo pedals removed and trashed; cages were hanging off them. Replaced with some donar XT SPuDs.
- Original worn BB UN5? 110mm E-Type removed....always a good feeling to get a +10 year steel BB out of a steel frame
Replaced with a NOS UN53 107mm; Made in Japan without the bloody plastic cup - Worn small and middle rings removed and trashed. Kept the STX-RC MC36 chainset because it's really a very nice Pista chainset! Kept the 42T big ring cos there's a season of life in it. A bit of wirewool and autosol did the trick to get it in a good shape.
- Replaced the worn and abused Sedis Sport chain with a mildly used HG73.
- Removed the STX-RC front, rear mech and cassette altogether in favour of an unworn 18T Uniglide sprocket plus some Velosolo CNC spacers. Great surprise to have my preferred gearing bang on the Magic Gear!
- Cleaned up and kept the original Orange Stem and Hot Rod flat bars and STX-RC brake-levers, but put on some chunky Lizard Skins lock-on grips plus Tioga Power Studs 6 bar-ends to help me man handle my way up some of the steeper climbs.
- New set of brake cables, brake-pads and cleaned-up the original STX-RC V-brakes but had to replace the noodles. They work a charm; although I would have preferred the cable guides to be on the top of the top-tube for a cleaner look.
- Totally re-built the head-set including re-greasing the "sealed cartridge" bearings (sounds more impressive than it was....the whole headset including bearings fell to bits all over the floor, so I actually had no choice since I didn't want to start smashing cups out)
- Unbelievably when I removed all the tat from the seat-post was a nice Thomson Elite logo....this has since been sold on for approx. 50% of the whole bike purchase price :!: I found a more appropriate off-set seat-post from a dumped road-side wreck, cleaned it up and shimmed the missing 0.2 inches to 26.8 with a beer can (which I had lying around... ;-))
- Kept the original Orange saddle; good enough for short distance untill I find a suitable Rolls (Union Jack version would look patroitic in the land of the Vikings
)- Cleaned up and tweaked the STX-RC hubs, Mavic 221 rims with DB DT Swiss spokes, new Velox rim tape, new Conti tubes, and finally got round to using some white allen key skewers from a wrong CNC order.
- Decided to keep the mammoth 2.35 Schwalbe Big Apples since they had plenty of tread on them. Sweet jesus they are fat and comfy! Just enough rolling resistance / weight so I'm not spinning out on the flats and simply no need to bother avoiding pot-holes! I'm pretty happy with them. Skinny tubes and fat tyres seem to go reasonably well together IMHO.
- Cleaned the frame, removed all superfluous and tatty decals. Just kept the Orange on the down-tube plus the Orange logo on the front of the forks to make it more discrete.
All in all I'm chuffed with it. Nice ride, looks smart but not too flashly to get stolen. If it does get stolen, financially it's no big loss but it's certainly a keeper and I like some of the quirky details.
Best of British!
