34henry3w
Retro Guru
In my quest to build a perfect replica of my high school proflex 856, I ended up buying 5 complete bikes on ebay. I built the replica using the best pats from all 5, a second bike with the second best parts....third bike with third best parts and so on..
Bike 1 became my replica (see link in my signature)
Bike 2 was sold
Bike 3 went to my buddy for a lot of beer
Bike 4 was sold
Bike "5" never was built because, being that it was a pile of the 5 worst parts, it wasn't worth it...everything was broken, missing..trashed. So "Bike 5" sat in a few rubbermaid bins for over a year.
Over the past years, my "Bike 1" replica basically hangs on the wall in my den and is never taken off road. It occurred to me that I should build a proflex that I actually could take off road. A bit rough around the edges..So this is what I did!
I pulled out all my remaining parts and got to work. I had an NOS front triangle I had scored a while back and this would be the base for the rider...IT had never had a front derailleur installed..
I supplemented missing parts with other cast aways from my bowti project etc. A friend had a good set of green wildgrippers and gave them to me for free! I found some awesome parts I totally forgot I had....NOS syncros stem!.
The girvin fork was a disaster. the worst parts from 5 forks..I had to make all new washers for it, and dremel out all the bushings to get it to move smoothly. I had to helicoil a stripped thread. I still had some leftover NOS decals which I used to repair the ones on the fork. after all that the fork works perfect!
Any of you proflex owners know the pain of installing the front derailleur. do yourself a favour an make a custom allen key like I did (See pic)
unlike my drawn out builds, this one came together in 2 afternoons. I took it for a ride with my GF and it rode perfectly!
The only parts I had to buy for this build was a single stainless shifter cable and the material for the washers...$9! total!
This one will get dirty!
Bike 1 became my replica (see link in my signature)
Bike 2 was sold
Bike 3 went to my buddy for a lot of beer
Bike 4 was sold
Bike "5" never was built because, being that it was a pile of the 5 worst parts, it wasn't worth it...everything was broken, missing..trashed. So "Bike 5" sat in a few rubbermaid bins for over a year.
Over the past years, my "Bike 1" replica basically hangs on the wall in my den and is never taken off road. It occurred to me that I should build a proflex that I actually could take off road. A bit rough around the edges..So this is what I did!
I pulled out all my remaining parts and got to work. I had an NOS front triangle I had scored a while back and this would be the base for the rider...IT had never had a front derailleur installed..
I supplemented missing parts with other cast aways from my bowti project etc. A friend had a good set of green wildgrippers and gave them to me for free! I found some awesome parts I totally forgot I had....NOS syncros stem!.
The girvin fork was a disaster. the worst parts from 5 forks..I had to make all new washers for it, and dremel out all the bushings to get it to move smoothly. I had to helicoil a stripped thread. I still had some leftover NOS decals which I used to repair the ones on the fork. after all that the fork works perfect!
Any of you proflex owners know the pain of installing the front derailleur. do yourself a favour an make a custom allen key like I did (See pic)
unlike my drawn out builds, this one came together in 2 afternoons. I took it for a ride with my GF and it rode perfectly!
The only parts I had to buy for this build was a single stainless shifter cable and the material for the washers...$9! total!
This one will get dirty!
