'92 Mountain Cycle San Andreas resurrection

[foxb13]

I'm not a fan of tuning, so nearly ditched these pulleys that were fitted to the Deore XT RD-M735-SS rear derailleur on the bike when I bought it from Japan. Well, it turns out that these are original Bullseye pulleys [1], some rather sought-after items, so I decided to put them back in lieu of the XTR ones.

 

[foxb13]

While working on the rear drivetrain, I also took the opportunity to replace the Type Q 12-28 cogs XTR cassette by a more versatile Type P 12-32 cogs one, as on the Team Elite bike.

 

[foxb13]

I've found very little information about the Panaracer Shield rims on my Sanny.



Except an Anti Snake Bite News booklet (written in German) on the Polish website RetroMTB [1]. To summarize, these rims were available in two flavors: the Shield DH for downhill use and the Shield XC for XC racing. Both featured the Anti Snake Bite (ASB) Protector, an elastomer rim tape that extends to the rim sidewalls, going between the tyre and the rim, to avoid pinch puncture. There's unfortunately no printed date on the ASB News booklet, but the Shield DH rims being disc-only, I feared they weren't period-correct, as downhill was far from mainstream in 1992, so I couldn't envision a manufacturer embracing such a niche market with a dedicated product.

Additionally, some of the tyres listed in the booklet, as well as the Magic DH tyres advertised on the rims, entered the market in the mid-90's: the Spike around 1994 and the Duster Pro, Smoke/Dart Magic and Magic DH/XC around 1996.

 

[foxb13]

After months of vain searches for a pair of 32-hole Mavic M 231 rims (as on the Team and Team Elite bikes) in decent condition, I started to look at some other period-correct rims. This is how I got this pair of NOS Ritchey Vantage Comp rims.




To complete the wheel rebuild, some DT Swiss Pulstar (same as straightpull Competition, in fact), double-butted 14/15g spokes were ordered.



But no matter how I tried, it was impossible to set the valve hole at the "right" location, due to the machining of the Pulstar hubs and the drilling of the Vantage Comp rims [1]. Grrrr!

 

[foxb13]

No luck either with the NOS onZa Porcipaws handlebar grips which started to disintegrate on their own .

 

[foxb13]

After some time, I secured a pair of 32-hole Mavic M 231 rims. As the San Andreas is sporting disc brakes, it didn't make sense to me to put rims with marks of brake pads on the sidewalls. Following this video tutorial, I resurfaced and refinished them by hand.

A tedious and lengthy process .





But I'm rather proud of the result .

 

[foxb13]

As the Team and Team Elite bikes were fitted with a Syncros Cattleprod 135mm stem, I was fearing that my Answer Atac in 150mm could be too long. Fortunately, another Atac stem in 135mm length (furthermore with 17.5° rise) was found.




A couple repro decals by @gil_m later, it was ready for the bike rebuild.

 

[foxb13]

Since I failed to identify the seatpost clamp on the Team and Team Elite bikes, I looked for months for a Ringlé Ti-bolt collar 1 3/8" in red anodized color that would have nicely matched the Camtwist QR rear skewer, to no avail. Or in cracked condition. Or in wrong color.

Dubbed S-Series by Mountain Cycle on the '93 framesets and above, I was by contrast able to locate what turned out being a MCS Lite seatpost binder, a popular item in the BMX scene of the late 80's, early 90's, in the correct size and color.

 

[foxb13]

In the end, the Odyssey SveLte Hi-Performance saddle was my Eleonore. Pure unobtainium in this part of the world. I'm not even talking about the titanium rails version... I was resigned to fit something more common, looking for classics such as Selle Italia Flite or Specialized Prolong, like in the aforementioned '91 Mountain Cycle ad, or other San Marco Titanio 200 (though the rarer "Bontrager" shape), like on @Baulz bike.

I don't remember the details and where/how I got it from, but I finally grabbed an even higher-end version of the Odyssey SvelTe saddle, the top-of-the-line SvelTe-Ti Kevlar, with titanium rails and Kevlar coating, in nearly immaculate condition.










All the bits were finally gathered to complete the rebuild of my San Andreas .

 

[foxb13]

Well, this was without taking into account a last minute hitch, as I had to find some handlebar grips to replace the dying onZa Porcipaws. The WTB Trail Grips were well acclaimed in the early 90's, and as for the Attack grips, ODI is still manufacturing reissues of the original Trail Grips for WTB.







Being reissues and further made from some of the denser rubber compound that Bikepro had ever seen BITD [1], they shouldn't self-destruct anytime soon!