Airborne 2000 Lucky Strike DB Rebuild

[Wold Ranger]

Airborne

Finding all this fascinating, as I have a very early Lucky Strike, points to discuss?
1 Disc mounts were available much earlier than 2000 (saw plenty myself on the circuit)
2 Mine is a far earlier frame yet has a much, much longer headtube, on a smaller frame and no external ring reinforcing, on the headtube, but yes internal reinforcing.
3 They were built in different factories- US, Soviet, Taiwan and China. Colour tone variation, tube profiling, frame weight variables and weld quality seems to bear this out. (Mine weighes just over 3 pounds- +/-1420g)

On the choice of build, I like the idea of full XTR group, but while reliable, it's just sooooo heavy, while not being cheap, some XT parts are actually much lighter and just as reliable, i.e. I have an XT M750 top swing front mech in 31.8 with Ti kit and it's just 93g
There's a nice Dura ace mid cage mech on Ebay at the mo thats 150g, I went for a Precision billet with Ti pins/bolts/springs and other trick bits, its 154g.

 

[haggis]

Damn this stupid computer! each time i try to check out this bike it gives me nothing but wee boxes with little red crosses in them, can someone tell me will this be something to do with the server my company is using

 

[WD Pro]

haggis - The pics look OK from the iPhone so as I am a thicko with computers, I can't help sorry :-( :?

World Ranger - All the info I found on the historical net search thing (that was relevant to me) I downloaded in PDF and the powers that be kindly uploaded to the archive for future reference :

http://www.retrobike.co.uk/gallery2/mai ... emId=82110

There is more stuff here :

http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.Airborne.net (copy and paste it all as the link breaks when I post it here ?)

But not all the links and pics work correctly / if at all etc. Have a look around as it seems to capture revisions of the website for the same year. I found that checking the water mark / copyright / date info at the bottom of the pages helps as some of the links direct wrongly. There are clear differences etc between the years / revisions but I am pretty sure I have pinpointed mine ok - even to within a few percent of the quoted frame weight It might help you ID yours ?

Not a lot of movement on my build, but I have finally got my stickers to do the frame blasting - well happy with the text font and sizing etc I was hoping to get it blasted between Christmas and new year but the place is family run (and closed) so it will have to get done in January some time

The wheels 'should' arrive on Wednesday (according to the notification from parcel force) so I will get my camera out and post up a few pics

WD

 

[WD Pro]

Quick update as I am getting the frame refinished tomorrow

The offending Datatag :

I saved a massive 6.8g’s by removing it …

I wasn’t quite happy with the polished areas on the frame and seat post so I had another go to get them to a standard I was happy with. They are now much better :

Note that I only concentrated on the areas that will be masked so beyond these, the finish goes progressively back to standard

For anyone interested, Meguiar’s NXT metal polish leaves a slightly nicer finish on polished Ti than Autosol. Autosol however will remove fine scratches a little quicker. Perfect combo = Autosol followed by NXT

The graphics were cut to protect the polished areas for blasting :

I guess you all know my name now … The USE graphic was left over from the Marin build and was actually supplied via ‘benandemu’ from the forum

I decided the name graphics looked better when they sloped towards the head tube :

Hopefully they will survive the blasting process, I will find out tomorrow… :?

I won’t be able to do the bits myself this time (large booth – suit and breathing equipment required etc) but if the opportunity presents itself I will see if I can snap a few pics.

For info, so the finish matches the frame, post, stem, bars and bar ends will all get done at the same time

WD

PS : Sorry most of the frame pics are a bit dark – It was only finished late and indoor lighting makes taking pictures of polished stuff really tricky :-( I will try and get a few more (with all the bungs in etc) in daylight before it gets blasted.

 

[marin man]

Progress at last pheeewwwww

I like the blasting method that you use to show the decals.....no one will be able to knick your bike now

 

[WD Pro]

They will :-( because they fell off

Seems that the harshness of the full size industrial blasting booth was a little to much for them :?

BUT the finish on the bits is ace, they look like new !

I should be able to get some pics up at lunch tommorrow

The top tube has a slightly uneven patch (only noticed when I was home and cleaned all the frame up) so I will have to nip back and get it blown over.

WD

 

[WD Pro]

Everthing pluged up and ready to go :

After :

WD

 

[marin man]

That is obscene :shock: :shock: :shock:

 

[coomber]

Wow!

 

[Awkward Kid]

I knew i'd seen one with black SIDS...
I've spoken (via singletrack) with the owner before whilst building mine up. Follow the links and enjoy mate,

http://www.singletrackworld.com/forum/t ... m-ht-build

Hit the link for his photos.