Early 90's Bontrager Race Lite OR - Restoration

[rjsdavis]

Hi to all

Stumbled across a really nice and original Race Lite a little while ago, and have finally got my hands on her. Have stripped her down, as I'm going to get her repainted and re-decaled and rebuild her into something that might have stumbled off the production line back in 91/92.

I've attached a couple of pics here, but have a gallery online of hi-res images if anyone wants to see them - so this is the starting point of this thread - however, I have a couple of questions about her to really pin down the details:

1 - Does anyone know how to exactly identify the year of build? I ask, as I am 95% confident that she's a pre-Trek Bonty and is probably somewhere around 1990-1994. However, I need to source some forks and I'm trying to work out whether she's a suspension adjusted geometry or not - my gut says that she's probably not.....

2 - I can't find a frame number on her - is there anywhere that it should be? (I've probably missed it somewhere).

3 - My preference is for rigid forks, soooooooooo has anyone got an appropriate 1 inch steerer forks for this? My preference in an ideal world would be some Bonty Switchblades or similar to set this off perfectly - but also love the look of Syncros Powerlites or Pace RC30's etc - but the geometry does seem to determine this issue for me....

At the moment, I'm envisaging this for the rebuild (nearly all of which I have here ready to fit):

* Full Deore XT M730 7 speed groupset (with thumbies/canti's)
* Bontrager Carbon Seatpin
* Black Turbo leather saddle
* Original Bontrager cromoly stem / hyperlite bar combo
* Mavic M231CD rims on the Deore XT hubs
* Smoke/Dart tyres
* M737 SPD Pedals
* Salsa seatclamp
* Rohloff chain

This is how she looks right now, with updates to follow post respray once she's been done:

 

[ratcapa]

It looks like 94 to me but I may be wrong. Switchblades are the only way to go IMO

 

[rjsdavis]

It looks like 94 to me but I may be wrong. Switchblades are the only way to go IMO

Thanks ratcapa - two questions from me:

1 - How do you know it's a '94 as opposed to being something earlier / later - is there a particular feature that marks it out? (just learning).... and... if it's a '94, does this mean that it's a suspension adjusted geometry frame?

2 - I would tend to agree on the Switchblades - what really annoys me is that I used to have a set of Tange Switchblades back in the early 90's on my M2, but swapped them out when I managed to get a set of Powerlites - cannot for the life of me work out what I did with them, so assume that I sold them! (Ggggrrrrr) Would have been perfect for this!

 

[ratcapa]

I sold some switchblades not that long ago..

Well I'm pretty sure that those decals came in around that time presuming they are original. My Bonty is what I can gather a 94 and looks identical and had the same decals although I have swapped to the earlier ones. The things I looked at are the gussets, drop-outs, head tube, rear stays and cable routing.

If I'm wrong someone will correct me I'm sure

 

[rjsdavis]

I sold some switchblades not that long ago..

Well I'm pretty sure that those decals came in around that time presuming they are original. My Bonty is what I can gather a 94 and looks identical and had the same decals although I have swapped to the earlier ones. The things I looked at are the gussets, drop-outs, head tube, rear stays and cable routing.

If I'm wrong someone will correct me I'm sure

Brilliant - thanks. That's good enough for me!

Got any other decent 1 inch steerer forks knocking about anywhere? Bugger about the switchblades!

PS - do you know if yours is suspension adjusted or not for the geometry? I ask, as if they are, it's been quite rightly pointed out that I were to stick some standard length rigid forks on which are shorter than the frame is expecting, it's going to make the steering rake too steep and balls up the handling! They came with some seized Rock Shox on them, so this doesn't really guide me either way.

 

[hollister]

It's a 94

Serial numbers are on the inside of the dropouts, and for all intents and purposes are useless

 

[rjsdavis]

Thanks for the replies. Happy to accept its a '94!

However, does anyone actually know whether this is a suspension adjusted geometry frame or not? (or how I can find out?). I need to know as it clearly affects which forks I try to source for it...

 

[rjsdavis]

Anyone out there know about the geometry question at all?

 

[hollister]

The TT for any size sus corrected bontrager in '94 is .20" shorter than full rigid

Also the st angle changes from 73 to 74(rigid-->suspended)

 

[rjsdavis]

Thanks Hollister. Do you know what the TT lengths should be for rigid and / or sus frames? Or do you know of a table somewhere on the net that says what they were when they were built?

Also, I presume that the lengths (if I can get them) are measured C-C?