retrobiker273891
Retro Guru
I am interested in going this route as I want a specialized hill climbing bike with no suspension with a super low gearing.
Newer bikes which are called 'gravel bikes' fit my purposes down to a t apart from the £1.5k and up price tag, generally. I suppose as they are still somewhat niche so no economy of scale.
Conversely modern mountain bikes with low gearing setups, in my pricerange (£3-500) have budget sub-par suspension forks. Besides, no suspension is purported to be much more efficient for hill climbing.
I thus got the idea to get an oldschool rigid mtb for the frame and then put a modern drivetrain on it which would have far lower gearing than the older classics.
Will this be a terrible problem in terms of compatibility?
I have had mixed messages. A lot of outright naysayers saying it is a fools errand and I should just buy a new bike as doing up an old one would cost more than buying a new bike.
There have been the odd responses indicating that it shouldn't be a problem so long as the old frame has 135mm dropouts, same as today's mtbs, which most after 1990 do from what I have been told, is that right? Also the crankset should have the same spacing on old bikes as new correct? 69mm is it?
I would be looking to pay around £400 total upper limit. If I was nearing the objective and invested I would not mind going over that but that is my soft limit.
From what I am gathering from this forum I could get a serviceable functioning vintage for around £200 then factor another £200 for a modern drivetrain.
I looked it up (have done a lot of learning in the past couple of weeks as had no real interest in biking and parts since the 90s) and it seems I could buy a crankset with 22 teeth front for £54 (https://www.sjscycles.co.uk/chainsets/sunrace-triple-chainset-with-detachable-rings-423222t-170mm/). That should give pretty low gearing regardless of the rear freewheel/cassette, and/or I could up the back, if a 7 speed, to 34t or 32 depending on if the wheel was freewheel or freehub.
I have also seen a few older bike cranksets go as low as 24t inner chainring so getting a base bike with that could save a big chunk.
I was thinking that would probably be the cheaper route compared to getting the popular 1x drivetrains available now. Although there is a cheapish option of big dinnerplate 1x for £150 (https://www.mbr.co.uk/reviews/groupset/microshift-advent-x). I do think it would be super cool to have a contemporary drivetrain but might be less compatible. Would depend on whether the old bike came with free hub already or not as I am guessing a new wheel with modern hub would take a big hit to the kitty.
I read some old ones have hubs anyway (is that right?), which would be compatible with newer cassettes, and even though 7 speed you can just remove the smallest cog (which is inconsequential to me since I am making for going up hills and just cruize down or on flats anyway) since the spacing and format is just the same bar the one cog.
So does this sound a reasonable goal given the budget? It seems that option 1 might be cheaper if I didn't have to change whole back wheel/freewheel to cassette and getting the majority of the lower gearing from the smaller front crank. I am thinking maybe 1 first and have the option for 2 down the road.
Another disparagement has been that if I buy a retrobike I will end up finding everything is ceased up and the parts extremely hard to replace and cost hundreds to find appropriate parts for it and that retrobikes are useless for riding, only good for looking at. From looking at the vibrancy of the market on this forum this sounds, in large part, nonesense. Is that right?
To be clear, I don't want it just as a project to look at, I will want to ride it as my main steed, so the possibility to replace parts if they wear out will be salient.
Any other considerations?
Newer bikes which are called 'gravel bikes' fit my purposes down to a t apart from the £1.5k and up price tag, generally. I suppose as they are still somewhat niche so no economy of scale.
Conversely modern mountain bikes with low gearing setups, in my pricerange (£3-500) have budget sub-par suspension forks. Besides, no suspension is purported to be much more efficient for hill climbing.
I thus got the idea to get an oldschool rigid mtb for the frame and then put a modern drivetrain on it which would have far lower gearing than the older classics.
Will this be a terrible problem in terms of compatibility?
I have had mixed messages. A lot of outright naysayers saying it is a fools errand and I should just buy a new bike as doing up an old one would cost more than buying a new bike.
There have been the odd responses indicating that it shouldn't be a problem so long as the old frame has 135mm dropouts, same as today's mtbs, which most after 1990 do from what I have been told, is that right? Also the crankset should have the same spacing on old bikes as new correct? 69mm is it?
I would be looking to pay around £400 total upper limit. If I was nearing the objective and invested I would not mind going over that but that is my soft limit.
From what I am gathering from this forum I could get a serviceable functioning vintage for around £200 then factor another £200 for a modern drivetrain.
I looked it up (have done a lot of learning in the past couple of weeks as had no real interest in biking and parts since the 90s) and it seems I could buy a crankset with 22 teeth front for £54 (https://www.sjscycles.co.uk/chainsets/sunrace-triple-chainset-with-detachable-rings-423222t-170mm/). That should give pretty low gearing regardless of the rear freewheel/cassette, and/or I could up the back, if a 7 speed, to 34t or 32 depending on if the wheel was freewheel or freehub.
I have also seen a few older bike cranksets go as low as 24t inner chainring so getting a base bike with that could save a big chunk.
I was thinking that would probably be the cheaper route compared to getting the popular 1x drivetrains available now. Although there is a cheapish option of big dinnerplate 1x for £150 (https://www.mbr.co.uk/reviews/groupset/microshift-advent-x). I do think it would be super cool to have a contemporary drivetrain but might be less compatible. Would depend on whether the old bike came with free hub already or not as I am guessing a new wheel with modern hub would take a big hit to the kitty.
I read some old ones have hubs anyway (is that right?), which would be compatible with newer cassettes, and even though 7 speed you can just remove the smallest cog (which is inconsequential to me since I am making for going up hills and just cruize down or on flats anyway) since the spacing and format is just the same bar the one cog.
So does this sound a reasonable goal given the budget? It seems that option 1 might be cheaper if I didn't have to change whole back wheel/freewheel to cassette and getting the majority of the lower gearing from the smaller front crank. I am thinking maybe 1 first and have the option for 2 down the road.
Another disparagement has been that if I buy a retrobike I will end up finding everything is ceased up and the parts extremely hard to replace and cost hundreds to find appropriate parts for it and that retrobikes are useless for riding, only good for looking at. From looking at the vibrancy of the market on this forum this sounds, in large part, nonesense. Is that right?
To be clear, I don't want it just as a project to look at, I will want to ride it as my main steed, so the possibility to replace parts if they wear out will be salient.
Any other considerations?
