Off Road Toad

[andrewl]

Thanks Chris, it was a long shot but it was great reading gaining even a little bit more information on Toads in general.

I think the older of the Toads I have dates from 89/90 but more likely to be 1989 I've been told by others although no one seems 100% sure which is quite understandable given how long ago it was.

If you are happy answering questions about Toad frames my other Toad has a collar at the top of the seat tube which I haven't seen on other frames. Any ideas why it was made this way?

Cheers

Andrew

 

[classen]

Hello Chris and welcome.

OK I'm going to hijack this thread for a second since Chris Dekerf has joined. I have a question about another Vancouver bike-shop-sponsered frame.

First off, I grew up in Vancouver and as a high school kid and BITD was very fond of Off Road Toads, Rocky Mountains, and Brodies. Two of my friends had toads, and I envied them greatly. I remember their very distinctive colors and to my mind, at the time, they seemed to have a very radical geometry. Keep in mind I was riding a Peugeot Canyon Express (Suntour XC equipped) at the time so the Toads were a big departure from the straight up mid 80s MTB. In my senior year of high school (1989) I was finally in a position to buy a nicer bike. I ended up getting a RekTek from Reckless Rider Cyclery located near Granville Island on Fir Street. I bought it from Bryn Johnson who I believe went on to work at Rocky Mountain for a short time(?) and then on to Race Face as their chief product engineer. Now that Race Face has bitten the dust perhaps he's looking fro a new job... anyways I digress.

Chris, did you ever overlap with Bryn at RM? Have you heard of the RekTek frames? and finally the information I am most interested to know..... who or where where the RekTek frames made? Did you make them while at RM?

I'm beginning a restoration project for my RekTek so you will very likely see it in your shop for a respray in the not-too-distant future.

Cheers,

 

[john]

Great to have some input from Chris DeKerf - welcome to the site.


Picked up on and responded to ORT's tweet/facebook message yesterday. Not quite sure why they've labelled everyone on this site 'Euros' esp when many on this thread don't live in the EU and I'd imagine many who do live in the EU wouldn't perhaps consider themselves 'Euros' anyhow.

Interesting to see how this new ORT venture pans out, esp after last years interest. I'd still run that 20 questions interview I sent over last year if it ever gets returned. Either way good luck ORT.

 

[john]

Of all the posts in the thread they have to crop mine for their tweetie image. They need to learn how to read. I'm not exactly Euro. In fact, I'm a little closer to them than I am to anywhere Euro.

They obviously liked the cut of your jib FMJ

 

[pete_mcc]

So the outcome of all this is people have a couple of options:

1) go to Chris Dekerf, spend $1800 on a custom frame built by a guy with a huge amount of knowledge and experience in the industry, building some of the nicest bikes out there, and a guy who built some of the original ORTs.

2) go to the new 'ORT' , spend $2600 on a nobby-no-name frame made to stock sizes by an unknown builder with no customer input and all the financial risk on the customer by a company who have no legitimate heritage but who do have a Facebook site and a printer/copier for making repro decals.

Mmmmmm choices, choices.....

If this company had so much faith in their products why wouldn't they start from scratch and invest a bit of cash, rather than steal heritage from a long dead company and use customers cash to finance their little pipe dream?

Bet they are glad they linked their face book site to this thread now.

Oh an I may be a 'euro' but half the reason Canadian bikes did so well in the UK was the similarities of the twos riding conditions, I somehow doubt that these will quite get the ringing endorsement that the giants that went before them received!

 

[BoyBurning]

Option 3:


British Eagle Carbon Pro.


And about as much security of replacement should anything go wrong as with option 2...


Or, if you're a 'Euro-Brit' and don't get it (not a dig at CdK) use your heritage rich and 'local' Yates / Roberts / Insert-as-appropriate...


BB

 

[FMJ]

2) go to the new 'ORT' , spend $2600 on a nobby-no-name frame made to stock sizes by an unknown builder with no customer input

Even Chris has said he doesn't know who is building the new Toads, so that is pure speculation.

 

[dekerf]

rektek

Hello classen,
I'd be happy to talk with you about RekTek stuff but I'd like to do that outside of the Toad forum. I'd like to limit my involvement in this whole new toad thing which I'm sure you can understand. I'm new to this, how do we do that? Can you re-post in the Dekerf forum and we pick it up there?
Cheers
Chris

 

[john]

Re: rektek

Hello classen,
I'd be happy to talk with you about RekTek stuff but I'd like to do that outside of the Toad forum. I'd like to limit my involvement in this whole new toad thing which I'm sure you can understand. I'm new to this, how do we do that? Can you re-post in the Dekerf forum and we pick it up there?
Cheers
Chris

Classen has already started a RekTek thread > http://www.retrobike.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=142614 if you'd not noted it.