Scotts on the Rocks!

[Tomac23]

This is my first build thread so go easy on me.

I’ve always been a fan of early 90s Scott bikes. Something about the bold block colour schemes. My two favourites are the 1990 Pro Racing and the 1990 Superlite. The both appeared together and were reviewed in an MBUK article ‘Scotts on the rocks’.

Also the bike I had in the 90s was a 1990 Scott Pro Racing. Lovely bike to ride. Tange Prestige tubing, bright green and orange frame and a nice mix of XT and Ritchey parts.

As was the way I messed around with the components back in the day adding some 3dv in the shape of an atac stem and a USE seatpost. Syncros bars, gripshuft also added as well as a manitou 1 to soften the ride. Awesome bike to ride. And then it got nicked. Totally gutted. Irreplaceable. As I’m sure many of you also experienced. So I needed to find another one.

So when I got back into retro bikes I needed to find one. But they’re hard to find. In 7 years of looking only two came up for sale. One in Australia and one in Poland. But both were pretty beaten up and not worth the additional shipping investment.

But In November 2021 I found one….

 

[raidan73]

I loved the early Scott's too. Looking forward to seeing more Ryan

 

[Tomac23]

So Pro Racing first….

So the good news was that I’d found one on the German local eBay site, it looked to be in my size and in great shape. He was Scott fan too but this one was too small for him. The bad news was that it was in Austria and the guy wouldn’t ship it.

I couldn’t risk anyone else buying it so I asked him to hold it for me and I’d sort something out.

I kept in touch with him for the next 6 months partly hoping he’d change his mind. But he didn’t.

In the mean time I found a near mint 1990 Pro for sale in Nottingham for £100 including a set of mk1 Scott pedersen brakes and XC comp groupset so I thought I’d use this as a trade. It worked.

So come May this year I decided (with a second child on the way) that it was now or never so I sorted a weekend to go and get it.

 

[Tomac23]

Austria was great fun. Highly recommend it to anyone. Great mountain biking and travelling with a bike box was easier than I thought.

So now back at home the Pro Racing is in great shape and almost original. There’s a slightly different cockpit set up to the brochure. It originally came with a Ritchey flat bar and shimano ST-M091 shifters.

I want to run with the Ritchey flat bar long term. Thanks Raiden73. But I’m planning on going to Malvern this year and I thought it might be fun to recreate the ad for this bike in 1990 where it featured a Scott AT-4 bar as well. Should I leave the Austrian dealer stickers on as well? Let me know what you think please

 

[Tomac23]

So onto the 1990 Scott Superlite. My favourite Scott colour way. I managed to find a great frameset in Germany which included the original stem, headset, bars, seatpost and saddle. A great base for a build.

 

[Vesatoro]

Those colours

 

[Markybeau]

Always had a soft spot for early 90's Scotts. Lovely bikes. Great thread

 

[Tomac23]

Thanks for the positive comments. Glad a few of you are enjoying the updates.

So Scott in the early 90s often didn’t stick to their published spec sheets but this is a good place to start.

Basically a mix of XT and Ritchey.

 

[Tomac23]

So where am I up to? Well I’ve got most of what I need but could do a set of Ritchey megabite tyres, some XT skewers some advice from this group.

Great Wheelset from @WimVDD by the way.

Which grips should I go for - black grab-on or white ODI?

Does it matter if I dont use Ritchey megabite tyres and use panaracer repro dart and smoke instead?

Answers on a postcard please. Cheers

 

[raidan73]

I don’t mind seeing the repro Panaracers, especially if you’re going to ride it. I’d go Smoke/Smoke though, rather than Smoke/Dart.