Show us your BREEZER

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Sorry, dlr, Ignaz X is not for sale. I do slightly covet your Lightning Pro, though. Reading your story about it, I'm sure I've ridden it when the ATB Sales rep brought it to John's Bikes in Bath (where I was working at the time) as a demo bike to get the shop guys excited about the brand and hopefully to sell more of them.

I collected the Twister yesterday (you should have bid, you would have won it. I only placed the minimum bid in the view that "If nobody else wants it, I'll have it, but I'm not paying any more than the opening bid price.") and, as you'd expect there are some good and some bad things about it:

Good stuff:
It's a Breezer Twister.
It's the right size for me.
No apparent cracks in the frame.
The pivot isn't at all worn.
The paint is mostly good, with a few chips on the rear triangle, and some cable rub on the head tube.
It has only been lightly used.
It has an XT rear mech that is still nice and tight.
It looks like it still has the original bottom bracket, which is smooth and has no play.
Separate brake levers and gear shifters (8 speed RF+ for the rear, Gripshift for the front).
It rides, stops and goes.
The tyres hold air.
The cables all move easily with little or no drag.

Not-so-good stuff:
Horrible Planet X bars and stem.
Cheap, nasty, "Chili Works" forks.
Heavy wheels, with slight buckle in the rear.
STX chainset.
Loads and loads of dirty oil on the chain.
LX V-brakes with pads 3/4 worn.
Gripshift front shifter.
Nasty grips.
Front triangle decals not in great shape.
Coil shock with spring that is too soft for my lardy arse.

So, nothing too disastrous.

The plan:
Strip it down and clean it up.
Replace forks with a set of Marzocchi X-Fly 100s that are in the toy boxes (but have a Chris King fork crown race, so I'll end up putting a CK headset on the bike, thous more than doubling the spend).
Replace front wheel with a disc brake compatible one from in the spares selection.
Replace front brake with Avid BB7 from the toy boxes
Replace stem with ???? from the toy boxes
Replace bars with Ritchey ones from the toy boxes.
Fit a flite saddle.
Either replace coil or get a suitable air rear shock.
Then argue with myself about singlespeed or geared.
 
Cool, a few of my friends had Sky's in 1992, for some reason at the time when I wanted a new bike I went to Halfords and bought a Raliegh Apex.....it was only in 94 when I wandered into ATB to see if they had any cosmetic second Marins that I spotted the Lightning Pro and had it, still have the original receipt.

Twister sounds good, I had no real need for it, was just thinking of bidding as rare, clean it up a bit. Does seem odd spec, rear shock different to the catalogues as well. What size is it as the seller never replied to a few questions I sent him.

Did he give any insight to how he ended up owning it ie I presume it came from Germany or the states at some point?

May have mentioned this elsewhere but I met Joe Breeze in the UK a few years back at the Bikeradar show at Brands Hatch :)
 
Re:

I have no "need" for it either, but I did sort of want it.

I think it would be listed as a 19", the head tube is about the same length as the ones on my '92 19" rigid Breezers. The saddle is at the right height for me with "about the right amount" of seat post showing to be aestheticall "right". And the reach to the bars feels "familiar".

I've seen a couple with coil-overs before, but I think I'll try to source a suitable air shock at some point. As for questions, I was in a bit of a rush, and just handed over the cash, loaded the bike and left. It has a Merlin Cycles sticker (the UK mail order people), so may be a UK market bike, possibly bought frame-only?

I've also met Joe a couple of times, and once got to ride Slickrock then Amasa Back with him, Tom Ritchey, Otis Guy and a few others at a Canyonlands Fat Tire Festival in Moab. Nice guys.
 
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Wow! Now you are showing off ;)
Tom ritchey, Otis guy...... The only gods you are missing I think are Gary fisher and Keith bontrager?
I've done the old Indian fire trail down Mt tamalpais but to have met them legends is awesome :)
 
My 1988 American Breezer, I bought this in late 1988 from Gold Coast Cycles in Santa Barbara California.


The Bike, well loved and used. I raced this bike for a few years mostly at Big Bear in California.

i-rPRQd2B-X2.jpg



The Serial Number

i-j8B9rTP-XL.jpg



The only remaining original decal. I had replaced all the decals before but due to lots of riding/racing, they wore off again.

i-8KNbFtF-XL.jpg
 
THE best start to a thread!

THE best start to a thread!

If you haven't seen it before, click back to page 1. Bet Martin wasn't expecting THAT as first reply within a few hours.

Rest of the thread is brilliant too - everything that's great about retrobike.
 
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my breezer storm, will be chaning gears and brakes soon, will update when finished.
 

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