Specialized Hardrock 1988?

[27motorhead]

Great news they are 26”, they did look 26”, but mine looks so different due to frame size I wasn’t 100% certain. Indeed with the riser/bmx/motoX bars this will ride like a large BMX and will be perfect for what you want to use it for.

Certainly not the lightest, but uber cool. Must have been stored away somewhere dark as the fluro yellow lettering still looks quite vivid.

Nice project!

 

[Nog1988]

Great news they are 26”, they did look 26”, but mine looks so different due to frame size I wasn’t 100% certain. Indeed with the riser/bmx/motoX bars this will ride like a large BMX and will be perfect for what you want to use it for.

Certainly not the lightest, but uber cool. Must have been stored away somewhere dark as the fluro yellow lettering still looks quite vivid.

Nice project!

Yeah the drive side looks bright but the non drive side is pretty faded. The decals on the non drive side are also scuffed, I was gonna look at wet sanding them with a fine sand paper to take the edges off. Do you think that would work? I don't want to buy new decals as I like the overall patina of the bike. Also to fit the riser/BMX/ moto X bars would I need to install a 1"to 1 1/8 inch stem converter so I can fit a bigger stem for the bars?

 

[Nog1988]

Some photos of the faded scuffed decals.

 

[27motorhead]

I'd leave the decals. Patina is perfection in my eyes. Just a good clean, T-Cut & polish (avoid the decals with the T-Cut!) and that frame will clean up lovely.

Guess you have a choice with what you want to do with the stem. Get an old 1" BMX quill stem, or get a convertor quill with 1" to 1 1/8" ahead/threadless that will give you more options of stem style and bar clamp DIA. I'd be looking at handlebar options first as you need to try and determine rise/width/style and clamp size on bars might determine which stem you go with which will impact 1 1/8" threadless vs. 1" quill.

There are a few threads with 26" BMX/cruisers on here. For instance:
https://www.retrobike.co.uk/threads/the-new-26”-cruiser-bmx-thread.472210/
Ask the relevant posters about their bars if you like them. There is a less friendly forum called LFGSS. It's full of hipsters and they love 26" with x1 conversion & BMX bars. Tread carefully on there! but you might find some more visual inspiration!

 

[bold stelvis]

I recently tried VERY cruisery bars on my Kona as an experiment (they were old cromo bars going cheap) - 100mm rise with about a 45 degree backsweep - despite their cheapo nature they weren't superheavy for cromo (about 560g which is still a bunch lighter than many of the boutique cromo 'moto' style offerings around these days) but they felt like they weighed a ton

was an interesting experiment - TOTALLY changed the feel of the bike, but I decided it was too much of a good thing, so am going to go for something less extreme - I reckon around 60-70mm of rise with somewhere between 12 to 25 degrees of backsweep would be cool

I did a lot of research into options, including clamp size and so on and here's what I found:

quite a few cromo moto/mx bars around (both vintage and new 'boutique' options) - these will generally have 22.2mm clamps, have a lot of rise and in the case of the newer boutique ones be very, very wide. usually also tend to be very heavy. The cool new ones can get very pricey also. good examples are:

Surly sunrise bar (or sunset for even more rise and backsweep - both are heavy as f&*k)
Stooge tracker or junker bars (loads of rise and sweep, very wide, also very heavy)
Wilde Cardinal bars (ditto - also pricey)
Magic components Moth bar (60 degree sweep! also 900g!!!)
etc

there are quite a few old school 25.4mm riser bars available on auction sites from back when that was cool for DH in the early 2000s - these tend to be around 30-50mm rise, and quite a bit less wide than modern trends (eg 650-70mm) and won't have a huge bunch of backsweep. weight is usually more reasonable (circa 350-400g) - good examples:

azonic worldforce
DMR wingbar
raceface air alloy
easton monkeybars

cheap option but maybe a bit risky with old alloy bars that might well have seen some serious action
steel klunker/MX bars come up on ebay now and again, or even some suitable bmx bars (ie low rise for bmx) - usually cheap, but will be heavy

theres a couple of places where you can get modern 25.4mm equivalents though they will tend to be a bit wider -

NS bikes Proof (or Lick which is a 6061 cheaper alternative - both aimed at DJ and track - about 70mm rise)
Nitto B802AAF (nice bar, but maybe not quite enough rise)
Nitto X Crumbworks "KT Bar" (wide, a lot of sweep, only 40mm rise)

loads more new options at 31.8mm clamp - some of the ones I am still considering:

Nitto B801AA SB (similar to B802 above but 31.8mm bulged - looks like it has a bit more rise and slightly different shape)
Simworks/Nitto "cowcow" bars
Soma Dream Risers (lots of sweep available in both 50mm and 70mm rise)
Wilde/Nitto "Countrybar" (again loads of sweep, about 50mm rise)
Hunter/Nitto "smoothmove high riser" (really like this one but probably very difficult to get one in the UK)
some of the more modern MTB brands like Gusset/Deity etc do a higher rise version of their DH bars but it seems really high risers aren't the fashion these days for the most part
ergotec in germany have a few options as well - but maybe not the coolest choice

 

[bold stelvis]

one more thing to consider is stem interface - if you have an older stem its probably too long and likely to have a clamp that will make fitting a high rise or sweepy bar very awkward or even downright impossible (eg if the bar has a crossbrace)

I know you can get quill adapters (I have one) and run a modern stem to make this functionally a non-issue, but if you care about aesthetics you might struggle a bit with the resultant look - especially on older frames like your hardrock (IMO of course)

if you're up for the bmx/moto look a BMX stem is generally the goto solution for this but that will limit your options pretty much to heavy cromo bars - alloy ones don't really come in 22.2mm

 

[bold stelvis]

try and experiment a bit before you settle on something though - I know its easy enough to see some cool youtube or instagram build and immediately think "I want that!", but you might find you actually prefer something else in the end

my experiment definitely made me realise that there is such a thing as too much (for me) and that I would actually be happier with just a bunch higher and shorter over the default mid 90s low and long flat bar and with a bit more sweep rather than full on bmx height or breach cruiser levels of sweepery