Rich Aitch
Retrobike Rider
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1991 Marin Muirwoods
Needs some T.L.C, specifically a shifter rebuild. Brocklanders kindly gave me some spare rapidfire mechanisms but when I install them I want to do photo's and a "how to" thread for other people who want to restore rapidfire units. If it all goes t*ts-up I'm going to put in some Deore thumbies. There's also an RB plan to bulk respray members' zolatone frames but a more pressing need is the badly faded decals which should be fl green and faded forks. I've got the spray can...
1994 Kawasaki KMB450.
I started the rebuild in February and thought I had it reasonably finished but people at the Cake-Run kept asking me why I had locked the forks out... It turns out they have a generous 10mm of travel. My half baked plan to slim down some Land-Rover Discovery suspension bushes thus re-juvenating the forks for about £3.50 has resulted in a broken favourite kitchen knife so now I have some re-manufactured RST400 elastomers from Suspensionforkparts.net as well as new fork gaitors. Also a plan to try and see if it is possible to wire up the righthand gripshifter so that it twists towards you for high gears- mimicking a motorbike throttle- is in the offing. As I've realised that it has a wopping huge 19" frame I'm planning to get this finished before my lanky mate comes to stay so I can lend him it and we can go riding together.
1994 Stumpy
Brought last year from Woody and used once for a tow path ride to see if the canals through Manchester would be suitable for an urban kayaking expedition [They're not, on so many levels :shock: ] I've been gathering parts up ready for rebuild. I'd like it to be ready for the B.D.W or day in the Peaks in September.
199x "Team Banana Falcon"
I thought this was finished and then woke up with an urge to de-Shimano it. I'd brought a Huret rear derailleur and then saw a lovely Ofmega [1980's -90's Eurotrash groupset*] Mundial/ Master transmission on Fleabay which I had to have. Also got a black Campag Mirage and silver Miche performance calipers to fit on [Front and back of bike are different colours hence mismatched brakes] and have just seen some drilled Weinmann leavers.
*I may be wrong but the impression I get is that Campagnolo stuff is a classy girl while Ofmega was the sort who slept with Berlusconi so she could get a job as a weather girl on one of his television stations.
All this is dependent on making space in the garage to do it, which depends on my Cagiva Mito engine rebuild because until my little heart-breaker is rebuilt all the space will stay crammed with exhausts and engine casings. Also now the recession is over people are starting to rip their kitchens out and renovate their houses again so it's also full of nice lengths of discarded timber from the skips outside the posh people's houses, So at the moment it is a kind of stalled man-shed hell that the creators of Wallace and Gromit would dismiss as been too extreme to be credible.
Needs some T.L.C, specifically a shifter rebuild. Brocklanders kindly gave me some spare rapidfire mechanisms but when I install them I want to do photo's and a "how to" thread for other people who want to restore rapidfire units. If it all goes t*ts-up I'm going to put in some Deore thumbies. There's also an RB plan to bulk respray members' zolatone frames but a more pressing need is the badly faded decals which should be fl green and faded forks. I've got the spray can...
1994 Kawasaki KMB450.
I started the rebuild in February and thought I had it reasonably finished but people at the Cake-Run kept asking me why I had locked the forks out... It turns out they have a generous 10mm of travel. My half baked plan to slim down some Land-Rover Discovery suspension bushes thus re-juvenating the forks for about £3.50 has resulted in a broken favourite kitchen knife so now I have some re-manufactured RST400 elastomers from Suspensionforkparts.net as well as new fork gaitors. Also a plan to try and see if it is possible to wire up the righthand gripshifter so that it twists towards you for high gears- mimicking a motorbike throttle- is in the offing. As I've realised that it has a wopping huge 19" frame I'm planning to get this finished before my lanky mate comes to stay so I can lend him it and we can go riding together.
1994 Stumpy
Brought last year from Woody and used once for a tow path ride to see if the canals through Manchester would be suitable for an urban kayaking expedition [They're not, on so many levels :shock: ] I've been gathering parts up ready for rebuild. I'd like it to be ready for the B.D.W or day in the Peaks in September.
199x "Team Banana Falcon"
I thought this was finished and then woke up with an urge to de-Shimano it. I'd brought a Huret rear derailleur and then saw a lovely Ofmega [1980's -90's Eurotrash groupset*] Mundial/ Master transmission on Fleabay which I had to have. Also got a black Campag Mirage and silver Miche performance calipers to fit on [Front and back of bike are different colours hence mismatched brakes] and have just seen some drilled Weinmann leavers.
*I may be wrong but the impression I get is that Campagnolo stuff is a classy girl while Ofmega was the sort who slept with Berlusconi so she could get a job as a weather girl on one of his television stations.
All this is dependent on making space in the garage to do it, which depends on my Cagiva Mito engine rebuild because until my little heart-breaker is rebuilt all the space will stay crammed with exhausts and engine casings. Also now the recession is over people are starting to rip their kitchens out and renovate their houses again so it's also full of nice lengths of discarded timber from the skips outside the posh people's houses, So at the moment it is a kind of stalled man-shed hell that the creators of Wallace and Gromit would dismiss as been too extreme to be credible.