Touring - Old but good used bikes

I'm trying to put together a list of "non-touring" bikes from the 90's that would make a good touring frame, like the Specialized Crossroads and 900 series Trek MTBs. Can you guys help to expand this list ?

specialized hard rock

What I'm really looking for are specific (model & year) bikes that are relatively light but strong enough to tour with in a 22" or larger frame size. Can be a mountain bike, road bike or hybrid.

Mine is a 21" Shogun Stumpjumper II. Might be about 1991.
Hoogie has a 21.5" Giant Yukon (early 90's). They're both 4130 steel.

Giant Iguana from 1989-1994? Available up to a 23" frame. I have a 1991 21" that is being converted to Expedition Tour duty. Only drawback so far is the 6 speed freewheel, but that is minor in my book.

Aaron:)

Trek 930
Giant Yukon

Why are asking about such a large frame??? Are you tall or do they work well for touring? Why i ask is that i found a vintage Hardrock for sale that has a 22" frame and rigid fork. It sounds like a great bike but i am 5'10" with a long torso. For Mt biking i used to like small, light bikes that ya can throw around. For touring, i am not really sure what size would work well. Late.
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I'm looking at a black, GT Outpost Trail on ebay right now. It's one of the few 24" frames I've seen, but I know next to nothing about GT or that model. The seller doesn't specify the components or year.
Can anyone offer an opinion ?

Why are asking about such a large frame??? Are you tall or do they work well for touring? Why i ask is that i found a vintage Hardrock for sale that has a 22" frame and rigid fork. It sounds like a great bike but i am 5'10" with a long torso. For Mt biking i used to like small, light bikes that ya can throw around. For touring, i am not really sure what size would work well. Late.
d
For touring,I understand that you will want to go a size larger.
I'm 6'2" and the 20" MTB that I'm using to tour with is way small.

I'm looking at a black, GT Outpost Trail on ebay right now. It's one of the few 24" frames I've seen, but I know next to nothing about GT or that model. The seller doesn't specify the components or year.
Can anyone offer an opinion ?

I was looking at the same bike for a winter commuter but opted out of it because they want way too much money for it. Probably a 93-95 low end bike. Plus unless I'm sadly mistaken that crankset was recalled by Shimano around 95 or 96 (I started working at a shop in 96 and replaced more of those than I care to remember).

Thanks, big guy. It's a challenge to get up to speed on all these models from different years.
I'd love to find a 900 series trek or something comparable.
I'm also on the lookout for a cheap beater for my son who is 6'4". His bike was stolen last week.

Why are asking about such a large frame??? Are you tall or do they work well for touring? Why i ask is that i found a vintage Hardrock for sale that has a 22" frame and rigid fork. It sounds like a great bike but i am 5'10" with a long torso. For Mt biking i used to like small, light bikes that ya can throw around. For touring, i am not really sure what size would work well. Late.
d

I would ride at least one size larger for touring vs MTB use. FWIW I ride a 25.5" (64-65cm) touring frame. I typically use a 21" MTB for technical riding. A 23" would be my first grab for Expedition Tour use, I am building up the 21" Iguana because it is what I have. I ride frames from 19" to 25.5", based on what I am using them for.

Aaron:)

1993 Specialized Crossroads Trail LX.

Lots of eyelets for racks and fenders and also has a mount for a sidewall dynamo. Bonus: has holes in the frame so you can route your electrical wiring internally.

1993 Specialized Crossroads Trail LX.

Lots of eyelets for racks and fenders and also has a mount for a sidewall dynamo. Bonus: has holes in the frame so you can route your electrical wiring internally.
Great bike, but how large do they go with the frames ? They also seem to be scarce.

Thanks, big guy. It's a challenge to get up to speed on all these models from different years.
I'd love to find a 900 series trek or something comparable.
I'm also on the lookout for a cheap beater for my son who is 6'4". His bike was stolen last week.

Gah... that's too bad. Always good to check craigslist, from what I've been seeing once you add the shipping to a bike ebay often ends up not being such a hot deal on cheaper bikes.

Trek 750 - double butted chromoly with good components. It's a like a Trek 520 with straight bars and mountain cranks.

Cannondale M900 - very light and stiff frame and good components. Top of the line Cannondale MTB.

Trek 750 - double butted chromoly with good components. It's a like a Trek 520 with straight bars and mountain cranks.
Thanks. What about the 800 series treks ? They seem to be easier to find.

I've got a 91 Trek 820- 21". It seems to be a nice frame for touring. The components could be better but it is a pretty stiff frame. They should be pretty easy to find..

Thanks. What about the 800 series treks ? They seem to be easier to find.

Trek 820, or preferably 850 if you can find one, are both a good choice and can be had with solid forks.

I had an 80's Peugeot Canyon Express that I would've considered very nice for touring. Very long chainstays. It only really lacked mid-fork mounts and extra bottle mounts. I had a pair of cannondale platform-style racks that didn't require the mid-fork mount, but I guess it would be pretty handy if you wanted a low-rider rack.

I have an '85 Peugeot Canyon Express that, as coweater said, would be a great touring frame. Dual eyelets front and rear, nice Ishiwata double butted lugged steel with looooong chainstays (18") and triple water bottle mounts. Also has a real pump peg behind the seat tube. It's probably the nicest riding bike I own; very lively feel. Good luck finding one; mine came out of a thrift store.

Right on with the canyon express. I bent the fork on mine a long time ago, replaced it with a chrome job from a motobecane, put 700c wheels with a flipflop hub on, fenders, and use it for light summer fixed touring. great frame.

I have toured on a 90 treck antelope, it was a little to small but easy to whip around and took a lot of abuse. 6 foot and it was a 19 inch frame with lots of seat post and a long stem. I weigh about 215 and had a 45 lb load on four corners.

now I am on a 90's KHS for off road touring stuff, 23 inch, no eyelets but a real solid bike. I just used p clamps and take a spare or two, have not needed them yet.

1990 Miyata Trailrunner

Thanks. What about the 800 series treks ? They seem to be easier to find.

They do pretty well :) Heres mines

http://www.bikemandan.com/stuff/IMG_2943-1.JPG

I didn't care for the feel of these 26x1.25 Nashbar slicks. I swapped in some Bontrager 1.95 semi tread tires and its much more comfortable (as well as making the bike now look really mean haha). Fenders are off too

Most MTBs make OK touring bikes if the chainstays are long enough. I'm not sure steel frames are any better than Alu frames, because of the fat tires. Cannondale makes really stiff frames....

They do pretty well :) Heres mines

http://www.bikemandan.com/stuff/IMG_2943-1.JPG

I didn't care for the feel of these 26x1.25 Nashbar slicks. I swapped in some Bontrager 1.95 semi tread tires and its much more comfortable (as well as making the bike now look really mean haha). Fenders are off too

I think those fenders were designed for a 700. But, I'm sure they work just fine. Nice utilitarian ride!

I have a sort of relevant question pertaining to this-

I found a pretty good deal on local craigslist, a Serotta Colorado LT w/ full Dura-Ace for about $500

I definitely like the feel of steel over aluminum, and I'm not planning on racing it. I was curious if it'd be absurd to try to make this into a bike with more of a relaxed feel to it - with wider tires, adding fenders and possibly doing some light touring- but mostly just commuting, and doing occasional longer and faster rides.

I've got a Specialized Allez Elite Triple right now, and it's great, but a bit too delicate. Do you guys think it'd be a decent investment to go for that? Or should I just try to find a cheaper older steel touring bike?

Thanks.

I doubt you'd be able to put much more than a 25c tire on that frame, and fuhgettabout fenders. Short reach calipers with zero clearance between seat tube and reat tire means no fenders. However, a Serotta for 500 bucks with D/A? Turn it around and make some dough, and continue to search for a more suitable piece of equipment.

Just my .02

+1 Trek 900 series. I have two 950s, a 1992 and a 1994. One was a C/L find, the other a frame off ebay plus a good (and cheap) donor bike to complete it.

I use the Nashbar 26-1.25 slicks for around town. I used Kenda Kross Plus 26 x 1.95 on my recent towpath tour. The slicks are a lot faster on pavement, but not suitable to the towpath I rode on for sure....

Wow, Dan- your Trek came out pretty nice. It even has more paint left on it than all the bikes at my household put together!

About putting drop bars on an mtb: I like the idea, but I`m getting mixed signals about sizing. Some folks commented earlier in this thread that a bigger frame would be desireable for touring, but I`ve heard before (and the geometry tables agree) that the seatpost, and therefore the catalogue size, will get smaller on a mountain bike in order to get a TT short enough to be comfortable with drops. Either way, I guess it`s no biggie as long as it gets taken into account. Dan, (or anybody else who`s set up a mountain bike with drop bars) care to comment?

The longer TT can be compensated for by using a shorter stem with a higher rise. Some would say that such stem has an ill effect over handling, but I've never noticed this.

http://i192.photobucket.com/albums/z258/konakilo/HardRock3-1.jpg?t=1225867376

I have a sort of relevant question pertaining to this-

I found a pretty good deal on local craigslist, a Serotta Colorado LT ... I was curious if it'd be absurd to try to make this into a bike with more of a relaxed feel to it - with wider tires, adding fenders and possibly doing some light touring- but mostly just commuting.... Or should I just try to find a cheaper older steel touring bike?

Definitely try to find the older cheaper steel tourer. A few years ago I tried to do more or less what you describe, starting with a nice steel Bianchi frame I found in the trash. Fenders, rack, and fatter tires were not the problem; but even so, as a commuter, that bike was dreadful. The geometry of the frame was just too "racy," and frame geometry is something you just can't fix.

OOohh, I like that green, Clayface! Looks like you did a nice build too, but it still goes to illustrate what I was getting at. In both cases (yours and Dan`s), the stems are tall and very short. In combination with the smaller frames and other factors, they both put the bars in a pretty standard placement for touring drops. But the frames still look small to me in that both bikes show a lot of seat post for a level TT frame and have the tall stems. Not that I think that`s bad, it just isn`t what I think of as "normal" and needs to be considered when chosing the frame. In addition to the "small" frame, your Rockhopper has a very short reach bar. Looks like something that might make my almost-the-right-size tandem fit me better. Like I posted a few days ago, there were references in this thread to using a bigger frame for touring than one would use for mountain biking and I don`t think that`s correct. But maybe I`m the one who isn`t correct- I find myself VERY confused over the simplest aspects of frame and cockpit geometry. For the past few months I`ve been scratching my head over the measurements I get from my own bikes. There doesn`t seem to be any corelation between combined TT/stem lengths and which bikes fit me well or don`t quite fit right. I suspect it has to do with HT and ST angles, but that`s getting beyond me.

In the days before compact frames became the norm (that is, early-to-mid nineties -mine is a '90 HardRock) the only way to get standover clearance was to move the level TT down. This and a long top tube is what makes these frames look smaller than a corresponding size tourer.
This is a very comfortable bike, with a bit of a stretched over position. Handling is excellent for touring: relaxed (too much if you ride unloaded) and worry-free.

What I'm really looking for are specific (model & year) bikes that are relatively light but strong enough to tour with in a 22" or larger frame size. Can be a mountain bike, road bike or hybrid.

Hi

I'm back in the hunt for two cheap XL bikes for my two sons to take to college, and eventually convert to tourers. Oldest son had a 23" Iron Horse Adventure stolen from his dorm this spring. It had 700 wheels and fit perfect. He is 6'5", so the bigger the better. My other son is 6'2" and still growing.

Not having any luck finding Giant Iguana or Trek 900 series. Any other suggestions ?
Anyone familiar with alu models such as Cannondale Alpine and Trek Antelope ?