Tandem Cycling - Flames? - First Ride

So, I bought a Trek custom tandem frame from Craigslist a while back. My wife and I have a Cannondale road tandem but it never fit correctly (Ebay purchase) and we wanted to do some of the longer group rides together. The Trek frame had never been built up - the story was that Trek too so long to deliver the frame - and I got it for $300. Over the course of several months, I've built up the frame using parts from EBay with cranks, wheels and fork coming from Precision and Tandems East. Our first ride on it was two weeks ago at the Grizzly Peak Century.

Now, I'm not normally a huge fan of flames and I agree that Trek frames are not the boutique-quality frames that we all know and love... But I must tell you, flames go a long way.

Here are some comments on the build:

1. I don't know how much it weighs.

2. Wound Up fork, 203 mm mechanical brakes front and back.

3. No matter how you order the four words "carbon", "tandem", "disc", and "fork", it will mean a lot of money.

4. The back dropout spacing is 135 mm, which is the only thing custom I can find on the frame. Otherwise, it looks like a Trek T2000. The spacing led to White Industries hubs with Velocity Fusion rims.

5. I bought the two sets of disc brakes so I could get 203 mm discs with the road levers. Before I sell the remaining set of 165 mm BB7's with mountain levers, I'm considering going to the 165 mm discs. I know that heat dissipation and stopping power will be better with 203's, but we're a 300 lb team and would like to take the weight savings, even though it isn't huge. I'm thinking that I'm going to try it and I'll let you know how it goes.

http://www.asce-sf.org/images/bike/bike4.JPG
http://www.asce-sf.org/images/bike/bike1.JPG
http://www.asce-sf.org/images/bike/bike2.JPG
http://www.asce-sf.org/images/bike/bike3.JPG

heh heh.... flames are cooool....
+1 on the Thudbuster. I see that you are using the grey plastic thingy. That's the one the instructions said to use for my stoker (based on her weight), but she found it a bit soft. She reports the blue providing excellent dampening with less spring. You might consider at least trying the blue one.

Flame paint job alone is worth more than 300 bucks . . .

$300 for a new tandem frame - sounds like a steal! Is it aluminum? I assume that building it up cost considerably more.

Love the flames!

Flame paint job alone is worth more than 300 bucks . . .

Or not!

OTOH that sure seems like a good deal even if you don't really care for the paint job.

Yes, it's an aluminum frame. The paint job is growing on me.

Re: the Thudbuster. My stoker was thinking about going to the white insert, which is a special order. She wants more spring.

I'd say that was a great find for $300.

Aren't your seats both pointed up quite a bit, or is it jus the photo?

Re: the Thudbuster. My stoker was thinking about going to the white insert, which is a special order. She wants more spring.

Gotta love it when your stoker communicates simply, clearly, and directly :thumb:

...and i'm actually kinda jealous about the flames...

Cheers!

Re: the seats, they do look like they're a little up.