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Well, here's the story. I was given an old Trek 2500 Carbon (1987), full dura-ace getup (indexed downtubes, woo), with tubular rims. Much better than my old bike, which was way way too small for me (this one's a bit big, I've been sized for a 56-58, and 60 is better than 48 with extended everything). Anyway, I was planning to take this bike on a summer trip with a group through the canadian rockies, but they require clincher tires, of course, and they prefer newer bike setups, but they're cool with me using my old dura ace and downtubes.

Anyways, a couple dillemas I've been having:

1. Spend quite a bit on a new wheelset, LBS reccomended a decent mavic wheelset, around $200, but I'm not looking for anything excruciatingly light, as I've still got my tubulars for that. Any reccomendations, possibly being able to keep the price for wheelset and tires under $200? keep in mind I can build my own as well.

2. Keep it with a 7 speed indexed freewheel, or switch my shifters to friction, and go to an 8 or 9 speed casette? I'm thinking this would be a pretty good decision, sort of phasing out the parts that are harder to work on on my bike.

3. The front fork. It's kinda shady, and I've wanted to get a new fork for it for a while (it seems to do an extroardinary amount of flexing for an aluminum fork). However, the problem exists that it seems that nobody makes threaded forks anymore. I'm looking for carbon, preferrably, but I'll really take anything, it seems. LBS has quite a few older threaded forks, but none of them are long enough for my bike. Is there anywhere that sells threaded forks anymore? Is it even possible to switch it over to a threadless fork, or is that quite a bit of a hassle/money hole?

4. Leave the whole project, scrounge up some extra money somehow (this is yet to be decided how, though), and go pick up a Trek 1000, as that's about my maximum cash limit.

Anyway... yeah, so that's pretty much it. Any insight or opinions would be greatly appreciated.

genericbikedude

1. If you build your own, you are looking at ~$80 for a decent set of velocitys or similar, ~$30 for spokes, and ~$70+ for hubs. If the prebuild mavics are well built, then they are a good deal. Unless you WANT to build wheels, which is another story. I'd build.

2. Ebay suntour barends, and go to 8. Take off the downtubes and use the bosses for cable routing.

3. I like threadless, but you'd need a new stem, headset and fork. $$$.

4. How expensive is this tour vs how much do you want to spend on a durable good?

John E

Take my advice ... I'm not using it :
1) 9-speed prebuilt wheelset (Harris Cyclery, Nashbar, etc.);
2) friction mode;
3a) check eBay for a suitable fork; avoid carbon;
3b) you can convert to threadless with your new fork;


Why do they "... prefer newer bike setups ..."? I put close to 40 miles / 65k km on my 1959 Capo this weekend, and I wouldn't hesitate to take it out on a century or a tour.

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2. About the barends... I'm not a huge fan of them, quite the opposite... however at my school's solar bike team, we've got some barend shifters and cable bosses from a botched project last year, I might throw them on and try them out again. However, if I switch the chain to a thinner chain, shouldn't the existing derailleur work on friction, as it's only limited by the limit screws?

4. it's $475 flat cost, not including extra cash and whatnot. Plus, I'm in high school, so not a lot of disposable income. I've got at most $400 spare cash, unless I can find someone to buy a car with a busted brake line and/or a small GT road bike with beat up shifters, in the next couple weeks.

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and the prefering newer bike setups, is simply a catch all, since a good portion of the guys on the ride don't know how to fix their own bikes. Hence why they don't really care with me, as I can fix it if it breaks, more times than not, and if I can't, someone else there could.

HillRider

As always, measure your rear dropout spacing. A 1987 bike is very likely 126 mm (6/7-speed spacing) and, since it's a carbon frame you CANNOT respace it to the 8/9/10-speed standard of 130mm. If so, you are stuck with 7-speed.

One workaround is to put 8 cogs of a 9-speed cassette on the 7-speed freehub body and use 9-speed shifters that will have one extra click.

2372ighost

These are nice:
https://cgi.ebay.com/NEW-ROAD-RACING-...QQcmdZViewItem

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it's got 126mm spacing, but the rear tubes are aluminum, not carbon. And carbon, contrary to popular belief, flexes more than you think it will (we do a lot of work with both making carbon for the solar team, as well as expanding all our carbon front forks to accomodate the hub motors). I dropped a cassette wheel in there earlier today, it fit fine, springing out aluminum lugged tubes 2 mm each way isn't difficult, and doesn't put any noticeable stress anywhere. Dunno if that's a "holy crap how is that not destroying the bike" no-no, but it seems fine.