Originally Posted by
pastorbobnlnh
Jon, you don't look a day over 49. Keep up the good living in VT!
Can you show us a picture of your 86bcd crankset? I'm certain I've seen one, but just can't picture it at the moment.
Speaking of rare chainrings; What about the ever elusive triplizer?
I've been hunting for an early '90s Shimano 105 triple crankset for months. No luck.
Turns out Peter White, the bicycle curmudgeon over the mountain from me here in NH, has a TA Alize/K 130bcd triplizer for about $100 with shipping. Add the other two TA rings and a set of chainring bolts and the bill could hit $300. And think, you don't even have a crankset yet!
Well, a little bit of searching turned up
XXCylces in France selling TA Alize chainrings for 1/3rd the price! I ordered the triplizer and the outer ring for less than the cost of a PW triplizer alone. Shipping was a reasonable $11.
I ordered the silver version. I hope the finish looks as nice as the 144bcd triplizer I have on my Super Sport. But as you can see, the style is different.
Thanks for your encouraging comment on my age. I'm going to celebrate my 58th birthday by riding the length of Vermont Route 58, which runs from the north end of Lake Willoughby to Montgomery. I've driven over it before, but have never ridden it. There's a memorable 2-mile climb out of Irasburg, a descent to Lowell, then another climb (on dirt) through Hazen's Notch. Not a long ways, though--not much over 30 miles. That's a good thing, since I won't be in any kind of long-distance shape by then.
Good info about XX Cycles. I had a good experience with them in the past with some 122 BCD Stronglight rings. I will think about buying a 130 BCD triplizer from them to use with the NOS Shimano 600 crankset I've been hoarding for years as trade bait.
No movement on the elusive 122/74 BCD triplizer. There was a flurry of interest about it last fall when it looked as if someone here might be able to make a prototype, but that has apparently fallen by the wayside. Early last year an outfit called Warhawk Industries (they mostly make custom BMX chainrings) agreed to make me a triplizer. I'm not sure why they did, though, because they clearly have no intention of ever doing so. For my own amusement, I continue to email them once a month or so to ask them when I can expect to get the ring. Occasionally I get a response from a guy there named Colin, who tells me they're going to make it really soon. I think he means "soon" in the context of geologic time.
Earlier this year, I got in touch with Tarn Mott at Primate Cycles in Australia, who shares a workspace with a guy named John, who owns Cycle Underground, which makes custom chainrings. That's apparently the only way to reach him, since he doesn't answer emails himself (it wasn't always that way, though; a couple of years back John told me he would be happy to make a 122/74 triplizer, but I stupidly didn't follow up on it it the time). Anyway, Tarn says that he passed my message on to John, and that John is quite keen on making it, and that I would likely be hearing from him soon. That was a few months back. I love the word "soon."
Let's see--an outfit in Wales called Highpath Engineering used to make custom rings, but quit at about the time I started looking. I've been hoping that someone will pick up that part of their business again, but no one has.
The frustrating thing about this to me is that I think it would be a real niche for someone. A lot of people really seem to like their old Stronglight 93 cranks (also 49s and 63s, if I have that right) and would be happy to buy one of these things. It's not like it would be purely a one-off--I'd think one could expect to sell 50 or 100 of these things right out of the gate. I know I'd buy two
I'm not giving up, though--going to keep working on it. Success is on the horizon. The horizon is an imaginary line that recedes as you approach it.