I’ve been doing “incremental improvements” for decades. Sometimes I even “improve” my bike into something completely different
This has happened multiple times as well. For example, I originally got a Specialized Stumpjumper Pro in 1999.
Untitled by
Stuart Black, on Flickr
The frame broke in 2003 and was replaced with this frame. At that point the stem and front hub were the only part original to the bike.
I rode that bike (with more tinkering) until 2015 when I got tired of the color. I swapped to something a bit more bold. Needless to say, most all of the parts from the original had been replaced…twice!
Then a 1999 Dean popped up at Pros Closet. Time for another color change. Oddly my local co-op had some rubber donuts in different colors and they just happened to be red, blue, yellow, and green which matched the Dean decal colors. That started a whole cascade of silly changes.
I found a Dean seatpost at my co-op. I found an integrated Dean handlebar/stem at Velo Swap. I found cables and ferrules to match the Dean decals as well as chain ring bolts (and rotor bolts, although you can’t seen them). I found spoke nipples in the Dean colors.
And then I found SRAM paddles and clamps that I could use for the Dean colors. Even the valve stem covers, bar end plugs/stem cap/seatpost clamp, and headset spacers follow that scheme.
Even this picture isn’t quite up to date. The only thing stopping me from doing the Dean colors in the brakes is finding the Klampers in the proper colors and prying open my wallet for something that silly.