Hi, I wanted to thank all of you that have posted on this thread. I've been lurking here for weeks and as a result ordered a Swift Frameset from Peter. It's a great bicycle; I'm completely satisfied with the way it rides and handles. It cost $390.00 plus shipping for those of you that might be interested in the cost of building one up yourself.

I wanted to use as many parts as possible from my parts bin and a spare road bike I had. The only items I had to buy were hubs, spokes, rims, brakes and cassette. I robbed my Dahon Helios of it's crankset and tires temporarily so I could ride it but I've since bought tires and installed a crankset from my parts bin. It's really nice that so many common parts are usable on the Swift.

I was able to use the Ultegra short cage rear deraileur off the road bike with the 11-32 cassette and it shifts without any issuses. This is nice because the short cage keeps the chain a little further from the ground.

Not so lucky with the Tektro BX3 brakes that were suggested as a solution to using drop bars and I would not recommend them except possibly on the rear and then only if you don't want to use fenders. The brakes don't have enough stopping power and the brake lever bottoms out on the handlebar when coming down a steep hill. The cable interferes with a fender and there's no way to fine tune the cable adjustment without resorting to an in-line adjuster. Tire removal is difficult as a result. I'm going to try traditional cantilevers next.

Thanks again everyone for the great information on this thread!