I picked up a 1988 Trek 400 Frame included with a pile of parts I needed for other projects for $30, from a guy clearing out a bunch of old projects. The frame is in pretty good shape, with the exception of the left downtube shifter mount.

What sort of bikes were these when they came out? It doesn't look like they were too high up Trek's lineup, but how were the bikes generally? I was kind of bouncing around with either trying a fixie build, to see what the craze is, or maybe a fixed front and 5/6/7spd rear shifting upright city type bike. Were they good enough on the road that it would make more sense to just buy a clamp on shift mount and make it back into road bike?

Dang impulse purchases....

They are great for any kind of build. I have had my 89 400 built both geared and fixed. Does the frame size fit you?

Size is one thing I am back and forth on, I'm not established enough yet in the bike realm to know exactly what I'm looking for in fit, and being disassembled I had no way of trying it out. It is a size or so smaller than my other bikes, but I generally buy the biggest frame that I can fit on (French fit, from what I understand). I don't think size is going to be a big issue I can't get around.

Oh, also for my general expansion of knowledge, what is the True Temper Gold Label RC-1 tubing? The 1987's were listed as 531 tubing, is this something similar, or a step down/up?

It's certainly a decent enough frame to justify an inexpensive build. For me, I would keep it a drop-bar bike because of the frame geometry. IMHO, what to do about the left shifter depends upon what sort of terrain you expect to ride it. The easiest thing would be to just build it as a fixed front, wide range rear (say with a 13-32 7-speed freewheel), with one downtube shifter, and a long cage derailleur.

A couple of other alternatives, is to buy a downtube cable stop, bypass the downtube shifter-mounts entirely, and put bar-con shifters on it - front and rear - or even more modern Brifters with a wide-range (9 or 10 speed) cassette. The last of these would require cold-setting the back triangle of the frame to 130mm rear-wheel spacing if it isn't already.

Either of these choices would work, it just comes down to your preference for what type of bike you want. The first alternative would surely be the cheaper, simpler idea. Because the size is slightly small for you, you probably would get proper fit with a 110 or 120mm quill stem.

BTW, True-Temper is good tubes - probably as good as 531, but cheaper in those days as they fought for market share, which is why Trek used it in their lower-end bikes.

The 88 400 was a True Temper frame/fork; they came with SR Ovaltech chainrings- I really liked those.

The 400T came with MT-60 components. My 88 400 was too big for me, so I moved it along.

I have an 86 400 Elance- I love that bike- especially since getting new wheels for it. I think it's the most beautiful bike I own and I've replaced most everything with Top Of The Line parts to work with everything on there.

Keep in mind, at this time, Trek didn't really do "entry level," so this is a good quality CrMo frame and fork- with a totally usable Sport/Touring geometry and 'decent' to 'really good' components. It won't be "race light," but it's a somewhat aggressive geometry with medium length chainstays.

I think it's a totally worthy frame to build up as a keeper.

Good call on the cable stops, I think I've got some stem mounted shifters lying around anyhow. Is there any concern with those mounts interfering with the cables being run, though? I.e., will they need to be hacksawed off? I might toss a wheelset from another bike on to check out fit before I get into spending much money, although I did get a couple spare stems in that pile of stuff, one of which was fairly long.

That crank was also in the box of goodies, and a spare chainring as well. He was really happy to continue tossing bits on the pile...

You're right though, the bike is quite beautiful, and definitely has a feel of quality to it.

The Origin-8 cable stops run the cables along the bottom of the downtube, so the shifter bosses won't get in the way of the cable.

I'd turn it into a 1xWhatever# with just a derailleur in the back. I did that to my bar bike and it's been surprisingly great. Single speed, fixed gear, coastie, or the Origin-8 cable stop idea works too. It's far from too far gone, that's for sure! You got a great deal at that price on a quality frame (damage not included).

Put up for sale on ebay for $90 BIN. Perfect candidate for a small statured hipster needing a SS or Fixie project. I just sold a TruTemper Schwinn Traveler frame for $60 and a small Trek Elance 330 Reynolds 531 frame with a small TT dent for $115, both net of shipping.

Yeah, for thirty bucks I came away with a pretty good haul. Old Trek 520 wheelset that I wanted as insurance for attempting my first wheel rebuild on my Miyata tourer project, the frame/fork/stem/bars, the stock ovaltech crank, extra chainring, pedals, an old Shimano light action derailleur, a set of Scott tri-bars (as the girlfriends has been asking for a set), bar ends that I've been meaning to buy for the MTB (even if they are a beautiful anodized purple ), some random Dia-Comp brake levers and bits, couple of stems, and I'm sure I'm missing some more.

Though about reselling it, but I don't particularly need the money or space. I've never done a frame up build before, thought it could be a fun project to build up into something I don't already have.

Plus, I have a personal objecting to buying things I know have been flipped with no work performed on CL, I would be hypocritical to do such a thing.

TT1 is the tubing used in an '85 Trek 460 I had. Excellent tubing. Very light for the day and in my estimation was as good as a 531.