John Bailey

This is my son's Schwinn Continental that he's been using as a commuter in college. He's never been able to shift out of the one gear he's used and the beast weighs 40 lbs. I've been wanting to learn how to rebuild a bike, so I gave him my mountain bike to commute with am going to put this monster into riding shape. I know it's not worth much, but the frame seems in good shape, so I'm going to be replacing components and learning. Reducing weight will be the main concern and making it look good will be next. I know it'll never be a lightweight, but I would think getting rid of a lot of the steel and replacing with aluminum would go a long way to make it much lighter.



So, my questions are what should I do first to reduce weight, and what difficulties will I run into replacing the old steel with newer, lighter parts?

Thanks,

John

akcapbikeforums

The wheels are the easiest. Change to alloy and cut many pounds.

CACycling

Wheels and crankset are the only places to remove significant weight.

brian3069

https://harriscyclery.net/itemdetails.cfm?ID=1335

Get rid of the of the one piece crank

John Bailey

Thanks,

I just weighed the front wheel with tire and it was 5 1/2 lbs. Any idea where I could go to find out how much weight I could save with alloy.

Thanks,

John

Mos6502

The wheels and crank are the big and obvious offenders. If your bike has the cursed 500lbs. forged steel handlebar stem - an alloy one will take a bit of weight off there - and you might as well go with aluminum/alloy bars while you're at it.

If you don't ride through all sorts of weather, the fenders are another thing to get rid of.

sonatageek

I would also swap out the rear derailliur with either a nice vintage model (Suntour VGT, ARX or the like) or an inexpensive new one like a Shimano Deore. Lighter and should give crisper shifting. It also sounds like you need new cables -- I suspect that is why your son has not been able to shift out of the one gear. Final change you could make is to replace the stem mounted heavy shifters with a set of the Falcon friction thumb shifters that Nashbar often has for .99 cents.

Changing the wheels will also get you better braking as the aluminum rims will let you stop in the rain.

Scooper

The OEM 27" wheels with steel rims, including tires, tubes, and freewheel on the rear will weigh ~11.7 pounds, while typical 700c rims with Ultegra hubs, Mavic Open Pro alloy rims, including tires, tubes, and 7-speed cassette on the rear will weigh ~6.7 pounds. You could save ~5 pounds by switching to newer wheels with alloy rims.

The steel Ashtabula one piece crank with cups, bearings, and double chainrings weighs 4.3 pounds, while a 2002 Campy Chorus alloy double crankset with bottom bracket weighs 2.0 pounds. You could save ~2.3 pounds by replacing the Ashtabula steel crank with a lighter alloy crankset.

John Bailey

Sounds like going with the adapter would give me a lot of options.

I've got the Deore on my Trek FX 7.3 and they work well.

Thanks guys, it sounds like I could get this bike down to the lower 30's lbs., which is what my mountain bike weighs.

John

Scooper

Yes; I used the TruVative adapter on my Schwinn Super Sport to convert it from the Ashtabula crank to a 3-piece alloy crankset.





That's a realistic goal.

John Bailey

Right on the money Stan! I just took off both wheels and they weighed 11.8 lbs. If I were to clean off the grease I'd lose that extra .1.

pastorbobnlnh 

LOL!

John,

A couple of years ago I lightened my '62 Continental by doing most of the above tricks. Mine ended up in the 29+ lb range, but at least it was sub 30 lbs. I always enjoy riding mine.

John Bailey

If I can get this bike to weigh less than 30 lbs. and make it look as good as yours and Stan's, my son just got himself a good mountain bike.

John

stringbreaker

Yep I got mine to just a shade under 30lbs by doing most of the same things as above. Now its going to be a proper commuter its gonna need fenders. I used the Planet bike jobs they are plastic but look like satin finished aluminum. One of the sweetest rides I have. That old steel takes a lot of the road roughness out. Besides if you ride that Shwinn to commute just think how easy your fancy (if you have one) road bike gonna ride. Its gonna feel like its a feather with tires on it.

John Bailey

The son is riding the mountain bike in the snow, so, I think we're gonna have to stay with the fenders.

John

michael k

Mind if I throw mine in here too?
I was able to do the crank conversion (triple) for about $65.The wheels (700c),Handle bars and brake levers are from a Mongoose comfort bike I picked for $30.Total, including the bike spent a little over $150. It was a good learning experience since it was the first time I've done anything this involved.

Keep us posted!!

John E

That means a fillet brazed CrMo Schwinn with aluminum cranks could get down to a respectable 27 lbs, right?

The two other big benefits of replacing those excessively heavy steel Varsinental rims with aluminum are dramatically improved braking and a huge boost in acceleration performance. Because of moment of inertia of rotating mass, "an ounce off the tires or rims is worth two ounces off the frame," when one is talking about responsiveness, rather than steady speed hill climbing.

Noah Scape

I commuted on a '73 Conti for years. I replaced the wheels and crank, added fender. upright bars and a ragged old Brooks B72. I really enjoyed riding it. One other positive... you could lock it up at the corner of Scum and Villainy and not worry too much that it would be stolen. When I lived in LA 20 years ago, my wife and I went out one night for dinner and drinks. I rode the Conti and she rode a nice Motobecane. When we arrived at our destination we discovered we had but one lock and a very short cable, so we locked the bikes together. When we came out after an enjoyable evening the Moto was gone, however the Conti had not moved. I donated it to our local bike library this past spring. Here's a pic of its final incarnation before I passed it along.

John Bailey

Nice job you guys! I'm inspired.

John

John Bailey

For those of you who have changed the crankset, did you have to change the rear cassette and shifters?

John

pastorbobnlnh 

Continentals were equipped with 5 speed freewheels. They usually had a range of 14-28.

If you go with a modern crankset, say for a 7-9 speed set up, you will probably need a narrower chain. If this is the case you should look for a SunTour "Ultra" 6 speed narrow spaced freewheel, if you maintain the current rear dropout spacing of about 120mm. If you spread it to 126mm to accept a new wheel, you could then use up to a 7 speed freewheel for a road bike (I might be wrong but I believe a 7 speed MTB is spaced for 130mm).

Depending on the range of the cogs, lets say you could probably handle up to a 30 tooth low gear, and your original shifters and RD will most likely work. Some do not like the original Alvit RD, others have no problems with them. Almost all of us like the upgrade to a SunTour RD. Even the cheapest ones tended to shift significantly better then the Hurets.

Is it relatively flat in your part of MI? If so, you might think about a FW in the 14-25 tooth range. Gives you better options when fighting a head wind.

Best of luck.

John Bailey

Where my son is going to college, it is very flat and shouldn't cause any problems. Although, I live on top of a long 18% hill and dearly love my granny gears. No matter which way I ride, I face that hill when I get home.

John

Scooper

John, I have lots of hills to deal with around here and built my Super Sport with very wide gearing specifically to climb the steepest grades while preserving long legs for speeding on the flats. With the 30-42-53 triple chainrings and 12-32 IRD 10-speed cassette my gear-inches range from 24.7 to 116.5.

Here a photo of the bike in the lowest gear:

Mr IGH

IMHO:
You're starting to spend substanial $$ on a Conti frame with a value ~$20. While it's cool to ride vintage, a Conti isn't really going to be very useful no matter how much you pimp it out. In my experience, these kind of projects are better when it's the second or third bike in the rider's stable, not as a primary bike. Also, if you're not a DIY'er with experience, labor charges are ging to be significant.

If it were me, I'd just get this old Conti up and running, then if I found out I was really going to start riding regularly, I'd start looking for something better to start upgrading so I could use in centuries etc. I'd look for something more modern, like an 80's Asian bike, still cool and vintage, might be able to find something nice with a triple crank already.

BTW, I weighted my old Super Champion Mod 58 with 500gm Kenda Kwest and Schrader tubed front wheel, it weighs about 4.75lbs. To make the 5lbs savings in thew wheels will take really light tires and rims. I don't use that kind of wheel/tire on my commuter because I carry a 30lbs packback on the bike and ride on roads with lots of debris and potholes (and weight 230lbs).

If you do go through with Mavic Open Pro's on a Conti, at least they'll be 700C so you can use 'em on your next bike

beech333

I agree. For all of the money that you could pour into this frame, you will never get it to the weight of a better quality vintage bike and you could end up spending quite a bit.

Personally, I've never cared about the weight of some old bikes. I have some that are around 20 lbs, but the one I ride the most is about 30 lbs, has steel wheels, and is gaining weight soon(fenders, lights, etc.). I doubt I would ever enter a race, so weight does not matter to me.

If it were mine, and I insisted on upgrading, I would just change out the wheels to alloy for braking purposes. Otherwise, you are better off looking in craigslist for a lighter bike that fits him.