canopus 

These C'dales were usually spaced to 128 so that a 126 slips in easy and you have to pull it open a bit to slip in a 130mm. I run 130mm Campy 10s in both of mine. The ST has a little bit better RD alignment than the SR I have (I think mainly due to the longer chain stays) but both of them work well. Dr. Cannondale does these all the time also so don't let spreading the frame a little worry you.

lubers

If you want to upgrade to a nine speed drive train its very easy to do, I upgraded mine to an Ultegra triple crank, long cage rear derailuer (Ultergra) went with bar end shifters. Works wonderful. I just replaced my wheel set with some Open Pro's with Ultegra hubs. I can give you a great price on my old wheelset just send me a PM. Have less than 500 miles on them

RobbieTunes

The prices seem high, they truly do. Once you decide what kind of group you want (down tube shifters, STI shifters, and the associated components) you can bargain hunt. If you're upgrading to modern stuff, consider a donor bike, swap the parts over, and sell that. You'd be surprised how cheap you can come out.

TL179

I'm so glad people are warming up to c'dales in this forum!

dwellman

Warming?

rccardr 

Modern 130 wheels like Alex Race24's are out there a'plenty and less than $100 a pair (sometimes...shipped!). They will slip between the chainstays very easily- never had a problem either muscleing them in there or with any structural issues afterwards. Lots of those late 80's frames were migrating to 128mm anyway. So you can do full Shimano 640X (or sister 105 2nd gen 1055/6 in frosty color) up to 8 speeds with zero problemo, matching gruppo, verty straightforward, very sweet working and riding bike- see pic.



Surprisingly, for not much more than Shimano 640X, you can go 5500 series 105 or 6500 series Ultegra 9 speed indexed. Sure, the DT shifters are more expensive but they can be found for $50-ish (somebody had a set of D-A's on the for sale thread recently), and the cassettes are about the same price as an 8 speed if you shop around. For a crankset, shop eBay for a compact square taper (both the Truvativ and FSA compacts are SWELL in my opinion) and use a 113-115 BB. My personal ST (again, see pic) is Ultegra 9 speed with a Truvativ triple, but I have a compact Truvativ on my Super Tempo.



I can fully understand why you would want to put a matching modern-ish setup on that frame. Done it many times, even kept a couple of them, and have never had a complaint.

auskip07

in all honestly i bought this bike with out knowing a darn clue about cannondale or what type it was. I rode it around it fit me personally
im 5'11" 34" leg lenght

It was until i posted on another site that i found out that the Cannondales are the Porsches of the bicycle world. For a 1980s bike it rides extremely well.

Here are the pictures of the parts i took off and frame. I got in an hour ago so i havent had time to clean them yet.

longbeachgary

Porches? F150's maybe (workhorse kind of bikes) but Porches? NO.

rothenfield1

Hey, if the OP feels like he's riding a Porsche when he rides his bike, who are you to kill the buzz. If you visit the road cycling forum, you'll find that many agree with him, at least about modern Cany's. Besides, this bike may be a gateway drug towards owning a bike that rides like a Ferrari. Heaven help him.

longbeachgary

No doubt that it's a great bike but considering what's out there, Cannondales (for the most part) are mid-range and plentiful. I don't want the guy to think he's driving a $500 porsche.

auskip07

Im currently rebuilding a Porsche 944 Turbo (951) so i like the comparison. Compared to my past huffys i like this bike alot. I cant wait to get a updated groupset on her. (i always love the commercial "back off its a huffy")

rothenfield1

Not to pick a fight, but I don’t know what you mean by your comments about it being ‘mid-ranged and plentiful’. Like most bikes of the day, the difference between low-mid-&high end was based more on the level of component group.

I agree with you, as one who has ridden mostly steel bike for the past several years, steel is much more compliant and the variety of steel tubing has added endless threads to this forum about one’s ride quality versus the other. Aluminum bikes don’t have the same warm characteristics. They are just stiff and light.

There is a reason you won’t find a ‘serious’ road race bike today being sold in steel. As far as I know, Cannondale was the first to use aluminum frames. It started a revolution that knocked steel out of the box. For that, the early Cannondales are historically significant. I love steel and always will, but I’ll admit it here, my daily rider these days is an aluminum.

pastorbobnlnh 

Ah ha! PC the C-Dale to match your Porsche. That would be sweet!

Where in Atlanta are you located? We have several C&Vers there and I'm an occasional visitor at my nephew's in East Atlanta where I stash a bike.

dwellman

I love Cannondales too. I definitely wouldn't say Porsche, either. More like Toyota or Honda. . maybe the 4Runner of the bike world. Introduced at the same time, many are still road worthy. Same stiff ride. Same type of following. Same glacial updates. Sill pay a price premium over similarly designed vehicles. . .

auskip07

That would be an idea but Im going to keep her as close to original yellow and then try to go black on the accessories. The car is Guard Red and i dont need any more red in my life

If any of you have more suggestions about the groupset i need it would be very appreciated. Im scowering ebay but most of the auctions are 2-4 days away from ending. Ive seen some SRAM and campaganolo sets and was wondering about the quality of those also what should i look for in a group set. Im trying to focus on a 9 speed

Im in Lilburn right now but looking at town houses closer to north ATL

rccardr 

New Shimano 105 FD/RD, Truvativ compact 50/34 crankset, 113 square taper BB, Tektro brakeset and levers, Shimano 9 speed chain and D-A DT shift levers = under $300. Mavic Open Pro rims on Ultegra hubs with Michelin Pro Race 3's = $375. Good wheels make a big difference, these are probably overkill but hey, I'm worth it. Not a Cannondale, but everything here came off of an '88 SR that I had previously built up for myself:



That SR frame with 7 speed Hyperglide cassette and shifters, could easily be a 9 speed with same wheels, different FD/RD/Shifters:

Lenton58 

Out of five bikes I don't have one with a matching set or complete group of anything. Reason/factors: family and income. I collect vintage pieces for a build that are roughly contemporaneous, and I study to make sure they they will work together. Sometimes I use new parts that are holdover or retro production from another era (Nitto is an example what with stems, seatposts and other stuff). There are enough resources both here on BF and elsewhere on the net (for example the late Sheldon Brown) to get a pretty good idea of what will work with what. As far as the transmission goes, friction shifting makes a lot of stuff compatible. And your assurance comes from not putting on more capacity in the cassette than the parts you have were designed for. Purists with very valuable machines will most likely take a stricter approach — as so they probably should. I can't afford it, and I'm not alone.

When I did my Trek 560, I needed a brake set. Now if the machine had been a 1950's Bates, I'd have scoured the planet for the brake set that might have been originally fitted on the machine. I did get as far as losing out on some eBay auctions. And, I followed our forum's sales and trade pages for vintage brake sets. In the end I just wanted to assemble the bike, and I bought a set of new Shimano Ultegra brakes. They do not look glaringly out of place, they work like gangbusters, and their reach is perfect — same as the Dura Ace brakes with a few more ounces and a third the price.

That's roughly my strategy anyway. Sure nothing wrong with a full group though — duh!

fas2c

This is exactly what I am planning to do with my Cdale I just picked up. It is a '97 R800 CAAD3. I love the *****'n red/yellow fade paint but paint blisters and corrosion @ the cable stops mean it is going to get a PC. I have picked up Ultegra triple, new chain, Mavic Rims laced to Ultegra hubs w/9 spd cassette, and Brooks saddle. I am going to reuse the 105 calipers until I can grab a set of Ultegra to keep the Ultegra theme flowing. New Aeros and barends are on the list too.

Lenton58 

Your parts: clean and buff the stuff up. If it were me, I'd start with a new chain which usually means a new cluster. It's up to you. Throw away those head bearings. Looks like there is some play in the jockey wheels on the RD. If you choose to freshen up the unit, and since you will want to get the rust off and buff it anyway, pull some of it apart and look out for the part number. Shimano (at least here in Japan) can supply the exact jockey wheels on order for that model. Yeah, a lot of them look the same, but they often aren't. By accident your LBS may have third party ones that fit right on, but they will probably be fancy anodized alloy ones that cost more than a couple of good dinners for two. The originals are as cheap as borscht.

Lenton58 

+ ... nothing wrong with that either!

NICE BIKES you guys!!

Wogster

The issue with tools, they fall into 3 categories:

1) Hardware store tools, that can be used for other things, wrenches, screw drivers, etc. Buy, the best you can afford.
2) Bike tools that are used often, crank pullers, freewheel/cassette tools, spoke wrench, these you buy. You don't always need top of the line.
3) Specialty tools you may use once in a blue moon, headset press for example, the tools are expensive and getting a shop to do it really isn't, so you get the shop to do it.

For something like a headset, I prefer if the shop gives me an "installed price", in other words the shop will pull out the old one and install the new one.

I wouldn't invest a lot into that bike right now. I suggest you clean up the corrosion, use a touch-up paint, re-install the parts, replacing the consumables, tires, tubes, cables, brake pads, bar tape, chain. Now ride it until November, replace only things that fail completely. By November you will know what your happy with and what your not, you strip it down, if you still want to powder coat it, then you do so then. The problem with a budget is, is the might-as-well-as always get you. It's the things like you get the shop to pull the headset, it's $30 to pull it and put it back in, but it's a a $25 part, so you might-as-well-as a new one in, your putting a new chain on, you might-as-well-as put on a new freewheel, so that the new chain doesn't get wrecked by the old one. Before you know it, you spent double what you wanted to and could have had a new bike for that. Your better off just replacing what you need to, to get it road worthy, give it a good 6-8 months on the road, if there is too much that needs replacing, you put it on 'bay or CL and get a different one.

auskip07

I like the bike, i hate the shifters. Lets start there. How do i replace only the 7 speed shifters that can work with a future 8 or 9 speed cassette that i might want? See the issue? i might as well buy a groupset and start plugging away at it.

dwellman

Friction shifters don't care. That goes for indexed shifters with friction mode, as well.

Integrated shifters (STI, Ergo, DoubleTap), however, as a minimum, need to be matched with proper cog spacing.

auskip07

well won a set 2 x 8 speed I actually perfer not having 3 cranks. This set is a little more modern and i got this for 150 shipped. Looks to be in good shape


Here is a Shimano 600 6400 group set. Included is:
1- FC-6400 square tapered crank, 172.5mm with Shimano 53/39 chainrings
2- ST-6400 STI shifters. 8 speed right/ double left
3- RD-6401 rear deraileur
4- FD-6401 front deraileur
5- Hyperglide 8 speed cassette 12-25
6- Hyperglide narrow chain

realestvin7

Nice.