Commuter made from cheap frame challenge
 

Hi I made this commuter from a kind of challenge I gave to me, it was to create a commuter from the cheapest "new" MTB I could found on FB marketplace on my city (north of Mexico), and using some from my spare parts bag, also part of the challenge was to make all the bike (except the rims) of steel (to avoid galvanic corrosion),
it has some characteristics:

1) MTB rigid rear and fork, Lower size frame: (is about 2" smaller) to mount and dismount easily, also the top tube will be closer to use Drop Bars
2) Drop bars & aluminum brake calipers and steel levers (from spare bag): multiple hands position, i like to brake on the hoods and on the drops while descending, old style levers = less friction on cheap calipers
3) High Bottom Bracket: the bottom bracket is 5 cms higher than my road bike, it helps on horrible roads and bumps also climbing some irregular steps
4) 26 x 2.15 Tires without knobs (new): less rolling resistance but with some bumps absorption
5) 7x3 transmission (spares bag): i live on hilly area, with a 48/38/28 crankset and a 14-28T freewheel enough to downhill with decent speed and to climb without exploding my 40yo+ meniscus
5) Cheap Lights, Bell, fenders and rear rack with his bungee cord (all from my spares bag)

I censored the frame brand because it doesn't deserve to be promoted.Im thinking to change the frame for a chromoly 80s -90s rigid, but if I did it I couldn't let it outside locked without worries.
Any advice or recommendations to improve this commuter bike are appreciated.
https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...f24d0406dd.jpg

You accomplished the goal, so good for you!

Things to check:

When I see a saddle pointed down, I usually suspect that the saddle is too high. That's the main reason people tilt theirs down. Try sitting on the bike while holding yourself up with one hand on a wall or something. Put your HEELS on the pedals (not the way you ride). Pedal backwards. Do your hips rock? If so, your saddle is too high.

I love saving money as much as everyone else, but I discovered the hard way that lights are not a great way to save money unless you ride at night minimally. I finally spent the big bucks and wish I had done it sooner.

But saving money on everything else, yeah, if it works, it's excellent. And you have steel fenders!

I like it, depechegore. My only concern is that your rear rack does not look like it can handle much weight. I hope you can find a stronger replacement.

Are you near an ocean? I trust you never see salted roads in the winter. Unless one of those is true or you sweat a ton, there is not much reason to worry about galvanic corrosion. Use aluminuim parts where they are better and worry about corrosion when it comes up. Greasing stems, seatposts, bolt thretc. is ads, ealways a good idea and doing it with marine grade grease (the stuff for boat trailer hubs; available in any auto parts store, at least in the US) has stopped galvanic corrosion in its tracks for me.

That rack looks marginally stiff. You may find going uphill with weight on it and standing out of the saddle is not fun. We all did exactly that when the Pletcher racks were the standard 50 years ago. Then Blackburn came along and life on bike got a real step better. Lots of good choices now.

noglider Thanks for your advices, what lights you recommend? i have on my road bike a pair of aliexpress usb ligths they have nice lumens but the battery go out of service quick, so i have "backups" , i was planning to do the same on the commuter but better i could take your advice on some brand-model of nice lights, about the fenders the freewheel sounds beautifull on the rear steel fender, a nice ratchet soud


Aubergine About the rack the frame lacks of the m5 holes to fasten one near the drops, maybe i could find an adapter to fasten something or go to drill and use thread tap, ( i added a picture of the rear rack im wanting to use)
https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...03f7bc0b53.jpg



79pmooney Maybe i did the spare parts selection with some fear, because on two road bikes restoration i have trouble taking out the saddle post due to galvanic corrosion, but youre right they were abandoned 20-30 years without any grease treatment, in this commuter case doesnt need to be all steel, one of those road (a handmade Miele) bikes, suffered a frame breakage on the donwtube near the headset, i always blame that the force applied (on the workbench) to take out the handlepost (also stucked with galvanic corrosion) and the torch we used caused a frame fatigue there
https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...856fa1068.jpeg

I don't know what headlight I recommend. I tend to light the American manufactures such as Cygolite.When you pay extra, you get a battery that is well tested and is likely to hold a charge when using the light from day to day and from year to year. Cheap lights from aliexpress might use inferior batteries. There was one model they had for a while which had a beam shape that complied with German law (stvzo). I really like it, and it was inexpensive. I bought a 8 or 9 of them, and 3 of them had batteries that stopped taking a charge, proving my theory that cheap lights have inferior batteries.

I recommend you look at reviews and browse the reports you see in the bikeforums section on lights and electronics.

I do like the way Cygolite products are made but the beam shapes are round rather than stvzo-compliant. I just noticed that Lezyne makes stvzo-compliant lights. They are expensive but an investment in your safety probably pays off.

I prefer a headlight that is powered by a dynamo rather than a battery. I don't have to charge it. I had to buy a dynamo hub and build the front wheel. I'm lucky I'm able to do that, and I enjoy it. Busch and Müller make headlights made for dynamos. It's a German company so of course the beam is stvzo-compliant. It's actually not a powerful light but I've received comments on how strong it seems. That's because, through optical engineering, the beam is focused. There are Dutch companies that make lights like these, too, such as Spanninga.

Years ago, I bought Busch & Müller headlights from https://xxcycle.com in France. Good prices. They may still sell them.

Get good lights from known quantities and qualities. Alibaba and his 40 thieves is a poor place to shop for anything the prices are cheap for a reason and it is not good. I would agree with noglider on STvZO style lights, a good beam pattern is important. Yes a bright light is good but a flashlight is really not helpful on a bike and that is what a lot of lights are because it is cheaper and easier to make but Lezyne and even Kryptonite in their X series makes some really good lights with a great beam pattern.

Your fork is bent.

Whole bike screams FAIL for a commuter, but hey nice fenders.
3" too small frame, 3x defaileurs for wut?, useless rack, drops, no SA XL dyno drum brake. Blah

hi GamblerGORD53 , the bike is a 17"inch MTB with a dropbar, i like a lot dropbars even in commuting, i know that for other guys commute with other kind of bars is better, i tried butterfly, bullhonrns, also have some alluminum shortened by saw to 50cm, another raisers, but when i commute with dropbars i used them near the height of the saddle and doesnt have back pains or other strange pains, thanks to noglider he recommends me to lower the seatpost (also a pain on my left musle gonne!), i retaked meassures and the bike is on the small side for me but is my size i have 83cm inseem, so a 17"-19" inch is ok for me, i lowered about 2" the seatpost, the 3x6 is for the zone i live is rough and hilly, this bike is a cheap bike challenge so i made it with about $40 dollars, got a new cheapo MTB from marketplace from a lady who owned it for his son , but never used, stored it and wanted her money back, the zone i live (north of mexico) if i have a bike with rohloff,sturmey dinamo , and hubs and chromoly could be stolen in seconds if i left it outside locked, but im planning to buy a touring bike to fill that emptyness in my heart lol, and thanks about the mudguards, they got a lot of compliments in my city too, i bought them on a store that sells very cheap but functional things for biking theyre targeted for people who work using his bike like gardeners, elote (corn) sellers, posicle sellers, etc. CVB the fork isnt bent, is horrible lol, but isnt bent XD

I should have replied to this. In this case I use P-clamps (rubber-covered metal straps with an extension that you can bolt the rack to) on the seat stays. You can see one here at the top of the pic:


https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...b5ae8e6fe.jpeg


And on this photo you can also see how the rack bolts to the extension:

https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...d0fb84224.jpeg

Aubergine beautiful bike!!! i have seen those p-clamps on the hardware store near my home, thanks for the tip

GamblerGORD53

Such an encourager. I think the bike is fine. It can be fine tuned as needs become apparent.

I would 100% get a milk crate that fit in under that seat. Zip tied to the rack.

The bike is not fine. O.p. needs no more encouragement, as is apparent. I support the reality check GG provided. Sadly, as usual, he couldn't resist letting his own prejudice against the time tested derailleur get in the way. There is a maxim of life which says that 'the whole is greater than the sum of it's parts thereof'. That certainly isn't true in commodities such as bicycles, computers, etc. For most things you can buy, the sum of the parts far exceeds what you actually get, and you will thus pay more, far more, trying to build a bicycle (or PC) from disparate parts purchased (or scrounged) piecemeal.

When I moved cross-country in 2008 I did so without a commuter bike. For $129 at a local bike co-op I got an undecaled Schwinn of late 90's/early ought's vintage. Touring geometry. Exage 400 components, Biopace rings. Ready to ride. That's a cheap commuter made with high value components. LIGHT. Ready to ride. I have built bikes in my time. The goal is usually to maximize performance and/or bling. There simply is no redeeming quality in the o.p. bike. It wasn't especially cheap (because so much labor had to be invested) no matter what it actually cost. It is not light. Steel side-pull brakes in 2020 anything is an affront. BTW 28 x 28 equals 1:1 ratio which means the effort in the lowest gear possible is 28ish 'gear inches'. 2.1" tires are a bit big for commuting. That bike doesn't need bigger than 32mm. My commuter (a tandem) has a 44/32/22 x 11-32 8sp 26 x 50mm tires. Lowest gear 17ish gear inches!! That's how you save your meniscus. Top gear is around 109". Plenty enough for commuting.

I'm setting up a road racer commuter with 50/34 x 12-36 8sp. (700C x 25mm). With any of my 'builds' I work with as much of the OEM bike as possible. That is how you save money. All I'm changing is the cassette, from OEM 11-27 to 12-36. You can't buy something as good or better than OEM without wasting money, and you can't scrounge anything as good as OEM unless you have unlimited time in which to do it.

Leisesturm 100% true, my cheap bike doesnt have a casette hub to put a capreo there and have a ferrari speed on descends lol, also have crappy brakes, is bulky, could have a better drivetrain (like the new shimano CUES stuff), the goal was to have a functional thing (for me) that even the thieves see it and say "i dont like that thing" (or even i dont understand that abomination), for me is great,but shure i understand there is on the low end tier (maybe more than low XD), and thats was on my crazy plan, for the drive trrain and performance i usually have a pace of 15 km/hr

ScottCommutes im using it with this "removable DIY" fruit crate i got for free from my nearest "fruteria" friends

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...1c735cf6bd.jpg