New Year, New Bike!
 

So since I got back into biking, I've been commuting on my road bike. It's a fast machine, pretty comfortable, but doesn't have provisions for rack and fenders and I didn't want to ruin the aesthetics by mounting any. Also, I'd be heartbroken if it got stolen, so I don't like leaving it locked out. Consequently I was looking for a bike that was almost as fast, could deal with rain, loads, and wouldn't be subject to theft.

A while ago, I got a cheapie rigid fork MTB to commute to school on. It's a 1997 Diamondback Sorrento with a 4130 frame & steel fork, 7-speed drive train. With some slicks it was a decent commuter. After I graduated I more or less parked it outside and used it on the rare trips to the local beer & pizza place. Finally, I dusted it off, and converted it to a touring/commuting machine.

Changes I made:

1. New bars and stem - I had an 80mm quill stem and old road bars lying around.
2. Shimano R600 brake levers - also lying around
3. Shimano Tourney 7-speed thumb shifters - bar-cons were my preference but they are $$$! These were $17 shipped, and perform fine.
4. New saddle - the old saddle had gotten really soft and wasn't comfortable anymore.
5. 1.25" slicks for speed
6. Nashbar Soho pedals with platforms on one side and SPDs on the other
7. The rear rim was dented nicely. I rebuilt the rear wheel with an Alex DM18 rim, brass nipples, and 14/15 spokes. The wheelbuilder though it was a bit of an odd request given the vintage of the hubs but they're plenty serviceable and I figured a hand built wheel would outlast a cheap machine-built one anyway.

Before:

http://yulaev.com/~ivany/pics/bicycle/db_2009-08-27.jpg

After:

(see attached)

My impressions: quite fast. My 7 mile commute is barely faster on my road bike than on this thing. The gearing leaves some to be desired, it's pretty "sparse" and unlike on the road bike with a 13-25 cluster, finding a good gear on this thing isn't possible sometimes. The large chainring is 44; a 48 would probably make more sense. The granny gear hardly gets touched anyway, but maybe for dirt paths with a significant load my tune will change. All in all, I'm very happy, and looking forward to some foul weather commuting!

This is great! The guys in the touring forum would really dig this. Lots of MTB to touring conversions there.

Great conversion, Ivan! I take it you've seen this thread? :thumb:

http://www.bikeforums.net/showthread...ar-Conversions

Nice conversion :)
Whenever I see these type of threads I get the itch to put drops on my Sirrus, then I go for a ride and the itch moves on. :)

Great suggestion on the thread scott :) I don't frequent C & V so I've not seen it but it looks like I'm not the first to have this idea.

Converted MTBs make really, really versatile bikes. Sure, it's not sexy, not as light as a modern road racer, and not great for bombing downhills either, but there isn't really anything that you can't do on this sort of bike.