cyclotoine

Hi,

A few guys I know ride cross not in the form of racing but epic rides. I want to join them. I recently aquired a 2nd lugged steel touring bike (1984 or so). I has cantis like my regular tourer/commuter (a nishiki international and I know a guy who as converted on into a cross bike), anyway I'm doing a conversion. I expect to do a lot of climbing, SO i need advice on tires, I was looking at what ritchey has to offer and they have a lot of choice. I will not ride this bike on pavement other than say to the trail type of thing or sometimes these epic rides end up on a highway and you ride back to your car on the road etc.. I will use a 11O BCD MTB cranks with 48/38 gearing and am not sure what to put in the back. I have been thinking about wheels a lot. SHould I use the original screw on freewheel hub with the 7 speed freewheel I have? or will I break my axel? I was thinking I could solve the axel breakage issue by using a solid axel or would you wholeheartedly recomment I move to a freehub for strength. I will be using 36 spoke wheels in any case... Also do most cyclocross bikes come with the really shallow drop bars as well? I am thinking Downtube shifters but I suppose I could move to barcons...so what do you think about:

1. Tire options?
2. Usuing old school touring hubs with a solid axel?
3. Is it worth my while to buy cyclocross bars?
4. Am I gonna hate myself the first time I bail because I am reaching for the downtube shifter?
5. Shoes and pedals? what kind of pedals are cyclocross specific? Crank bros candy c? Time atac?

thanks

MATTO

From experiance get some Tufo tubular clinchers or even better Tufo sew-ups, that way you can put stans sealant in it and also not worry about rolling your tire. Im not shure what you mean by cyclocross bars but regular bull horns should be fine, just not carbon, I laid my bike over in a pavement section in a cyclocross race at 25+ and there still fine, scratched a lot though. Also form experiance I see a lot of pro riders using sti shifters on the course but for durability you could use barcons and dummy break levers. Because if you go down in the sand you could mess your Sti levers up, as for hubs I have never had any problems with hubs breaking and im really hard on my wheels but if you want durability go with chris king, hope this helps. If your worried about weight or durability and only cyclocross your bike you could run a single gear up front with a chain gaurd and a chain stopper and 10 or 9 speed in the back finished up with barcon shifters, thats my set up at least, hope it works out for you.


Edit forgot about pedals, something that wont jam up with sand, when I first got into cyclocross I had a set of old school onza pedals and now I use shimano 5somthing, from what ive heard egg beaters are the best for dealing with mud and sand but you dont have a big platform to stand on.

cyclintom

1) Tires are something of an individual preference. wider tires give you better traction under most conditions but they jam up faster with mud. Beware of a lot of small knobs instead of fewer wider spaced knobs. Small knobs will twist and turn and slip out from under you in a turn or under pressure.

If the tires are too wide they jam mud around the cantilevers and the seattube-chainstay intersection and stop you as effectively as holding the brakes on all the way.

If they're too narrow and/or the knobs are very widely spaced the tire will shed mud like gangbusters but it won't get any traction in very soft stuff like thin mud.

2) Old hubs can be OK if you aren't too heavy. But remember that breaking axles was pretty common before cassettes. They didn't go to cassettes for no reason you know. There's another bearing out next to the dropout on the right side. If you have to go to 130 mm hubs be sure and have the rear end properly re-spaced. This isn't hard or expensive but you have to have the correct tools of you can end up breaking even cassette axles.

3) If your present bars are wide enough (the wider the better) it doesn't matter enough to bother. If your knees hit the barend shifters they're too narrow.

4) Not necessarily but barends are better.

5) SpD's are good but Eggbeaters are cheaper. MTB shoes without excessively large knobs (like almost ALL made now) are the trick solution. I don't know who the footwear clowns are but maybe someone should tell them that 2" knobs are like - so center ring.

If you're using 110 BDC cranks use a 34 at least until you've graduated to Class B. By then you'll have learned that it's better than a 38 anyway.

Mount the bars as HIGH as you can get them without breaking the stem or steering tube.
they should be only a bare inch below the saddle. You can get long rise stems from Rivendell easier than anywhere else I've seen though perhaps Sheldon Brown has them as well. He's pretty good at stocking REAL(tm) parts that smart people use.

Use CANTILEVERS and not V-Brakes.

If you intend to race:

Ride the hell out of the bike everywhere on pavement, dirt trails and climb nasty hills and practice portaging the bike A LOT. See if you can get Martin Eadon's "Off The Road" which is a good cyclocross training film that covers the basics such as proper dismounts, basic manuveurs, training practices etc.

Absolutely NOTHING trains you nearly so good as actually racing. Don't be afraid to look silly your first couple of times out and don't try to beat others if you're going to end up passing out on the course or get tunnel vision and crash someone else. If you aren't smart enough to know your limits you might hurt someone else who knows theirs.

If you don't intend to race:

You'll find a cyclocross bike a really fun ride. With knobbies and cantilevers and that muddy fox look no one expects you to go fast on the road so you don't feel competition from geek riders on Operas who think that passing someone on a cyclocross bike with their $10,000 toy makes them better than you. It's a good snicker.

Off road there's no passing traffic except from the occasional first year college geek on a fully suspended mountain bike who believes that his father buying him an $8,000 Yeti with 15 more axles in the suspension than an 18 wheeler means that he's better than you.

You'll find a whole new world of fun where you become your own worst competition. And your own best friend.

cyclotoine

hey thanks, you have a lot of sweet bikes cyclintom, I have only 7. haha.. your name is also strangely similar... anyway the only point I would like to bring up again is this. I know all of what you have said about cassette hub being stronger and respacing etc. I am a grad student and don't have alot of cash, however I may splurge and get the drop outs spread (35 bucks at an LBS a few blocks away) and spend around 300 on a nice set of wheels from another LBS that will build really nice ones with LX hubs sand a washer to make them 130. I think I'll go with 8 speed for durability and cheep barcon availability. I plan to use a 1" to 1 1/8" stem adapter with a ritchey pro stem I have, that should get the bars up to seat level at least. The only reason I was toying with the idea of using the cassette hub is that I figured if I put a solid axel in it, it would be able to take the beating and I could save about 400 dollars for the time being to see if I really get into it or not. I may do that for the first couple months and then upgrade the wheels later. Thanks again. I'm going to use old MTB cranks with a 34, 48 configuration I think. i may throw on a 28 for the first bit as well.

cyclintom

If I may suggest - rather than have a set of wheels custom built - buy Mavic Kyserium Equipes. Best value out there bar none on the Internet.

cyclotoine

yes valid point. However I shy away from low spoke counts and would sooned use my old touring wheels (36 spoke) for the cross build and buy myself a new set of touring wheels which will still be cheeper by about 200 dollars. Then my cross bike could also be my winter bike by changing the tires. By the time I shipped a set of Kyserium Equipes I and paid duties blah blah blah to Canada I would be over 500 bucks anyway.