supercharger

Recently acquired frame built with Ultegra components.

beance

Beautiful!

plonz 

I'm liking this one. Looks like it just means business and is ready to dish out the pain! Nicely done.

styggno1

Changed tires - from all black Conti GP 24 to more traditional looking Vittoria Corsa 25 - rendering a reason for posting this bike here again. Merckx MX Leader in Motorola colours and built with a 2009-2010 Super Record 11 group (the first SR11 did not have any red details/decals).

seedsbelize 

I just put Dia Compe aero levers on my 72 World Voyageur. I'll get a pic or two up soon.

malcala622

@styggno1 this bike is just beaitiful.

Made me say "hello Moto!!" from those old Motorola commercials.

RiddleOfSteel

1985 Cannondale ST400. Frame weld/build date of 1984. Colors and components (originally Shimano 6200-era pieces) for 1985 including a 13-34 6-speed freewheel and a 45/50T half-step double chainring. Now with a ton of 7800 Dura-Ace, save for the 10s Campagnolo cassette. 32mm Continental Grand Sport Race tires. A fantastic bicycle, and one that will take on winter/rain duties with soon to be mounted fenders. A lot of cleaning and touch up of the frame paid off. The metallic black sparkles, and is glossy and smooth (after compounding and waxing). Stiff chassis for great power transfer, with tires, bars, and saddle soaking up anything the frame transmits.

ski4bob

Here's my latest project, I really love this colorway and it rides so damned well! What do you think?

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neamatoad

I think I need to start checking ebay for an '80s schwinn...

RiddleOfSteel

I am think "[Heck] yeah!!"



It's even in my size, and the colors and groupset look soooooooooo good on it! Dang it, now I need one!

billytwosheds 

This one is going to a friend who helped me move my collection to a new apartment when I was in a bind.

1985 Team Fuji, pink with full chrome underneath. Shimano 9spd, mix of Sugino somethingorother, 600 tri color and later 105. New owner isn't super picky, and this thing rides really nicely.











If you noticed, this had a Suntour Synchro shift attachment instead of the standard side-of-the-bottom-tube variety. I filed down some downtube cable stops and fitted them to a Suntour clamp-on shifter mount. Works very well after the cable and housing length are dialed in.

Bike Gremlin

If I see correct - you are using an a-head stem with a threaded fork, is that right?

Is it possible to install a-head headset with an a-head fork, or with this (original?) fork?

RiddleOfSteel

The frame and fork are original. The Shimano 600 EX (6200-era) threaded headset is original. I used a quill stem adapter that has a quill type insert into the steerer with a 1 1/8" diameter upper/exposed portion, and that's where a 1 1/8" (clamp diameter) stem (meant for threadless forks) mounts to. From there, the handlebar clamp diameter can be whatever you want--26.0mm, 31.8mm, 34.9mm (rare, unnecessary). I have a 115mm stem with a 26.0mm bar clamp.

You will see a lot of us doing this to bikes set up with Ergos/STIs. It's really nice, and makes the front end significantly more rigid and 'sure' feeling while at the same time not being harsh.

I honestly have no idea on any of your 'a-head' references, even after looking them up, so I can't help you there. I know that you can swap in any fork with a 1" steerer, and have that steerer be threaded (like this era of bike) or threadless. And you can have the threadless steerer be mated with a threadless headset (like modern stuff). All you would have to do then is find a 1" threadless (clamp) stem and you'd be good to go. I've done it before and it's worked out well.

Bike Gremlin

Yup - threadless is what I meant.

coolkat

I've had a few of them and they are just the best for retro roadie conversions. Very nicely made, plentiful, cheap, and they ride super well. Modern enough to have the features you want and they look appropriate with modern parts hanging on them.

My '89 Schwinn Prelude:

RiddleOfSteel

Sweet! Long ago (five years...) I swapped a carbon for with a 1" threadless steerer. Looked cool, worked decently. Thankfully it wasn't on a super valuable bike, though I'd still want a redo with it (old tight geometry Peugeot--PB14 from '83).

malcala622

RiddleOfSteel

I am working on Hollowtech II thighs, as an average, across the board. So far, I am only at Octalink mass/power. Soon....

Steve Whitlatch 

That looks stunning. The color combos and the components just flow together. Well done. So many beautiful builds in this thread. This one really stands out.

jlax2485

I picked up an '86 prelude with plans on modernizing it but the 120mm rear spacing is a mind boggling choice on the part of Schwinn that will prevent me from moving forward. I just don't want to try and spread the dropouts that far. I assume they did it for cost saving purposes but there really isn't a good reason why they would do this in 1986. The frame is really nice though.

ski4bob

All the 80's Schwinn's I've experienced have 126mm spacing, and cold setting the rear to 130mm is easy peasy!

RiddleOfSteel

Like any modern or nicer feature, Schwinn rolled them out progressively as the years went on and the nice stuff trickled down to lesser models.

An '86 Prelude with 120mm rear spacing does seem a little odd, but my 1984 Super Sport (#3 in the Schwinn lineup that year) still had 120mm rear spacing (Suntour Ultra 6 freewheel) while the Peloton (#2) was 126mm spacing. I would think that an '87 Prelude would have been bumped up in spacing.

A very nice surprise is recessed nut brake caliper mounting on an '85 or '86 Le Tour that I came across recently. Le Tours being decent mid-range offerings (I have always been a fan of them), I thought Schwinn would have stuck to nutted caliper mounts for a few more years. Especially considering that they would hybridize the feature by having the front be recessed and the rear be nutted. I think Shimano's Exage line (and probably lower end from that) accommodated this.

Thankfully, as @ski4bob mentioned, spreading a 120mm dropout to 126mm or 130mm is easy enough to do carefully (Sheldon Brown has his method) or by a shop. I had my 120mm Super Le Tour spaced to 130mm, including dropout realignment, and it's great to have a sweet old (1977 chrome) frame easily take modern pieces.

malcala622

Road Fan

Who would be the resident Campy Ergo expert?

Andy_K 

I know @RiddleOfSteel does some good work with them. I've done a bit of experimenting with off-spec mix and match but I wouldn't claim to be an expert. What do you want to know?