Hey guys, first poster here. This is my first attempt at building a fixie. I bought a 30 dollar semi-rusty roadbike that otherwise worked okay. Good paint job, derailers and brakes were wonky. I've been meaning to turn something into a fixie. Bought myself a rim with a flip-flop hub, cogs on and everything.

Putting the wheel in, it seems that if I were to get the chainring as close as possible to the frame, and the hub as far to the dropout as I could, the chainline would still be off by about a centimeter. And THAT's if I scoot the hub over till it touches the dropout; I'd have to insanely redish the rim if I wanted to do that. Are there any sort of spacers that move the cog further from the hub? Is that possible? Did I pick a bad frame? Maybe my eye is wrong and it could work better than not. I don't know if it's worth the trouble of all the shenanigans involved in messing with the cranks/bottom bracket.

what do you mean scoot the hub over?


some cranksets put their inner ring way far out, some don't. likely it's an issue with the crankset, as most flip/flop hubs and bb are pretty standard. if you told us more about the frame, we'd know better.

it's not worth the shenanigans of messing with cranks and bb, you're right. unfortunately, it's more than likely going to come to that.

I mean, if I were to merely move the hub over until it touches that dropout. Basically, if I were to move the cog as close to the chainline as I could. I don't know the exact model. It's this kind of frame:

https://farm4.static.flickr.com/3171/...abeeb8f7df.jpg

Univega, with the not-regular but not-entirely-women's frame. I told a bike shop I wanted to turn it into a fixie, and he looked at it and said it was too wide in the back and would be difficult. I tried anyway :-/

Having bought it for only 30, I'm sure there's someone out there willing to buy it off me so I can trade in for an actual single speed...it might come to that. We'll see how I feel tomorrow.

That Univega will make a perfectly good geared bike for someone. If I were to advise you, I'd suggest that you invest ~$65 in tires, tubes, wrap, cables, etc. and refurbish it completely. Adjust the hub bearings, and check the headset and bottom bracket grease. If they turn freely and the lubrication is okay, leave them and re-adjust only.

You'll sell it for ~$195-215 with a good advertisement and you can plow the $100 profit into a better bike from which to start. Or... Rinse and repeat until you can buy the bike that you really want.

Just my two cents.

PG

Hm. That's not a bad idea, either. But I think my main question is still whether it's a lost cause. Has anyone had experience turning mixte frames into fixies? Has there ever been problems with bottom brackets? Am I missing some main mechanical point?

Hm....maybe my eye was just off. On a last ditch whim, I decided to shorten the chain and just see what the chainline looked like if I just tried it. It seems...pretty straight! Teeth go into each slot in the middle, no rubbing on the sides. Hm...

Most of the time a bike with an ISO or OPC bottom bracket will line up pretty much straight between the cog and the inner chainring. If the chainring is out too far, you can get longer chainring bolts and spacers.

Does the over-locknut (OLD) of your rear wheel match the spacing of your frame? Sounds like it does not. When putting a track wheelset (usually spaced to 120mm) on a road frame (usually 126mm or 130mm) it is necessary to add the appropriate amount of spacers on each side of the wheel, so you don't have to crank the axle nuts way down and bend the frame every time you install your rear wheel. This isn't totally necessary, but makes things a LOT easier to work with.

Regarding chainline, did you actually measure it or are you just eyeballing it? I can't eyeball because my eyes lie to me. When it's wrong it looks straight and sometimes vice versa. Usually the little ring of a double will match up with the hub. If not, there's no issue re-dishing the wheel a bit unless you want to use it as a flip-flop.

Yeah, I think my eyes were lying to me. I think since the dropout goes in at an angle compared to the chainline, it was causing some sort of illusion that the chainring/hub weren't aligned, but after putting the chain on, it seems perfectly straight. Woohoo!

And to answer your question, my dropouts are 126mm, so it is a little wider. I'll go out tomorrow and buy some washers. Although I itch to just bend them and ride it now...