Hproduguidon

Motobecane interclub 1980/85

m.c. 

This is mine in its current state. Its a Rivendell Hubbuhubbuh . It was in the bottom floor of my house that was flooded in Hurricane Ida. The fork, headset, and eccentric got put in the dumpster with the soaked box. I was able to purchase a raw fork from Rivendell. The frame and fork will be getting a new matching paint job.
The hard part has been finding a box to ship the frame in. No local bike shops have any tandem boxes and I'm worried two normal boxes taped together will just break apart. I think I may wrap it well in bubble wrap and see if the UPS store can find something to fit it into.

Chilepines

Here's a video on packing your tandem with 2 regular bike boxes. They just tape it heavily. I've put 2 boxes together with zip ties which has worked well. Just poke a couple of holes through both boxes when you have them lined up and run a zip tie through them. Of course you still want to bubble wrap or some other wrap the frame in the box, but if you are just shipping a frame and not a bunch of parts there is not much there to ruin your paint job.

m.c. 

Thanks, I'll probably try that.

longpete

Use Ebike box(some come with wheels mounted and are large enough).

m.c. 

Thanks, I'll look into that.

mkane

2010 Supremo

antmaster5000

Awesome bike- how do you like the rear disc brake?

kermie

Here is our first tandem. Told the wife we would see if this is something she would be interested in doing on a regular basis since I cannot get her on her single very often. It's a 1993 Santana Vision. I will need to change out the brake pads to get us into a better stopping place. We upgraded the saddles to Selle Anatomica and she is more comfortable. We are looking into new handlebars for her as she hates the drops. The wife is having fun so far and is looking forward to longer rides. She is a social butterfly and loves the attention it gets from folks.

mkane

For the type of riding we do these days it works great. The rear caliper is a Paul's. Toying with the idea of trying a different rotor. If we ever start doing steep stuff again, we may go with a disc up front. Our previous tandem had a front disc, and we dearly miss it descending. Anything over 40 mph gets uncomfortable.

ehcoplex 

Recent rescue-and-refurbish

James1964 

Nice to see vintage tandems on this thread. Here's mine again after cleaning it up.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/571911...h/52306390464/

ehcoplex 

Ooh, nice! Lugged, and the bent stoker seat-tube- very cool! Do you miss having a rear drum? How does the Cyclone (I think that's what it is...) FD handle the triple? I'm having trouble with the SLJ FD on mine..

James1964 

The Mafac cantilever brakes work well, though I've never had a tandem with a drum brake. The Cyclone FD works fine. It's old-school shifting; when up-shifting from the smallest ring to the middle one, I have to over shift it slightly and then back it off when engaged. It probably just needs adjusting, but central Ohio is relatively flat so it's only ridden in the middle and large rings.

ehcoplex 

I've got wheels I pulled from my old Cannondale touring bike on the tandem, so no drum brake (I did swap out for a solid axle, though these wheels are just temporary- I'll build up something tandem-specific this winter). It's been fine for our limited riding so far, though we've been sticking to the 'flatter' routes.
As far as the FD, the trouble I'm having is getting it to shift down from the middle to the granny. I suspect it has something to do with the cable routing/housing for the SLJ. I do have a Cyclone FD that was intended for another build that I may throw on and see if it's better.

Murray Missile 

My wife and I restrict our tandem riding to Rails To Trails and other bike paths as she won't ride on the road, with the exception of the side streets near home, so we don't need anything too fancy for what we do. Of course being the tinkerer that I am I have to make upgrades, most aren't necessary but I enjoy it. And who knows? Maybe I'll get her over her fear of roding on the road, I won't hold my breath though.

Here's our first tandem, an old Northwoods box store tandem that I took as a trade in. I discovered too late that whoever did the assembly at the store had the timimg chain installed incorrectly and the teeth on the chainwheels were damaged so I had to replace the cranksets. Since the only sets I could find at the time were several grades better than the originals my OCD made it "necessary" to upgrade the rest of the components as well. You know, "lipstick on a pig" LOL, basically I kept the frame, headset and fork and replaced everything else taking it from a 3X6 to 3X8. My wife and I thoroughly enjoyed it but it's heavy, hard to load and my wife has a hard time getting on and off due to the high top bar.




I bought a NOS Raleigh Companion frameset off Ebay that would fit my wife much better with the intent of transferring everything from the Northwoods to it. I won't bore you with the gory details but I ended up with 2 of them for the price of 1 and started buying components for the 2nd one which incuded FSA Gossamer cranksets and a Deore XT 3X9 drivetrain. Slightly better than the Nothwoods, the main tubes at least are Chrome Moly and they have BB eccentrics for chain tensioning
(Picture for reference only)


Before they got built this Trek T900 came up for sale at a really good price. It's lighter than the Raleighs and the top tube is slightly lower at the stoker position. It will be the recipient of the best of the new parts and the Raleighs will be assembled with what's left from the Trek takeoffs and the Northwoods. One Raleigh will be kept as a loaner and the other probably given to my cousins or donated. This picture is as purchased.

jethro00

Murray Missle,

We keep our Trek T900 as a backup. We ride it once a week to keep it in good running order. I like having a backup so if we wake up and see a flat tire, I don't have to fix it at that moment to ride. We just grab another tandem. Okay, we now have 3 tandems, so we grab 1 of the other 2. But, they are all different (rationale). My stoker was terrified of riding on the roads for some time. She is no longer terrified, just plain scared. But, we ride every morning, part on roads, part on college campus, levee path, etc. You may find your stoker will be more willing to try roads on the Trek T900. She may feel like she could jump off with the low top tube. My stoker has never jumped off. But, she took comfort in that thought when we first got the T900.

Murray Missile 

I actually just rode it for the first time this afternoon! I bought it about 4 days after my 2nd total knee replacement and 5 weeeks and 4 days after my 1st. I was bored and scrolling through the local FB Marketplace ( my nemesis ) and spotted it. I had been looking for a tandem with an even lower stoker top bar than the Raleighs for a quite awhile. I had come across several really nice Santanas, Burleys and CoMotions at bargain basement prices but they all had the staight top bar in the stoker position and wouldn't work for my wife. As soon as I saw the frame on this I knew it was the one but I couldn't even get in the car to go look it over. I found out in talking with the seller that I knew his wife's brother so based on that and the photos I told them I'd take it and would have our oldest son pick it up for me. When I first told my wife I got that "ANOTHER bike?" look but when he pulled in the driveway with it she was out the door before I could even get out of my chair LOL. I've only been able to get back on a bike other than the one on my trainer in the past couple of weeks and that's mainly been on a 20 inch folder with a couple short rides on an old 26" MTB. I was feeling pretty good today so I got the tandem out and took a short solo ride to get a feel for it. It is SO much lighter than the old Northwoods! I think it's going to work out really well for us, I know it's going to be much easier to load!

jethro00

Murray Missle,

In light of your knee surgeries, you may also find that you like the low top bar of the T900. One of the reasons we have no plans to part with our T900 is that it's the easiest to ride of our tandems if either of us is not 100%.

Murray Missile 

Oh yeah, the lower top bar is a definite plus for me as well. Right now I still have to lay it down to step over the frame, they said I won't have full mobility for several more months.

Thebucket71

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Thebucket71

Our very first tandem. Brand new CoMotion Java. Every ride is getting better.

Paul J

Orange, my favorite color😁

tachoknight

Below is our 2012 Cannondale tandem that we used during the 2022 RAGBRAI. The story of this bike is that we were in a Trek store in a suburb of Chicago and they happened to have this ... Cannondale ... that they had purchased from another bike store that had gone out of business. We were immediately smitten and pretty much knew this was our bike; we have another(!) tandem, a KHS Tandemmania that was bought from a Chicago lakefront bike rental, and it had seen a lot of usage. We realized we liked riding tandems, but we didn't like the KHS.

We came back the next day on the train, bought it, and rode it home 25 miles in a ferocious thunderstorm; we figured if we could have a good time on the bike under those conditions (seriously, I had to stop at one point because the rain was so hard I couldn't see), it was meant to be. We made some upgrades; the bags are custom from Buckhorn Bags and they do great for the empty space in the frame for holding repair stuff, some supplies, etc. We got a SteerStopper and that has made a world of difference in terms of working with the bike when it's stationary as the front wheel really doesn't want to stay straight. The pedals are Crank Brothers; the stoker is a pair of Double Shots and I forget the ones I have on front; we decided she would be able to clip in, while I have bigger platforms without clips for emergency stopping. We also changed the seats, I'm a big Brooks Saddle B-17 fan and she's partial to Terry. We outfitted the bike to be as close to a touring tandem as we could get and have ridden it on some long rides.

Here's to hopefully a lot of adventures with it. Wish Amtrak would take them though, that would greatly expand our options for tandem adventures!

Our 2012 Cannondale tandem

daywood 

I’ve posted a photo of our mid-80s Motobecane before but I’ve changed a lot of it in the past few months and it feels like a different bike; thus, a new photo.

I’ve recently replaced the graphics, replaced the captain’s flat bar and RapidFire shifters with FSA Adventure bars and Claris brifters, and also replaced the stem, spacers, rear rack and captain’s saddle. I removed the front rack and added a bar bag with a quick connect system and a better perch for Mickey.

Here it is with the new bits just before getting loaded into the back of my pickup to head into Portland for this year’s Bridge Pedal.