I finished putting together the Miyata, can't wait to take it for a real spin! I've had it for a while, with the original Shimano "Exage" group on it, and it had some old busted wheels too.
I took all the old parts off of it, and the bike shop built the rear wheel & installed the fenders, and cranks. I'm still using the original Shimano "Exage" cranks & front derailleur, but everything else has been replaced with newer parts.
After some trial and error, the bike now has brakes, downtube shifters, derailleurs, and a chain on it. The downtube shifters are really easy to deal with, which is part of the reason I'm moving away from the STI-style shifters I currently use. (If they break on the road, it'll be easier to fix)
"Spline triple-butted" it says - I'd think that would be super-light, but I guess not. Although back in the day this was probably equivalent to my Bianchi Eros from '05. This wasn't their top-o-the-line bike, but it wasn't the lowest-grade one either. (As gauged from here)
The finished product, sporting a Brooks saddle & dynohub/halogen light:
In total it's got to be a good 25 lbs or so, without the carradice saddle bag & water bottle mounts... But when I took it for a test-ride earlier tonight, it felt solid, and actually felt decent on a little climb in front of my apt, even with platform pedals!
And check out the extensions the LBS put on the fenders! It's a length of tire, quick-tied to the fender. Talk about full coverage, can't wait to take this thing out in the rain.
Oh and the bike has great accents on it, like art-deco triangles like this one, and little yellow squiggly lines on the top tube too, it reminds me of Miami Vice.
(Sorry for the wacky formatting in this post, but the main thing here is the pictures, the pictures!)
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Old Yet New Miyata Commute/Brevet bike
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2 comments:
wow.. 25 lbs..? is that typical for randoneering..? i'm not a 'randoneer' in the literal sense; but i've done tons of BIG solo unsupported rides with 5 digit elevation totals.. there's little chance that 25 lbs would be tolerable for me (i'm old i guess)..
it's probably towards the higher end of bike-weights used by randos, but i will guess that most rando bikes are steel.
i've seen everything from fixed gears to loaded tourers, and everything in between on the rides so far (even some carbon bikes, but I don't think many randos use that, since the frames usually have no fender clearance).
i might take the miyata into the LBS to see what the actual weight is, but at least from the info I could find online the stock models (in the 80's) were about 25 lbs - i've got some newer parts on it now, but nothing super-light.
on the 18 mile ride in to work this morning, it didn't really feel much different than the Bianchi, maybe a little slower uphill but not by much. i'm loving it so far!
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