Schwinn Le Tour III putting it all together (out of order)

I already posted shots of the finished Le Tour II mxte project so here I am back tracking a bit to talk about how it all went together starting from the stripped down frame and (mostly) cleaned up components.

First I needed to get the fork taken care of.  I had used one of my spiffy new tools (Nashbar crown race puller) to get the crown race off so I could clean it.

Then I needed to clean up some rust on the chromed fork blades so they would be nice and shiny again.  Some Turtle was chrome cleaner/rust remover and brass brush wheel on the Dremel tool did the job.

Then it was on to using more cool tools (Nashbar crown race setter and headset press) to remount the crown race on the fork and get the cleaned up cups back on the head tube.

With the frame-set taken care of it was on to the wheels.  The wheel-set that came on this bike was just fine and I will certainly reuse it but since this project was financed by my brother for his wife I went with some brand new 27 inch wheels from Amazon.  They are relatively inexpensive (under $70 for the set) and; they are lighter, have a better braking surface and nicer spokes and hubs than the originals.  The drawback to the factory wheels is that both front and rear came too tight and needed to be adjusted and IMHO they don't use enough grease in the bearings so I took care of that too.  Not a huge deal if you are willing do to a bit of extra work and have the proper cone wrenches handy.

factory amount

Ryan amount

In getting the bike back together I encountered three issues.  I had purchased "thumbies" from Velo-Orange so I could mount the shifter's on the handlebar to make them easier to reach.

I got them all set up only to find that due to an issue with how the shifter hardware interfaced with the thumbies I couldn't get the front derailleur shifter to work properly -it basically loosened itself every time I shifted.

In the diagram below, part 3533 has a "shaft" that all the shifter parts fit around, Velo-Orange very kindly provides an extra long shaft to use with the thumbies, except that the shifter "guts" would not fit around the VO part as it was just slightly too big and using the stock part, meant for a stem shifter mount, the shaft was too short to fit all of the washers that go at the end (3526, 3527, 3528).  Where is Goldie Locks when you need her? I speculate the lack of a key washer is what allowed the front derailleur shifter to keep loosening.

So I had to scrap that and go with the original stem mount system (below).  Thank goodness for keeping and cleaning all the original parts!

I also mounted the basket (a key piece of the build) only to find it hung down low enough to interfere with the front tire.  Luckily I happened to have a Dia Compe mini rack I had intended for a later build that mounts to center pull brakes and that solved the basket issue.  I did have to add an extra washer to keep the rack "tang" from getting hung up on the headset and interfering with steerage.

Finally I was ready for the last piece of the build adding on the cork grips.  I was lucky I had two pairs of grips because I destroyed one set in getting the #$%^* things mounted!  I read somewhere you are supposed to glue them on but I had no luck getting them mounted until I greased them up and I still ended up with a small crack near the front of the left grip because they were so tough to rotate onto the bar.  I do like the look, especially shellacked but boy they were a pain in the rear.  (Note its possible that the cork grips are meant for a 22.2 diameter bars rather than the 23.8mm bars I used but I checked the packaging and it did not specify.)

One thing I really liked about this build is how much detail they put into this bike, almost all of the components had either a Le Tour marking or said "Schwinn Approved".  Even the seat post has a Le Tour marking that you would never see!

It really made me appreciate the level of detail they put into these Japanese Schwinn's.

As always -ride.smile.repeat.

Schwinn Le Tour III -Finished

Its done, she loved it, more later when I am not so darn tired

finished product in new home

Blue, Bell, Basket

Spiffed up crank

Final stages

Schwinn Le Tour III Mixte Rescue update

When last I left you, my erstwhile readers, I had obtained a Schwinn Le Tour III mixte to build up so my brother could give it to his wife on her birthday at the end of April.  While I'm not as far along as I would like to be I have made progress and should be able to get it completed on time.  First the little minx made it into the rack for inspection and deconstruction

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And I ended up with this

And this

And then the packages started to arrive, first came the nice new 27 inch allow wheels, to go with some fat 27 x 1 3/8" Kenda K40s I already had in stock.

And lots of cool bits for the cockpit, new pedals, basket etc.

I have also made use of a handy little item that my buddy Hugh, at Hugh's bicycle blog, turned me on to.  The ultrasonic -cleaner.  This little helper (below)

Turns dirty, grimy, nasty  stuff like this..

Into nice clean shiny stuff like this - I didn't even notice the first time I saw the derailleur that it had a Le Tour badge, now that its clean it really stands out.

So now its time to finish the cleaning and lubing parts.  Checking the new hoops for spin and true,and adding grease to the hubs as the wheels from the factory are usually miserly with the lube.  Then on to building this baby back up and ready for the road.

Normally I am pretty conservative with my rebuilds, I make sure that I have at least a little profit after donor bike and parts costs,  but I am going off course with the LeTour III.  I am going to blow way past the $250 my brother had slated for this project, but that's ok as I went overboard in large part for myself to build a really sharp mixte.  Big bro will get a deal, my Sister-in-law will get a bike she will hopefully have fun riding and I get to create a cool ride.  Until next time.

Ride. Smile. Repeat.

Oh the Humanity! or What did they do to you little Peugeot? (May 2012)

Last May,  I went to my usual old bike haunt, BikeWorks, looking for parts but of course couldn't help but go look at what they had in the warehouse for project bikes. As it turned out they had a big line of bikes all leaned together that they hadn't sorted yet.  I was looking through them somewhat distractedly " Road bike, Mountain bike, Mixte, Hybrid, Stingray, Road bike..wait..what the HELL!" and then I took another look at what I had thought was a old Schwinn Sting Ray and then did a double take worthy of a bugs bunny cartoon- some ingenious and blasphemous bastard had taken a 70′s Peugeot UO-8 road bike and equipped it with Ape Hanger handle bars and Banana seat effectively turning it into a Schwinn Sting Ray. I was stunned, impressed and horrified all at once. Is it a Peug-winn, a Schwin-geot or a UO-Ray8?

What the hell happened?

And then the bike spoke to me in heavily accented English; Pleeze Monsieur, HELP!, remove my shame, Merde! undo what zey did to moi, I want to be ze road bike again. Lets Allez!  How could I possibly walk away?  When one of the other customers overheard me telling the wrench I was getting the bike solely to restore it to its natural state, he offered to take the ape hangers and banana seat off my hands for $10,  since the bike was only $25 I was able to take on another bike project I didn't need for a net of $15 bucks.


 Once I stopped shaking my head over the absurdity of what had been done to this former road bike,

I realized that except for the saddle,  handle bars and brake levers I had a pretty complete road bike and in fact it didn't take much digging around the garage to mock up a road bike once I had stripped the offending ape hangers and banana seat off.

And although it was "only" a lowly entry level UO-8 it still had its charms...

classic 70s head badge

Atax stem with made in France flourish and non plastic Simplex stem shifters

Once I got down to business cleaning it up, replacing all the standard pieces and cleaning and rebuilding the bearings it all came together pretty nicely.

Once I had it back to its 70′s entry level road bike glory, it sold in a day on Craigslist to a nice young lady who teaches science to kids.

Ride.Smile.Repeat.

Ryan's Rebuilds to the Rescue

One of my older brothers also lives in the greater Seattle metro area and most weeks we are able to get together before work at a downtown Seattle coffee shop.  Recently he revealed to me a pickle he found himself in.  In cleaning out his garage he had decided to put an old bike into a garage sale, it was an Nishiki Hybrid bike that he had used in a sprint triathlon but it was functional and nothing special .  Anyway not long after the garage sale his wife asked him what had happened to her bike.....seems she considered the Nishiki her bike and my brother, at first speechless, had to confess that he sold it not realizing it was her bike.  Doh!  So knowing his little brother is a bike geek and that his wife's birthday was approaching at the end of April, he came to me with a request that I find a bike to replace the one he had sold.

His criteria was that it would  be a step through (women's bike), which the Nishiki was not, and that it had to be blue.  He also wanted to keep the budget in the $250 range.  I told him I thought I could help him out and envisioned a split top tube classic European Mixte, perhaps a Peugeot or Motobecane, to fit the bill.  Today I decided to visit my favorite haunt for bike projects, Bike Works, to search out a donor for this project and I found not exactly what I had in my own mind but a bike that fit the bill none the less.  Ots a nice  late 70s or early 80s Schwinn Le Tour III Mixte frame in need of some TLC.  No split top tube but a very nice Japanese built lugged frame with Le Tour branded Sun Tour parts, and the blue paint seems to be in good shape for its age.  It's certainly NOT a 40 pound, hernia inducing, Chicago built Varsity.

1978 Catalog

I have some nice swept back city bars and brake levers to match  from Velo Orange put aside for just such a project and I think the SunTour components will clean up nicely.

Since I only had to shell out $40 for this little gem I might also be able to upgrade the Steel wheels to some new Alloy 27 inchers and maybe add a faux leather sprung saddle.  And for sure it needs a nice basket up front.

I am hoping this will turn out to be a sweet Mixte if I do my job right and certainly it will be a upgrade over the Nishiki that was a garage sale casualty.  Should be a fun build for my sister in-law, and a face saver for my brother- More to come.

Ride.Smile.Repeat.

1979 Fuji Royale (September 2012)

Make: Fuji
Model: Royale 
Year:  1979 
Obtained: September 2012 
Found: Bike Works 
Paid: $25.00


While visiting my favorite place for project bikes, Bike Works, on a Wednesday  I spotted a Fuji frame-set that gave me pause.  I thought to myself  "stop buying frame-sets! its easier to do complete bikes" and so I passed it by.  I really liked the look of it, however, especially the world championship-like banding on the down tube and I had been hankering to work on a Fuji for a while so on Thursday I was back to buy it.

The excellent site -Classic Fuji- helped me identify my prize as a 1979 model Fuji Royale

My frame-set came with a front derailleur, stem, seat post, brakes, bottom bracket, and a crappy headset.  I bought a new Tange headset and got most of the other parts out of the parts bin.  Unfortunately I did not get a frame-set only picture.  Have I mentioned that I really like head badges?  The Fuji's head badge is a classic.

I ran into issues with the rear derailleur and the crank-set I had out the parts bin so I put a new Shimano TZ-50 RD on the frame (cheap but effective) and lucked into a Fuji panto-graphed crank-set at Recycled Cycles to fix the crank issue.  I even found a (modern) Fuji branded saddle for this build.  The crank cleaned up nicely with the application of some Mother's Aluminum polish, a  great tip from my friend Hugh -Mothers really does the trick.

When I brought this bike home I had a vision of doing some orange accents to tie into the orange band from the world championship looking rainbow stripes and the orange lug lining on the frame.  I think the orange bar tape and toe straps add some color to an otherwise understated silver frame.

All in all I am happy with how it turned out and it was snapped up off Craigslist fairly quickly, so I guess the orange accents worked.

On a side note a new job, hurray for income!,  has kept me away from regular posting on the blog but I am hoping to finish up both the Raleigh curbside find project and the Fiorelli project soon. 

As always. Ride.Smile.Repeat.