Almost, but not quite, there

The plan for today was to finish the 1973 Motobecane Mirage, but first I was going to ride to the farmers Market.  It was sunny and 60 degrees today so I was wanted to enjoy the weather.

There were tiny pies to be purchased and eaten later with the girl (Bumble berry).

pFreim Triple IPA

And tiny beers to be sampled at the Beer Junction, a great start to my Sunday.

After getting a start in July of last year, I have been working on the Mirage for much of the last three days and it is very close to being ready to list but I have a couple things left and I am calling it quits for the day.  Since it was so beautiful out I did take the opportunity to take a few pictures.  This isn't the most troublesome build ever but nor is it the easiest and I will have a tale to tell once it is truly finished.  I felt my break was well deserved.

Until next time; Ride.Smile. Repeat

And then there were three

Ok that isn't actually true yet but it's the goal, get down to three bikes in the whole apartment;

• The 2009 Handsome Devil
• The 1987 Nishiki Cresta GT
• The 1978 Motobecane Grand Touring

Those three will keep me plenty busy as the last two both need the complete overhaul/spa treatment, and even the HD needs new bar tape and a few tweaks.

The pictures above are from June of 2017 and chronicle the height of the bike zaniness,  it can be tough to see it all but there are; two complete mountain bikes, two complete road bikes and five frames, as well as various wheel-sets occupying my humble balcony.

The pictures above reflect how things look today, just a bit of a change.  What happened to all the stuff you ask?

• The 1978 Schwinn Traveler and one wheel set remain in the on deck circle- a project in waiting
• The 1980 Raleigh Rapide is completed and listed on CL for sale
• The Green 1973 Motobecane Mirage is in the work stand and is close (fingers crossed) to being done and will be sold on CL.
• The Yellow Motobecane Mirage frameset was sold along with a few french parts and a wheel-set.
• The 1960 something,Torpado Alpha Frameset and all its parts were sold as a project and I threw in a bunch of new consumables; tires, tubes, cotter pins, cables, etc.
• The 1984 Nishiki Cascade was sold with new tires as a project.
• The 1986 Miyata Trail runner was sold - the guy traveled 50 miles just to get the stock wheel-set.
• The wheelset from the 1974 Nishiki Professional with the sanshin high flange hubs got moved inside and if I am dumb enough to buy a frame only project down the road they will be ready.

The last two residents of the balcony along with some wheels and rims and various metal bits went to the scrap yard (sad trombone).

• The 1983 Raleigh Record (Junk Bike) had a trashed seat tube
• The 1974 Nishiki Professional had many issues and was more than I wanted to tackle

I did harvest many parts from both of the bikes above some of which have been sold on and some of which may appear again soon in a future project.  For the Nishiki Professional as an example, I kept the wheel-set, and the seat post and saddle, while the stem, shifters, and derailleurs got sold. The Sugino bottom bracket and crankset I may also clean up and sell.  I should have never bought that bike but I think I at least broke even.

Some of these projects have been lingering for 5 years and it was cathartic to clear them out.  It also didn't hurt to put some $$ in my pocket.  I still have two projects I want to complete before tacking the Nishiki Cresta GT,  and after that I have the long overdue MotoGT to give a well deserved overhaul, so I am far from out of the woods.  After I get through all that I hope to take more of a one at a time approach to my rehab projects.  We'll see how that works out... lol. 

in the workstand

Until next time. Ride.Smile.Don't hoard.Repeat.

A somber goodbye and an Impulsive Hello!

A few weeks ago, reluctantly, I put the Schwinn Passage on Craigslist.  I made sure the price was at a I don't want to sell this but if you meet my price I will be ok with it level.  There was no action in the first week and then I got some interest from a young man who arranged to see it on a Saturday.  The day before on Friday I got a call I had been waiting a long time for, a Job offer!  A lack of job was the reason the Schwinn was on the block and I considered cancelling the ad and telling the guy the Passage was off the market.  Although I had an offer I wasn't going to start right away or get paid right away either and I had a good feeling about the potential buyer so I went ahead with the meeting. The guy and his wife drove up from Joint Base Lewis McChord (about 50 miles) and when he saw the bike I heard him say under his breath, it looks even better than the ad, and I knew I had made the right choice.  He was very excited to buy it and I was excited to fill up my wallet.

I now had a  job in the offing, projects completed and listed on CL, and a hole in my quiver, I have been working hard to clear the decks of bike projects, frames and parts that I will probably never get to..BUT...I really liked having a mid 80s Japanese touring bike.  Maybe I will just take a peek at CL, nada, hmm wonder what's for sale on Bike Forums these days.

Catalog shot

On bike forums I see that there is a 1987 Nishiki Cresta in 58cm which is my size but it says local pickup only.  I click the post for a closer look, the seller is in Portland, Oregon, that is not too far down the road, my old stomping grounds and home to numerous friends and family, that could work.  And wait a sec the logo the seller is using on his Bike Forums profile is familiar....I think its the same as the logo for The Simplicity of Vintage cycles blog, the same blog that got me so obsessed with Vintage Japanese Touring bikes that I went in search of a Schwinn Passage.  So I PM the seller, is this Josh of blog fame? and he emails me back asking if I am the guy who runs the Ryan's Rebuild blog, small world!

Now I am still technically unemployed and cash strapped so I don't commit right away but I keep my eye on the listing, ping my Portland friends, who are Oregon Ducks and live in the Hollywood district btw, to see if I could stay with them on the off chance I come to Portland for the weekend.  I find the 1987 Nishiki Catalog online and start obsessing.

Ok who am I kidding, of course I am going to buy it!  I get up early Saturday and drive down to Portland, meet up, get a tour of his very nice, and clean!, shop and seal the deal.  And now I am the proud owner of a 1987 Nishiki Crest GT touring bike that is nearly bone stock.

I have many more pictures here and I will probably do another post just on all the cool features of this bike but for now I just wanted to follow up on my tease from a few days ago and share the new addition to the stable.

I just completed the Raleigh Mixte and the Motobecane Mirage has been over half done for 8 months so I want to get it completed on CL soon.  I have one other potential quick and dirty project after that and then the decks will be cleared.  Then I can start the rehab on this lovely Nishiki, maybe in time to do the Tour de Lopez for the second consecutive year on my second consecutive mid 80s Japanese touring bike.

Ride. Replace, Smile. Repeat.

Moving on from a Mixte

I have discovered something about myself and Mixtes.  When I'm building one for someone, like a sister in law, or niece or daughter, I enjoy the process.  When I am building one on spec, not so much.

I found the above Mixte at bike works in September of 2015, it was $32.50, it was all there, the paint and decals were in good shape, sold.  I really disliked the bars for some reason,  too much rise I think, and I quickly replaced them with a Wald bar with 2.5 inch rise.  I had picked up a set of grips at the sale as the ones on the bike had seen better days and the new ones were a buck.

I wasn't wise in the ways of rubber grips then and I don't think I prepped them very well and they only ended up going on about half way.  For some reason I let that defeat me, the bike got put aside, then put outside where it languished for at least a year.  It was on a covered porch but it still allowed the new bars to start to get some surface rust - bad Ryan!!

Last fall as unemployment wore on I brought the bike back in, thinking I could fix it fast and sell it, that was in October.  I saw it everyday from my favorite chair for months and I finally got fed up and in the stand it went.

I was too broke to list it for what I paid and too apathetic about it to do a complete tear down, so I made a list, poured an IPA, put on some John Lee Hooker and got to work.

Since grips had sidelined this project I thought I would tackle them first,  I got the grips from bike works off the bars and set them aside.  I'm still mad at them and didn't want to jinx the project by reusing them.  I had some rubber grips, still new in packaging that I think I had got for a 3 speed, which I decided to use instead.  I have learned since the 2015 fiasco that dish soap is your friend for mounting rubber grips.  It makes things slick but eventually evaporates. I coated the inside of the grip and lightly coated the bar and got them started...

And then I reached for the "persuader" to finish the job.

Grip problem solved!

At one point, early on I think, I removed an important part of the rack and the equally important hardware and instead of putting them in a baggie and taping them to the rack I put them down...somewhere.  I do not remember where and they are nowhere to be found, so I just removed the rack.  It was going to bug me anyway because they designed this bike with such a short seat tube that this particular rack was never going to be level.  I hate slanty racks.  

The bike also came with fenders but both front and back were rubbing on the tires and since fixing fender lines can take 20 minutes or 20 hours, I chose to just remove them.

The tires that came with the Mixte, as is often the case with vintage bikes, were dry rotted.  Normally I would go with some nice gum-wall tires but I didn't want to spend a penny more than necessary on this project, so I went with the Specialized Tri-Sports that I took off the Passage.  

I also used the saddle that came with the Passage as both it and the tires are basically new.

I really though I could get the Mixte up and running with out a penny out of pocket but it turns out I needed two mountain bike style brake cables (round end) and I only had one.

I have a whole box of cables and I had probably 5 or 6 road bike brake cables but only one with a mountain bike end.  Sigh..... off to the bike shop.

Dang, I forgot I can't go to the shop a mile away, it closed!  (sad trombone) I liked that place and the owner so I'm sorry they didn't last.  I ended up going to Bike Works and got the cable for $2.00, probably would have been cheaper on Amazon but I wanted it NOW and I like supporting Bike Works.

And so the Mixte is done.  It wasn't a complete tear down rehab, I didn't touch the bearings,  and the price and description will reflect that, but it is a functional bike.  And yes I know that a brown saddle and black grips is a fashion disaster but I don't care! I want it gone!!!

I ended up doing the following:

• Wipe down frame and fork with armor all wipes
• Sanded brake shoes
• New grips
• Newish tires and tubes (under 25 miles)
• New saddle
• New brake cables and housing
• New RD cable and housing
• Adjusted shifting 
• Adjusted brakes
• Gave the chain and FW a WD 40 spray and wipe down and lubed the chain.
• Greased seat post and stem

It would be on CL right now except that I am heading out of town in the morning and I don't want to be the guy who lists something and then isn't around to show it.  My trip out of town is somewhat impulsive and involves a bike...(cue maniacal laughter).  More to come.

EDIT (3/38/18) after languishing on CL with the brown saddle for a few weeks I broke down and swapped to a sprung black one I had in the parts bin.  Will see if that and lowering the price from its already reasonable amount will shift it.

Craiglist Razzie's vintage bike edition 2018

This is, mostly, tongue in cheek as I realize I am both a bike nerd and experienced in working with Craigslist.  I do realize not everyone gives a lot of thought to what will make an item sell and they may not really even know what they have or how to present it.

Yes you sensed a "but" coming, nearly everyone in North America has a mobile phone, and even the most basic has a camera function.  And both the camera and the laptop you may be uploading it to have editing software that a chimp could use, believe me most chimps would probably be better at it than I am.  My premise, then is that there is really no reason to A) not have a picture of your item, and B) not have a halfway decent picture or half a dozen decent pictures.  Craigslist allows you 24 pictures per  post in fact.

Finally my basic assumption is that you put something on CL because you want to sell it, wouldn't you want to make it easy for someone to like your item then if you want to sell it?  or heck forget like how about being able to identify it.

With that background I present the 2018 Craigslist Razzie's bike category.

No photo

Yes in 2018 people with internet access are posting CL ads with no photos.  My example is a person who advertised a "Raleigh Super Coarse" for $350.  Now it would help if they spelled Course correctly but I am no spelling whiz so I will let that slide.  I am puzzled though as to how you can ask premium dollars for something you don't even have a photo of.  I would normally just brush this off but I actually responded to the ad and, kindly I hope, suggested that without photos the bike would have a hard time selling and btw its spelled Course which will make it easier for people to find it.

Lazy

I have two examples of the Lazy category.

This was advertised simply as blue road bike, I would like your $40 but I can't be bothered to take 5 seconds to back the bike out of the dark hole to take a decent picture.  I will say that many folks who take only one picture do at least identify the maker and model of the bike so I can use the interwebs to figure out what it should look like,

This is lazy for another reason, I get that taking a bike down off the hooks is a hassle, even if you are figuring to sell it, BUT you can use the orient button on your edit software- and in like 5 seconds the bike looks right side up. And you can spend and additional 5 seconds to apply the "magic wand" button and clear up that focus.  This seller posted two pictures, they were exactly the same....smh.

Deliberately obtuse

This person took 3 photos and to their credit even a couple nice close ups...

They were all with bike upside down!  Do you think I need a neck stretch, or that I will actually try to ride it this way?

Clueless

Again I get the fact I am looking for details in bike ads but..

this is your only shot, really?  What can I tell from this shot, its got a rack and flat bars and is presumably a mountain bike?  Why do I have to be Sherlock Holmes when you want me to buy this?  Hmm where should I take this shot? hallway or outside in the great outdoors, I'm going with narrow hallway.

In the Dark

I see a lot of these and they would be pretty easy to fix by either taking the shots in decent light or

using your editing software, btw dark or a cluttered background - pick one.

The Grand prize winner

This one actually made me laugh out loud...

What I imagine happened is the bike got leaned up against a picnic table next to a campfire at about 10 pm and then the seller ran by the bike and snapped a picture.

Ok rant over, is it just me?  tell me its not just me.

Something Impulsive this way comes....

And its going to involve this sweet Sand Canyon tire from Swift (by Panaracer)

For many years I thought the only way to get a 27 x 1 3/8 tire was the Kenda K40 and then someone over at bike forums pointed me to this tire.   They are twice as expensive as the Kenda's but they should have the suppleness of the Panaracer Pasela's.

My impulsive act will also include; a lot of driving, ducks, and Hollywood.

More to come.....