So I went to Ebay and CL to search and set up alerts for forks. You think it would be easy with the right criteria correct? Well that assumes everyone selling their stuff actually knows what they have and can list it accurately. I had a search on CL for touring bikes with cantilever brakes, I got 3 results and exactly zero had Cantis! I stumbled across a nice Peugeot no one with an auto search will find because he spelled it Peugot. Sigh. I routinely see sizing that is way off and all sorts of wheel sizes that are not even close to a known size, or 26" as 700c and vice versa. What that means is I mostly shift through alot of crap to be sure I don't miss what I actually want. Which brings me to the fork above.
When I searched for 27" wheel size, Cantilever brake forks I got very little and this one didn't show up so after scouring the ebay listing for forks I stumble across this blue Canti fork. The description says its 700c, fortunately I know that is not correct because they have given me other info but I would have never found it without allot of digging through dross.
I know this fork is not 700c because its from a Schwinn Passage!!! its even Tange as you can see on the drop-out. How is that for Karma? I was led back to the model that got me into this Touring thing in the first place. Its Hi-ten steel not cromo, like the current re-bent fork, but I can live with that. The steerer is slightly longer that what I eyeballed mine at but I would rather have too many threads rather than too few and I have spacers that I can use to deal with any gaps and/or take it to a shop to have some length cut down.
It was more than a Sunlite chrome replacement 27" caliper fork would, be or a 700c canti unicrown fork would be but neither of those fit what I want. It was also considerably less that the $212 someone wanted for a Trek 520 fork! Its ordered from eBay so we shall see in a week or so. Its essentially what I paid for the Trek 520 Cirrus fork except in that case I got a whole bike attached.
Its going to be butt ugly with the contrasting blue of the frame but I am going to test it as is before I spend any time with aesthetics like paint. And if I like the feel and the ride then I can worry about paint and maybe a Tange fork decal. I guess I will have a Schwin-shiki Crestage when its all together.
Search for a grail. Find a Passage. wait and see.
EDIT
I noticed that the same eBay seller has this on their site.
Which tells me there is a 99,9% chance the fork I bought came from a 58 cm frame -hooray. Not sure why they broke up the band other than to maximize profit, I am paying more for the fork than they are asking for the frame btw, or because the frame has a big dent maybe it was more of an after thought. In any event I am grateful that the combo was broken up so I could snag a fork.
Well done. Hope it works for you! BTW, i'm green with envy over your recent Trek find.
ReplyDeleteThanks Mike I hope it works too! And thanks for the compliment on the Trek, it was total dumb luck. The warehouse guy at Bike Works once told me that Vintage touring bike are "like a drop of water on a hot skillet - they evaporate." It was all fortuitous timing.
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