ramonesfreak |
08-09-2025 06:02 AM |
Finished this project yesterday. Took my Cannondale MTB bike I bought in 1991 and turned into an upright cruiser. If I lived in Key West this bike would be perfect. When I bought this bike I was working at a bike shop as a mechanic and was able to upgrade a bunch of stuff with the hot parts of the day. It was an awesome bike so I kept it safe and as-is all these years. Ringle water bottle cage, XT shifters and XT rear derailleur , Richey seat post, and wheels, hubs and cranks still on the bike now.
At 53 I couldn’t handle the extreme riding position any more and before spending a zillion dollars on a Rivendale or something, I figured I would see what I could do with this. Replaced the head set and bars with Velo Orange. Nitto stem, NOS XT skewers, Paul brakes…..the brakes cost more than the entire bike cost new LOL…but wanted them forever so treated myself along with a Thomson SP clamp, new seat, pedals, rack, bags, chain rings, tires, grips etc all changed. The biggest challenge was I found the fork threads badly damaged when I removed the old headset from that washer tab spinning around the threads. I had to do some math and get a thread cutter and re-thread the forks…worked out perfect. The other challenge was dealing with that short head tube. It was tricky finding a stem that would be tall enough to make this project work. In the end, this barely worked. The stem is at the max height, right at the line. I got lucky.
Anyway, this thing is damn comfortable and I love it. With one pedal stroke it rolls a mile. And without the rear bag of tools, it’s super light. It’s only problem is the 24” wheels are slow. I can’t keep up with my wife on her 700c wheels so with her, I have to ride my other X-county bike that is awesome but again, very uncomfortable.
I should have taken before and after photos.. oh well
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1754747699.jpg
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1754747780.jpg
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1754748125.jpg
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