Silver Shifter Bump Caps

For some of us the friction shifter has never lost favor.  There was a lean time for a while where you had to keep your old stuff alive, then Rivendell and Dia-Compe brought back the Suntour ratcheting shifter from the ashes.  Silky smooth, easy to trim out, and pretty to boot.  The only downside I have ever been able to find is the pionty’ish end when they are set up on bar ends.  My solution has been to just use my older Suntour barcons.  I have seen everything from electrical tape to kickstand end caps employed to blunt the ends.  For the most part this can be a non issue, with the exception of trail use, knee caps and aesthetics. 

I recently came across a NOS Suntour solution that while not perfect has been pretty far on the plus side of acceptable. 

The fit is close to perfect.  These were designed to fit the non-ratcheting suntour downtube and stem shifters of long ago.  They have some stretch and give to help slide them on.  The end is just a little big.  I solved this by putting a little squirt of shoe goo in the cap before sliding it on.  They stay on fine without the glue, but are just more squishy at the tip.  These are easy on the hands and knees, squishy enough to prevent poking problems, and if my older shifters are an indication these should outlive the cockroaches. 

I have a decent supply of these to offer for sale.  $3 will get you a pair, plus $2 flat rate shipping and handling in the continental US.  Overseas shipping will be at cost, contact me before you buy.

 


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Pay pal works best for me, but if you want these and are paypal adverse feel free to contact me and we can work something out. 

Thanks for taking a look!

Thursday Standard and Fuji Stoke

First order of business was getting the new old Fuji to its new owner for some weekend fun prior to deciding on the final build out.  I am pretty sure her stoke is apparent,

after some fast wide loops to get a feel for the handing, she was showing off, hopefully there will be miles of smiles.

Then the munchikin and I made our way around the point to check the surf, just for fun,

Of course, since it is thursday and I am on daddy duty the surf is overhead and pumping, so it goes. 

Back to work, exciting things are happening, more on that in a bit.

650b Conversion Clearance

Some of you may be familiar with converting old road bikes to 650b, smaller rim, fatter tire, possibly more fun.  I am working on an older Fuji  for a friend at the moment and had to share this.  It has and will have the original 27×1-1/4 tires for a bit due to budget constraints.  But look at those perfect dimples, it could not get any better if you built it that way on purpose. 

Frosting on the cake is the bottom bracket drop of 60m or so.  If I had the money I would convert it and put Berthoud fenders on it just because it seems like the right thing to do.  I took it for a test ride, and even with no front load, trail in the low 40s and the big hoops it handles great.  Still, it begs for fatter rubber.

 

Load Testing

Today was another fantastic day to be out on the bike gathering the groceries for the week

ide blue skies to the east with the fog looming just offshore behind me.  THe high sweeping clouds made the blue skies pop, this one made me think of the swallows that will be heading back south pretty soon.

Enough day dreaming, and time for the business end of the trip.  Two stops totaling, 1 gal milk, 1 gallon Tangerine Juice, 3 quarts yogurt, boxes of cereal and crackers, more juice, bananas, and some how squeezing the camera gear back in the bags.  One trick I use is to take the bags of stuff out of the boxes, getting every little bit I can out of the hauling capacity.

Fully loaded with over 30 lbs of stuff I decided to head uphill to push the bike and myself a bit.  The handling climbing up was very precise, not slow speed wobbles all over the road, even mashing a 36/30 low gear.  The views were fantastic once above the fog, the bank looming just off the beach, with the channel islands poking out the top miles away.  This shot diving into one of my favorite turns captured it best.