2007 Kona Heihei with XTR is sat doing nothing.

If I were to purchase an appropriate 29er/monstercross/adventre frame, how much kit could I recycle? I’d rebuild the wheels.

The cranks are traditional triple – would road triple shifters work with it?

If I bought hydraulic STI levers could I connect the XTR calipers to them? Or I could just use plain hydro levers and fit the existing thumbies somewhere?

Presumably a monstercross type bike would have 130mm rear axle, not the 135 of my XTRs, so that means 29er doesn’t it?

What else could go wrong?

All disc equipped “road” or gravel frames are 135mm now I think.

Depends on budget! You will need some new brakes and shifters.

Either a complete set of shimano hydraulic sti or a set of hydraulic brakes with bar end shifters, or cable STI with cable disc brakes.

I think 2007 XTR was still 9 speed?

I would go:

TRP Hylex brakes
Microshift / shimano road 9 speed bar end shifters

Or cheaper would be 9speed STI and the juin tech callipers. Not sure they will work the triple tho.

Mountainbikes are long
Roadbikes are short.
Shortening stem with already narrow bars it all gets a bit annoying to actually ride.

Is what i found.

So we don’t think the XTR MTB calipers are compatible with modern levers?

The shifters I have are in fact bar-end shifters with the Paul’s components thumbie adapters. However bar end shifters look like they’d be crap to use.

@josh I meant to say I’d replace the frame.

Looks like the Vagabond that got me thinking might actually be a good frame for this….?

It might be easier to just fit appropriate tyres and ride the Kona. Or sell it complete and put the proceeds towards a gravel bike.

It would be easier, but it would not be what I am asking about 🙂

I want a Genesis Vagabond but do not have a grand to spare, that’s the point.

Can’t fauly my Gevanelle Hylex shifters/brakes at the minute and I think they can be run 9 speed up to 11 speed with the appropriate shifters installed.

I wouldn’t ditch the bar end shifters yet, I put them on my Peregrine and really like them for long steady paced rides. Take a little bit of getting accustomed to but look fine and also keep cables away from getting tangled at the front of the bike if you were going to carry luggage as well..

I still have the end-plug mounts they originally came with. It would certainly save a load of cash.

NNnnngggh!!!!!

A 2007 Hei-Hei? Stick some fast tyres on it an RiiiiiDE! It’ll rip your legs off and be much more fun than an overweight cross bike, even if you only ever take it out in the dry!

(slightly biased as my newest MTB is a 2006 Kona King, which is still awesome).

If anything, I reckon the hei-hei would be more suitable to adventure/bike-packing than a gravel bike… Shorter stem and wider bars to calm the handling down, and away you go!

Please don’t split it… Retrobike might be interested if you really don’t want it anymore..

I think the only bit you’re recycling is the hubs and (maybe) the XTR calipers? Sell them and buy a whole bike 🙂

Hubs, cranks, mechs, shifters, seatpost and ideally brakes.

A 2007 Hei-Hei? Stick some fast tyres on it an RiiiiiDE! It’ll rip your legs off and be much more fun than an overweight cross bike, even if you only ever take it out in the dry!

It won’t be an adventure bike no matter how hard I ride it now will it? It’s FS for a start.

I do wonder if retrobike would be interested. It’s a very nice XC race bike and a nice build.

It’s a bike. You can ride it on adventures.

Therefore: Adventure bike, no?

🙁

It won’t be an adventure bike no matter how hard I ride it now will it? It’s FS for a start.

You sound like a marketing departments wet dream.

So what, we’re all supposed to ride the same kind of bike all the time? I’m not allowed to have specialist bikes?

You sound like a marketing departments wet dream.

You sound like a knob.

I’m scrabbling around adapting ten year old kit cos I can’t afford a new bike, so I’m hardly a marketing wet dream am I?

It’s a bike. You can ride it on adventures.

Therefore: Adventure bike, no?

No. Adventure bike has a specific meaning in this context. Now all of you stop being such passive-aggressive bell ends and tell me if I can run my old calipers on road hydro levers.

Cranks/mechs/shifters – I guess that will come down to suitability and compatibility. For instance you may find that the inner ring on a triple could foul seatstays, or the band on your front mech is where the bottle cage mounts are.

Seatpost will depend on the seattube diameter – but hardly a showstopper to buy a new seatpost.

If you’re doing it on a budget I’d have thought that cable disks would be cheaper than hydro STIs.

AFAIK none of the hydro STIs work with 9-speed MTB mechs.

It would be easier, but it would not be what I am asking about

I want a Genesis Vagabond but do not have a grand to spare, that’s the point.

You could cut and shut the frame to match the Vagabond numbers maybe – Scewfix sell welders – then bend the bars until they look like drops. The skewers should be fine. Likewise with the rims, just buy some dinged ones and weld in new sections – space them regularly so that the wheel retains structural integrity and stresses are evened out.

The end result will be a proper adventure bike, not some off- the-peg lifestyle accessory and you will have saved loads of dosh you can spend on other stuff.

Or you could just save up for a bit? Aren’t you a fabulously wealthy con tractor who travels the globe printing his own money?

There’s almost nothing of significant value that you could transfer and you’ll almost certainly regret cannibalising the Kona, which you will later realise was a decent bike you should have just ridden on the same stuff.

imo.

So you think that riding a 26 FS XC race bike is the same as riding a fat tired road bike?

I had a some what older bike that I added 2 inch big Apples to. That alone was quite a good mod and it was/is a versatile

I recon that you’ll find an MTB frame short enough to take drops if you go old enough. I think my 2000 hard tail has the same length top tube as my road bike. Or I’d try a set of loop bars. My bike has Mary Bars but a set of loop bars should give a great range of hand positions.

Wheels and tyres. Either 2 inch tyres on 26 inch wheels or larger rims and thinner tyres. The new 650b and fat road tyres could work

You might want to source a rigid fork as well maybe from carbon cycles

If you really want to go to drop bars and the XTR is nine speed I’d use SORA 9 speed STi and cable brakes. I have found cable discs to be great. Or you could try on of the boxes that converts cable to hydraulic. Isaw one a Giant bike and it was quite small and neet. But I can’t find one by googling..

Keep:
Headset
Stem
Saddle
Hubs
Discs
Shifters
Cranks
Bottom Bracket
Front Mech
Rear Mech
Chain
Cassette

Replace:
Frame
Fork
Bars
Seatpost
Rims
Disc calipers
Brake Levers

I’d go for it personally. Bikes are always worth more in bits, so to get most back from the Hei Hei you would split it anyway. Decent 26″ straight steerer forks are getting good money and the Hei Hei is a classic frame – if you are not using it then flog it.

All the stuff in the keep list is worth more to you to use up than its worth 2nd hand.

This way you are starting from very good kit. If on a budget you could just get some Tektro cable brake levers and Juin Tech / Acor /TRP cable-hydro calipers or some BB7s.

Hmm. Taking on board comments about keeping the original bike, just had another look at it.

Flipped the stem, fitted a wide ish flat bar, de- weight weenied it a bit. Looks much better now. Part of its weird aspect is not so much the small wheels but the super skinny 2.0 tyres. They were big when I put them on!

Will still consider the project later if/ when I have more £