Having just bought my dream full suspension bike the total bike count now equals 5! Living in a terraced house and lacking storage, I’m now looking to reduce the number of bikes I own (I know it goes against n+1) The BMX cruiser is up for sale (any takers?) and the vintage road bike commuter is too useful a machine to go anywhere, which leaves the geared hardtail and the single speed. I’ve hatched a plan to get rid of the frames of these two machines(yet again any takers?)and build up one bike which is run as a single speed most of the time but can have gears fitted for races , when I’m feeling lazy and possible future bike packing expeditions.(Ready for the abuse from all you hardcore 24hr ss racers)

Ideally it will be steel, reasonably priced and available in a 19″ frame of larger (I’m a giant!) What would you recommend?
Oh and I think I like the idea of swoppable dropouts over an EBB but open to being persuaded???

All suggestion gratefully received!
Cheers

💡 Salsa ElMariachi with swappable alternator dropouts

Inbred?

Or….sell the single speed and build up a wheel with one these beauties…..

Niner Sir Nine, Surly Karate Monkey

Kona Unit, albeit with a swop of sliders.

Shimano Hone rear hub that you can attach the mech to that and EBB

My solution to this but i need gears about twice per year

why not use the frame you have and use a tensioner?

Or I have a mech hanger that fits SS dropouts if you like

why not use the frame you have and use a tensioner?

I’ve done this, works well and means you can use near any frame.

Alternatively, Singular Swift fits your bill. I’ve had 3 EBB bikes, all worked fine.

Swift ebb far less faff than the SS inbred I have now. Not sure the rest is appreciably better though to account for the cost.

Dialled Bikes Love/Hate?

Second vote for the Salsa here…just ordered a new 2014 frame as well 🙂

Or….sell the single speed and build up a wheel with one these beauties…..

Apologies, forgot to post the link: Eccentric hub

Genesis ioid with alfine hub. takes a couple of minutes to swap to SS with a second rear wheel. Shifter, cable and rear wheel come off as one.

Sideways cycles have got a 19 inch salsa el mariachi on sale at the moment- save me buying it please!

Pipedream sirius 853, sliding dropouts best solution IMO.

I’ve had a pipedream and a salsa elmariachi and the salsas a better ride .

I was going to ask if Pipedream still made the Sirius with sliding dropouts – appears they do.

FWIW my Sirius (sliding drop outs) built up as a SS was flawless. My Singular Peregrine (EBB) with Alfine was also flawless.

I’d chose mine over which had the better colour, geometry, weight and price.

I’ve been running my Cotic Soul as a singlespeed recently:

At the rear, it’s running a normal Hope Pro 2 rear hub with a set of spacers and an 18T rear cog, plus an On One Doofer that mounts on the gear hanger. Up front, I use a Hope 32T DH single ring and a singlespeed chain.

None of the above preculdes me also using – at will – a set of XTR shifters / derailleurs / chain and a 10 speed cassette.

Because the bike was geared before I went singlespeed, all the cables and indexing is perfect for the bike. It takes about 30 minutes to put gears back on, although I’ve not felt the need to for the last 4 months or so.

The moral of the story is that you probably don’t need a new frame, if you have a geared, vertical dropout hardtail.

That said, I’m seriously considering swapping my drop-bar bike for a flat-bar, so that I can share the XTR drivetrain between the two bikes…rather than have it sat in cupboard most of the time.

Sell the redline it has a daft sized rear hub anyway, sell the PA bite the bullet & try alloy, SC chameleon is a nice lightish frame that’ll be raceable with & without gears & I can have a go on it see @kingerstu for a review

Thanks for all the replies, I agree I could easily stick with what I have. The reason for the change would be for something lighter and more racey. My hardtail is a dialled bikes Prince Albert which is a bit more of a hardcore hardtail and the ss is a redline monocog which has no gear hanger and is running a ss specific wtb hub but is a bit weightier than I’d like. The parts I have between the two of them could make a great long distance/racey ss which could easily be switched to gears but neither of the frames are really what I’m after. The salsa is looking very tempting so may have to investigate further.
Cheers

Dialled Love/Hate came with a mech hanger at one time.

Slidey Inbred is an easily singlespeedable frame. I could change mine over in 5 mins. Leave the shifter & chain guide brackets on, full length outer on the mech, geared wheel & longer chain ready to go on.
If you want something posh, a SIR.9 is lovely & just as easy to change over if you leave the gear hanger dropout on.

In true singletrack fashion I will recommend what I ride, but only because I built it for the same reasons!

I have a horizontal dropout 29er One One Inbred. It has a mech hanger so it can run a rear mech for gears, but you don’t need a tensioner for SS. Brake calliper in inside the seat/chain stays so clearance for disk crakes if you want to run pannier bike packing won’t be an issue.

Running mine rigid, but you could stick anything between 80 and 120mm of bounce up front if you like.