I have a penchant for Retrobikes.
Especially steel framed HTs.
The thing is 29ers have kind of ruined the 26" thing for me (let's not go into that one on this thread)
I have it in my mind to build a retro 29er .... Bear with me.
Take a modern On One or such like steel frame, remove disc tab, add canti tabs and then build up with my M950 group set currently awaiting a frame.
I have all the bits bar a frame and the 26" wheels would obviously need rebuilding.
Thoughts?
Well if you look really hard you may find a retro 'Big wheeled' bike
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From 1992, the Diamond Back Overdive Comp with 700cc wheels.
Didn't Cleland do 29er's 'back in the day'?
If you keep an eye out a last generation, Surly Karate Monkey frame would be an ideal platform. Quite retro geometry, canti studs included and more fun than a bucket of kittens.
Heres mine - not properly retro as I'm running disks.
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I'd be more inclined to get 18bikes or similar to weld up a 29er with cantis
wwaswas - Member wrote:
"Didn't Cleland do 29er's 'back in the day'?"
Yes Cleland made 700c wheeled off-road bikes based on 700x47c Nokia Hakapeliitta snow tyres from Finland.
I own a 700c Cleland Range-Rider from 1982. Highpath Engineering also made some around 1986-91.
In the early 1980s, Cleland owner Geoff Apps exported quite a few of these "big tyres" to Gary Fisher in the States. It was the rediscovery of some of these old tyres that kick-started the fledgling US 29er movement. Gary Fisher's earlier race experience with early bigger wheeled mountain bikes meant that he was easily persuaded to underwrite the creation of the first WTB Nanoraptor tyre 29er tyre.
So the 29er movement started in England.
Sorry, I mean Finland.*
You could downsize to an early 1980s Tom Ritchey/Mountaibikes, 650b "competition"
http://www.flickr.com/photos/slonie/8008516231/sizes/c/in/photostream/
650b wheeled mountain bikes like this were made by Tom Ritchey, Lennard Zinn, Ross Schafer, and Jim Merz from 1981-1984. They used Nokia Hakkapeliitta tyres suplied by Geoff Apps in England.
Appreciate the history of the 29er and 650b
Here's me last year (read fat) pootling on a Cleland 8)
http://www.retrobike.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=33&t=253560&hilit=Gates
Why not just run with road Avid BB brakes with the canti levers? Sticking with early Hope disc hubs would keep it retro.
Or see if you could get hold of an SE Stout like mine and just take the disc mounts off:
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