frood, is that ^ a putty grey longitude?

V brakes in 1994?

The original cantis were Kona ones and were legendarily bad even for cantis. I had HS33’s back in the day but didn’t want to zip tie cables to the newly painted frame. I bought some mega fancy period parallel push brakes (the kind of things that Shimano copied and made brilliant) but they didn’t work very well so just put some modern V’s on, work well!!

core, it is indeed a 2015 longitude, Velocity Rims, Chronicles, 35mm stem and a 1×10 drivetrain with a 42 expander sprocket. Lovely bit of kit and remarkably capable

Looks and sounds brilliant, a keeper that for sure, I bet if a lot of people had one in their fleet it would survive a lot of comings and goings of other bikes!

Not sure if this really counts. It gets used to ride to the shop every once in a while. I bought it for a tenner to use on a pub crawl bike ride thing. I keep meaning to do it up a bit but I can never be arsed. By do it up a bit I mean get a nicer looking saddle, sort the brakes out, singlespeed it properly and get a quill stem adaptor so I can use something longer and wider. Would probably make it fine for all the local bridleways at any rate.

Soma B-Side with Niner forks (on long term loan, thanks Max!)

About the longest I’ve owned a bike.
These fangled plus size tyres suit it a treat.
I’ve a 2015 Five in the garage but it’s not seeing a lot of use since those tyres went on.

[url=https://flic.kr/p/wT6hqS]IMAG0135[/url] by pten2106, on Flickr

Frood – you say the Longitude is capable? In what way?

Have seen someone in my town nipping around on a Longitude, need to chase them down and have a chat really!

link – imgur rubbish

After realising that I can have a variety of rigids for the price and maintenance of a full bouncer I’ve got a selection. this, imho, is the pretty one:

double post

julioflo I got myself the 19.5″ frame with a 35mm stem, it’s slack, it’s got wide bars on and big tyres. My fastest time (KOM atm) up one of the local training climbs I’ve got (540m climb in 5.8km) is set on it, yet it’s quite happy getting chucked down stuff (though I will refrain from taking it to the golfy – I have the codeine for that) With the massive rubber it steamrollers over things.
It’s also happy to get loaded up with an anything cage on each fork leg, a bar bag and a carrier on the rear and trudge out some miles – I bought a set of Jones bars to put on it for some longer stuff (maybe the puffer) but haven’t got around to trying them out on it yet.
It’s been doing more miles than everything except the commuter since I got it and won’t be leaving my fleet any time soon

Currently….
Ritchey Team Comp

FAT Chance Fat Chance

Surly Pugsley

Cotic Soul (don’t really like this build and considering bounce and gears)

And the Rooster is nearly there, next week hopefully and a retro Ibis that has been taking an age to complete. TBH the Retros get very rare outing these days. I’d love a Stooge as well.

Nice Pugsley

My old Kona from earlier this afternoon.
(Clearly a bit removed from original spec).

My Ridgeback Storm. Bit of a gate, but I like it

[url=https://flic.kr/p/xDFMuq]Ridgeback Storm[/url] by Colin, on Flickr

Slight thread hijack – i’m after a salsa cromoto 29er fork….this would be the thread to ask!

OCB – what’s the kona like with that fork, looks a fair bit longer than a period project 2?

From a trip this week:

In the wild…

[url=https://flic.kr/p/xrg4xc]bike[/url] by molgrips, on Flickr

I could bang on about how it’s pure and simple and how suspension is for marketing led sheep, but I won’t. It’s bumpy as ****. First ride out on my local loop I set off downhill at my usual pace and almost broke both my wrists and the bike. Bastard uncomfortable. It’s definitely no replacement for a FS.

However taken on its own merits it’s an absolutely stunning bike for its purpose. I built it for the South Wales Valleys, where long epics (if you start in Cardiff) mean 10 or 15 miles of road, some trails over the mountains followed by more road home. And it’s superb at this – steep head angle means super sharp handling and the riding position is the perfect balance of efficiency and handling. Don’t have to worry about being too stretched out because my weight’s not over boingy suspension forks.

After 7 months or so I’ve figured out how to ride it – standing up, moving around a lot and heaving on those wide bars in a higher gear. The opposite of how you ride a long travel FS.

Frood – Thanks for the feedback. Glad to hear you are throwing it down stuff. Sounds great to me. Very tempted by a Longitude (if I can find one) or a Stooge. Both sound like a more fun ride than current racy 29er I have

What is this? I clearly have a thing for beach cruser style frames

My inbred ss rigid. Have since replaced the weird swept back bars to some easton havens. Great little bike for my wet commutes.

Molgrips, what forks have you got on the salsa? Looks great, I love that red!

thepodge, looks a lot like a trek sawyer

Thanks but it doesn’t look quite so good in that pic. Maybe I should look for an old one and get it painted

Molgrips, what forks have you got on the salsa? Looks great, I love that red!

Those are carbon Firestarters. The red incidentally looks much better close up, it’s sparkly metallic 🙂