damerell

( Big picture )

This is the old bike I scrounged out of a friend's garage, realised was a stupid bike for a fixed conversion, and now has a new lease of life as a 650B 5-speed (with the S5 steel-shelled Sturmey Archer hub).

I've made a few obvious-in-retrospect discoveries, like that a caliper brake has to have some play so a fork crown mounted light bracket needs a nut between it and the brake. Also the seatpost's too short (and, of course, the replacement I've got to go on is about a mile long for silly compact frames); drilling a hole through a steel mudguard from before the dawn of time takes a while; tan sidewalls and mucky fingers don't go together...

But it goes, and it's a nice change from the regular tourer or the Brompton, and I hope it's not too pinchable given the age and batteredness of the frame - supposing chavs don't recognise SONs, anyway. Also, the chainring is a pleasantly alarming colour.