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I also want to commute with a set of skinny tired wheels every now and then. Not sure about fork choice. Single or double ring? Drops or flats? 29" or 700cc? MTB or road for brakes and drivetrain? If anyone's done something similar, would love be to hear your thoughts and recommendations.
I have a similar "need" for a commuter and have currently set-up my Escapade like this (used to be drop bar):
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It's probably too short and / or has my body weight too far back, but it rides surprisingly well. I've built it up with 600mm flat bars, an Alfine 39T chainset, Deore/Zee 1x10 11-36T and Hope/DT wheels rolling on 37c tyres.
I'm interested to see what else people have come up with. There don't appear to be many flat bar non-suspension corrected frame out there (Genesis CdF, Roadrat and Salsa Marrakesh spring to mind), so I'd be keen to see how an On One Inbred 29 is adapted.
I've just built a franken-bike myself, pretty much just for towpath mileage.
Old cross frame and wheelset now built up with bull horns and aero bars. Selcof on sale from Planet X.
I went for bar end shifters as running V brakes which were going spare, 10 speed shifter on an old 9 speed XT GS mech that was also in the spare parts bin.
52-36 semi-compact road chainset, 12-28 cassette.
On-one BSC Gravel Road tyres, 700 x 33 or 40 tyres were £15 each for, nice light mixed use tyre. 33 fitted as using Mavic Open Pro rims.
Nice build Ben. Do you find the gear range enough for bashing out road distance and to climb well too? Can CX drop bar brakes/gears mix with MTB mechs?
I wanted to do the same with an old 26" frame for a general do it all bike and intention of riding it at the Dirty Reiver. Being a 26" non disc frame and wanting 700c wheels it turned into a bit of a headache...and a little more expensive than intended. But it kept me busy. First proper ride on it tomorrow. First little ride was difficult to judge properly as I was hungover, it seemed to wander around the road but was great off road.
Nice whippersnapper. What drivetrain components and ratios did you use?
Trailrider Jim - Member
Nice build Ben. Do you find the gear range enough for bashing out road distance and to climb well too? Can CX drop bar brakes/gears mix with MTB mechs?
The 39T x 11-32T gear range is fine for my inclined commute and around town, although I definitely spend more time in the smaller sprockets. With drop bars and MTB gears, it depends: Shimano 9sp is all compatible, but 10sp drop bar shifters will only work with a 9sp MTB rear mech. You can get Tiagra 10sp and 105 11sp stuff with an 11-32 cassette and long cage mechs, so there's no real need to mix road and MTB kit unless you have existing parts.
I was just really seeing whether I could adapt the Escapade as my commuter / urban hack / occasional tourer, rather buy a new frame. So far, so good though. 🙂
Drivetrain I managed to use the spares box except for the single ring. That is a 38t superstar ring on an old polished lx crankset. It has a 10 speed 11-36 cassette. It's probably a little low geared for big road rides but fine off road. I used a clutch mech which meant shifters were a bit of an issue. Microshift make dynasys compatible shifters although I struggled to find the bar end version which is what I originally wanted.