The joy of a pub bike

The trick is making a bike that looks shit but is functionally spot on. Old alu mtb frame, rigid forks, gears and brakes all well adjusted. My latest iteration has an old silent rear hub and it's great, chilled commuting.

I used to live in the middle of nowhere, everything was walking distance (corner shop, pub etc)

I'm going to have to take issue with your definition of 'middle of nowhere'  - went to visit my pal last year at his new gaff - his nearest shop is almost a 4hr round trip drive 🙂

Not an alu mtb, but certainly rigid. And looks terrible but rides like a dream (until you reach a hill).

Probably around 4000km on this bike, core components still haven't skipped a beat.

I'm looking at a 90s MTB as a pub beater bike but already I'm dreaming up ways to mod it, powdercoat, drop bar conversion, canti's to Vbrakes....

Not sure it'll be a beater for long! 😁

Now't wrong with V brakes or canti's - just need the right pads. Got a 90's MTB but it's not a pub bike - I don't leave it anywhere other than locked up in a secure bike parking at work, or my garage. My son left it in the side garden at weekend - I was 75 miles away - saw it in the garden on CCTV - phoned him, he'd forgot he'd moved it out the garage, but was 50 miles away by then. Fortunately he got a mate to come round and put it in the back garden. I'd be livid if it got knicked - had it over 30 years and done Snowdon on it. It's my 'work' bike.

Not so sure a 'pub' bike would sit with me as I'd be tarting it up !

I don't buy into the "i won't be bothered if it gets nicked" thing. Sure, it's probably less likely to get stolen if there are other options available but on its own they'll 'ave away. With any bike there's going to emotional attachment, getting it just right, curing all those squeaks and rattles, the wheel might be crap but you've you've spent a couple housr regreasing and replacing the wheel bearings and perfecting the cup and cone "tension" etc etc. The more you ride it the more attached you become.

If my pub/commute bike got nicked I'd be annoyed. Probably because of the cost of a bus ticket home and then the scramble to assemble another hack bike out of worn out bits i've kept hold of.

I can’t wait for pub bike season 2023
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My pub bike is nearly rusted out of commission sadly, every nip to the shops could be frame-fatal. I have its replacement but it's almost too nice to use for pub duties.

Now also has front porter and rear pannier racks since that photo. Started off as a £100 beater but as klunk said, you fix things, fit your prefered contact points, build wheels, fit mudguards that don't rattle, wire in a dynamo, do thousands of miles. I'd be gutted if it got nicked!

V brakes are fine, just not as maintenance free as discs. Decent pads definitely help.

I had a 1990 ish Muddy Fox hybrid for many years for this purpose. My eldest adopted it as his school bike and totalled it at the start of the school summer holidays.

Thanks to his grandad the replacement is a flat bar converted Dawes super galaxy from the back of his shed that looks tatty as flip but is actually a really nice bike but ultra uncool.

I no longer have a pub bike but there is an old Schwinn in the shed and a dmr single speed kit in a box...

Now’t wrong with V brakes or canti’s

In a box no, on a bike very much yes.

Cantis are a pain, good v brakes (like CC direct curve) are fine in most situations.

Pub bike.

My old Ti 26er, now running singlespeed.

[url= https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/49501992407_18b7dfebc1_k.jp g" target="_blank">https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/49501992407_18b7dfebc1_k.jp g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://flic.kr/p/2iqjDHH ]1060341[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/druidh2000/ ]Colin Cadden[/url], on Flickr

Are shoppers allowed in this thread? Not actually used it yet.

Are shoppers allowed in this thread? Not actually used it yet.

There'll likely be a pub near/on the way to/from the shops so I think you're good. Nice looking functional bike by the way. How did you do the front mudguard stays?

The joy of a pub where you can safely leave your bike

Are shoppers allowed in this thread? Not actually used it yet.

Truth be told, I've not actually used the pub bike to go to a pub yet. It's for shopping/commuting/nipping round to see people etc.

I'd be annoyed if it got nicked, but not nearly as annoyed compared to my nice bikes.

There's some surprisingly nice bikes here, disappointing lack of rattle-can specials

I built a sort of pub bike with the added bonus of it being a fixie so harder to ride away, also harder to ride away after I'd had a few pints of cider 😮

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My old pub bike is very similar to Mr Overshoot's but with the addition of rust, rack, tatty pannier and mudguards. It reached it's peak when I was looking it up in town and a dodgy looking geezer walked past and said "why are you locking that up? No-one is going to nick that". It actually rides like a dream - if I come back from a long ride on another bike and need something from the shops I'll hop on it and it feels so much more comfortable.
Best thing is leaving it unlocked outside a shop if I can still see it, just in case some scrote tries to ride away with it, but comes a cropper because it's fixed wheel.

@garage-dweller..
It’s one of these…..11690 Stays VELOFLEXX 65.
I melted holes in the mudguard and cable tied it on. No rattles or rubs. Quality stuff.
If you see them cheap they are the bolt on version rather than the ones with rubber bands.

In the process of building this as a pub/shopping bike. I'd be gutted if it was stolen.

I had one when i graduated, used to use it for getting around for about 5 years, an Emmelle MTB/hybrid in flouro pink that cost me 20-25 quid to buy and saved me thousands in taxis and buses.
Used to sometimes get too drunk to ride home, so i'd leave it locked up in town and come back and collect it in the morning, err, at lunchtime.

Then it got stolen. So i bought another similar piece of junk.

Then spotted the stolen one a couple of weeks later in the very early hours of a saturday morning, and rode it home.

Then spent two days looking for my D lock before i realised i'd left it with the new beater, locked to a railing in the city centre.

My current beater is an inbred, possibly the worst bike i've ever had the misfortune to own. But it's 10km or forest tracks and darkness to the nearest pub, so it rarely gets used for that.

My son has the right idea. His commuter/pub bike has dodgy tandem adaptation. Taxi!...

I hate to say it, but some of those bikes look too good to be left out where a scrote could take a shine to them. My commuter looks a bit tatty (the old shit tape on the fram to stop rubs gives it a certain something, as do the cableties holding on the bordged mudguards), but it's functionally perfect and I would be gutted if some little shit took it.

I like Matt's lads bike. I can't see any issues with that WHATSOEVER after a few pints 🙂

My pub bike is far too nice really. But our local (5 miles away from me) pub has been our night riding venue for years and years, we have a chunky lock stationed out the back, attached to an old mill wheel. Riding back is always fun, there's definitely a limit on how many beers you can have even going home on all the back roads!

I don’t buy into the “i won’t be bothered if it gets nicked” thing. Sure, it’s probably less likely to get stolen if there are other options available but on its own they’ll ‘ave away. With any bike there’s going to emotional

100% my old commuter / pub bike was a bike from the tip, built a fixed rear wheel a saddle from spares box, added full guards new tape asome old spds. Cost ~£250 in total I recall 14 year ago. I put over 20k miles (~25kmiles but I stopped counting) on that bike and when the frame finally died I was upset. Kept it for nostalgia!

I'm not seeing any proper 'pub' bikes here, all are far too nice.

Genuine shitter all parts from spares box. Tell a lie I had to buy cranks £19.99 off eBay.

Such a comfy frame(work commuter/pub/errand bike

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Here’s mine, a slightly rusty Kona Paddywagon, it’s got a new drivetrain and the drops have been swapped for some sunline risers from the spares pile

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I paid £62.25 for the bike, I’ve spent around £50 on parts for it (not including the bars, grips and pedals from the spares box) so not super cheap but also not overly expensive. I’d still be gutted if it was stolen though as I’ve really fallen for it!

I’m not seeing any proper ‘pub’ bikes here, all are far too nice.

That's the thing, however they start out the normal trickle-down* of tidy parts from the "proper" bikes means they end up being something quite different. My '94 rigid runaround had now got an XT disc brake on a Fox Fork, in a CK headset, HOPE, Thomson, RF Turbines...

*Not in the Truss-o-nomics sense.

Um, well this is the bike I ride to the pub on, I realise a pub bike should be rubbish, but frankly why spoil the pleasure of riding to the pub by riding something shit?

Also my commuter, shopper and will happily put in a shift as a low-gnar gravel bike, (tyres a bit slick and mudguards are too close to the wheels for actual mud really).

I love my pub bike! I bought the frame and forks from the classifieds a few years ago. It's an old Genesis Day One with scorch marks around at the bottom of the seat tube where someone has used a blowtorch to remove a seized BB, and similar marks at the rear dropouts, as well as loads of dings. Most of the rest is from the parts bin, apart from the On One Geoffs and Ergon grips. It's a lovely bike to ride, and the Pizza rack is great. I've had a hand operation recently which makes it hard to use the left brake, so had my SRAM Automatix with a coaster brake built up into a wheel. It helps me to stop, but I'll probably go back to the original SS wheel once my hand is working properly again.

If anyone has one of these frames knocking around in a medium please let me know - I'd love to build up an Alfine version for more distant pubs 🙂

My son has the right idea. His commuter/pub bike has dodgy tandem adaptation. Taxi!…

Fairly often see someone riding around Göteborg with an old butchers bike where the large low front loadspace has the one of those orange school chairs trimmed down and bolted/welded to it. Usually has a mate sat on it carrying beer or pizza. Or both.

If you want really dodgy, a mate fell off their pub bike once (v.v.v.v. drunk) and dumped it behind the house for several months while a) hand healed b) winter happened.
Came back to it to find the stem had been knocked off centre by a handful of degrees and was now impossible to move as it'd spent 6 months being rained on.

So we got a 6 foot piece of scaffolding pipe and bent the handlebars to where they needed to be, while leaving the stem crooked.
That was early noughties. The bike is still being used today, only thing that's been changed since then is the tubes.

@zippykona

interested to know what headset you used on that frame? looks like we got the same bargain from eBay...

If anyone has one of these frames knocking around in a medium please let me know – I’d love to build up an Alfine version for more distant pubs 🙂

Damn, the bike that my nice Trek up there replaced was a medium DayOne. I even had it set up with flat bars and a 3 speed/coaster Nexus wheel.

If you want really dodgy, a mate fell off their pub bike once (v.v.v.v. drunk)

I once tried to give a mate in a similar state a pub bike lift home. He couldn't even manage to sit on the child's trailer bike I attempted to carry him on!

godzilla
Free Member
I can’t wait for pub bike season 2023

That Pinnacle is hot. MTB GRAVEL GEO DH!

This is mine. My dad won it when he bought a washing machine, he's about 4 inches shorter than me so it's a bit small, I added the rack and shopping basket. Also has crappy panniers most of the time.

I've spent zero on it. And would be annoyed if it got nicked.

https://postimg.cc/1V1CynXQ

Oh FFS - why won't it post the sodding image?!

Anyway - rattle-can, matt black Pinnacle. Was my station bike.

@gdj001 it was one of these..

https://www.chainreactioncycles.com/brand-x-semi-integrated-44iiss-sealed-headset/rp-prod208220?utm_source=CRM&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=OrderDispatch&utm_content=error

I've not had a 'beater' for a while but I do have a 6 year old Stooge singlespeed that never gets washed. Perfect for any local trips to the leisure centre, Tesco and anything upto a couple of hours ride.

Oh FFS – why won’t it post the sodding image?!

Looks like you used the link tool rather than the image one, that looks like a picture of the sun over some mountains.

It's worth sod all, but had it 25 years from new, so I'd be gutted if it went.

Probably more likely to get nicked out of the shed than outside the local pubs to be fair

[url= https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52054112438_c626bf6051_4k.jp g" target="_blank">https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/52054112438_c626bf6051_4k.jp g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://www.flickr.com/gp/85252658@N05/165VYDC8H5 ]DSC00402[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/85252658@N05/ ]davetheblade[/url], on Flickr

That's an absolute beauty. 😍

How's that Kona in such good nick after 25 years?

I've had bikes less than a week old look more worn than that.

Love the green.

@zippykona cheers, ordered

Some of these bikes look quite fancy. Not sure I’d leave some of them outside a pub round our way.

I have a very tatty Triumph folding bike (think it’s a a Traffic Master from sometime in the 70’s). It’s rusted solid so doesn’t fold anymore but the 3 speed Sturmey Archer gears still work and the 20” whitewall tyres are a bit cracked and balding.

Found in the back of parent’s barn. I think my mum bought it new in the 70s.

No one wants to nick it.

Looks like this bike but imagine it living in a barn for 25 years with no love
Triumph traffic master

Failing that I have a very tired Diamondback Sorento I bought in 1998 with seized forks, bald and cracking tyres, rusting steel wheels, about 4 of the 21 gears working, lots of rust and barely 1 brake.
No one even looks at it. To be fair I might stick some old road bike wheels in it and single speed it or turn it into a gravel bike.

That Triumph has a certain charm to it.

@tthew I should have kept quiet - don’t want competition for a second hand Day One frame!
Your Trek looks lovely 🙂

That’s an absolute beauty. 😍

Why thank you 😊

How’s that Kona in such good nick after 25 years?

I used to look after bikes 🤣

It's only been ridden regularly for a short amount of those 25 years, but it earned its stripes - it went down Roych Clough and Jacobs Ladder a couple of times back in the day. The only original components are the frame and those long clear plastic frame protector tubes over the cables on the top tube.

A can of silicone spray does wonders for that fabulous green paint 😉

Ahhh, g'wan then, here's the T800, complete with dexion rack bodge and top tube pad (covering what looks like fire damage)

Frame was a tenner on ebay, it had been in a hedge in Surrey for 15 years. All the ancillaries had to be removed with an angle grinder.

Forks definitely the most expensive bit as I became fixated on adapting it to 700c, everything else has been free.

The chain is XTR, liberated from Brook McDonald's box of post crash spare parts during a particularly drunk Fort William world cup practice day. 😬

It's actually my 'everything within 5 miles bike' so as well as pub trips gets me to work, this one earns money, the rest spend it.

I don’t have many pubs around me since moving to the US but my 2008 Roadrat is now the pub bike.

Occasion steel only club runs, rides with the kids, runs to the shops etc..

Bought for about 450 out of the classifieds around 2011, plenty of commuting done and only put on grips, chains, gears and new balls in the rear hub.

Rust, cables outers are split, grips worn through and a brand no one knows.
Old XT group set and made out of old pipe, it should outlast me.

I bought my pub bike in the Alps while I was out there kayaking. I fancied a bike ride but hiring a bike was north of 50 euro a day, I picked this Motobecane up on fb marketplace for 40 euro, bought a new saddle from Decathlon to replace the solid plastic one then took it for a spin up the Col du Galibier. The brakes are rubbish so it was pretty scary coming back down!
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Some of these bikes look quite fancy. Not sure I’d leave some of them outside a pub round our way.

I'll say. My fave local will let you bring your bike in, which is good of them. so being where it is, there's often a collection of pretty exotic hardware there! Ti and carbon race bikes, custom frames, etc. My bike for locking up outside is a scruffy old Marin hybrid; looks crap, covered in dirt etc, scratched and battered. Has some good parts mind; XTR and Hope hubs, XTR cranks, decent headset, brakes, etc. Runs nicely. That's the main thing. The philosophy is to lock it up near a much nicer looking bike; they'll go for that instead. My attitude s that if it's still there when I come back to it, then it's a bonus. You cant' be getting sentimental over a material object. Its paid for itself countless times over, so although I'd be a bit sad if it did get nicked, it's just a bike at the end of the day.

Love my pub/town/shop/etc bike. Old Specialized Tricross (I think - the SS one they did). Few dents in it and hammerite paint job makes it look about as undesirable as possible with matching (carbon!) fork. Halo SS rear wheel and some generic thing up front, single speed, V brakes, mud guards and On-One OG bars. Keep thinking about chucking a few quid at it like getting a Halo front wheel to match the rear but given I've not even cleaned it in about 4 or 5 years of ownership its probably not worth it. Thats not to say I don't love it though - recently sold my CX bike over this...

Yup, love my pubc/commuter bike. For the last few years it's been an old Rudge Bi-frame (full size folder) that I just thought was a great design and bought for £60 off eBay. It's been folded about half a dozen times. I put drop bars on it and for a while it was a "unique" looking monstercross type thing. Did some big days on the road with slick tyres, and also took it to New Zealand on a work trip and bikepacked down the north island on it, amongst other things.

More recently:

Earning its keep "tidying up" after Arwen (and gaining some firewood in the process):

I'm often tempted to take a nicer bike to the pub, but then I remember that I'll need to carry a lock, whereas there's one attached to my pub bike, and find some lights that are charged, and then take them off and carry them so they don't get nicked, whereas my pub bike has a dynamo, and my nice bike might get nicked...

@didnthurt - it was free, pedals ok and no one is going to nick it (cost me 2 inner new inner tubes).

Basically everything I look for in a pub bike. Bike thieves have actually moved it out of the way to steal a few friends’ bikes at least once. And once some yobbos chucked it in a hedge for fun but apart from that it’s been ignored for several years.

Edit: forgot to paste the images in

Also, yes I did weld some disc tabs and a brace on, and yes I did cut out the brake bridge/chainstay braces to fit a 700c wheel in, and no I haven't got round to finding a 700c fork to go on it, or rebuilding the dynamo into a 700c wheel, so the front is still 26". Reverse mullet.

Also also, the pannier rack seat reminded me of the time I cut up an old chopper-style My Little Princess kids BSO and fitted the seat to my then pub bike (and in fact, only bike). Much fun was had on the way home from various pubs.

Eldest has just got himself a uni/pub bike today and sent me pics.

From what I can gather, any bike left at the end of the academic year is commandeered by the uni, and then sold at the start of term, as seen, for £20, with a recommendation you get it serviced. (I'm guessing anything remotely decent gets dealt with separately)

Apparently this was the only one in his size with two working brakes. Looked very plain in the pics, been either destickered or painted over, but he sent me close ups later - Nexus 7spd rear hub and dynamo front hub. Gears are a bit sticky but if it's just a cable needed or something similar, I reckon he's got a cracking deal there.

@MoreCashThanDash - that’s a genius idea. I bet they have literally shedloads of old bikes just dumped there because people are too lazy to get rid of it/take it home.

Much better than dumping them all.