"Gags" <gags_44nospamatnospamtpg.com.au> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...
Quoted message said:I am currently looking at a cheap second hand road bike (really large
frame)
that has 27" wheels. I was thinking of buying it and then putting 700c
wheels on it as there is more selection of tyres in the market and I
already
have 700c on my current road bike so I wouldn't have to double up with
spare
tubes.
As I am only planning on having a front brake, I was thinking of getting a
new set of forks that were 700c for the front and simply putting a 700c on
the back. I know that this will result in a fair bit of clearance between
the rear tyre and the bottom bracket but unfortunately I haven't got
enough
cash to fork out on a track frame.
I know that by fitting a 700c front tyre I will lower the front of the
frame
but I am pretty confident that I will be able to still setup the bike
correctly for me by getting the right stem/bar setup.
Should I be worried about the changed geometry having a negative effect on
the overall handling of the bike?? Has anyone else had experience of this
on their own bikes??
Any help will be appreciated.
Gags
Hi Gags,
Being old enough to have 27" wheels the bike should have semi horizontal
dropouts. I'm also guessing that it has a screw on freewheel. So you have
most of the ingredients to turn this into a street fixie. All you need to
add is a 3/32" track cog and get hold of some BMX chainring bolts and get
the rear wheel redished to re-centre the rim on the respaced axle.
If you havent already ready Sheldon Browns article i recommend you do.
http://www.sheldonbrown.com/fixed-conversion.html
With repect to the wheels personally I would just stick with the current 27"
variety. There is no problem getting 27x 1 or 1-1/4" tyres for them and you
can use 700C 19/23 tubes without a problem.
If and only if the brake reach was long enough to properly accommodate a
700C wheel would I consider running 700C wheels. In my own personal case I
toyed with the idea of replacing the 27" rims with 700Cs but wasn't up to
risking wasting cash replacing the forks and rims to acheive this only to
find out that it stuffed up the excellent handling this bike already had.
Now that I have an established love for this bike in it's fixed incarnation
I have decided to replace it's worn out hubs with proper track ones with a
lockring. I am sticking with the 27" rims as I can see no valid reason to
change them at this point in time.
If you are looking at riding this bike on the road don't worry about not
getting a track frame. Firstly you would need to get a braze-ons added for
bottle cages and secondly the geometry of the frame is not as relaxed as a
road bike. There are road specific fixed/ss frames out there but if you are
only testing the water then an old road frame is the way to go.
If you are looking at changing the stem/bar setup consider a bullhorn type
bar with a shorter stem. I and many others find this preferable to dropbars
on our fixies.
I think the changes in bike handling as a result of altering fork length
would have been discussed in some depth in the past in, so a search of this
group or rec.bicycles.tech on google should give you a wide range of
opinions.
I'll see you on Sunday.
Geoff
