Make it last a little longer, Longer with Big Red!

[Cataboo]

Big red is rideable! This was a marin columbus tubing steel mountain bike frame I got off ebay - I stuck a surly steamroller fork on it, and am running 700cs. All my plans to use parts off the surly, sort of fell through after finding out that I couldn't run road cranks on a mountain bike frame. I had a set of carbon cyclocross compact double 44/36 cranks that I managed to make work (a bottom bracket spacer made that work).

One of my complaints with the surly is that my wrists really didn't like flat bars, so I put drop bars on. I was going to use bar end shifters, but there was a spare set of 9 speed 105 shifters in the parts box and since the bike had already ended up with carbon cranks, I kinda figured there wasn't much reason to skimp. Not to mention, I think I'm slightly too gear retarded to use bar end shifters.

So now I have a longer top tube, a more setback seat angle and drop bars. Logistically putting 700cs on a mountain bike wasn't my best idea - but I could have actually bought touring or mountain bike cranks instead of using what I had or bought paul's bmx brakes instead of drilling out the fender attachment spot to make road brakes work on it. Or I coulda just bought a road frame, but there's really a shortage of small steel frames with the top tube, standover, and seat angle I like.

Other than the frame and the fork, I only had to buy a front derailleur, so I can't complain too much

I still need to put racks on it and the rest of that.

The seats been jacked up a bit since these pics:

[Owlie]

Hee, the tires and bar tape look pink in that second picture, though I bet they're red.

Very nice. And very red!

[Cataboo]

The tires haven't stayed as red as they're supposed to be - but they were pretty beat up looking, so I didn't leave them on the surly to sell.

[OakLeaf]

Very nice!

[Bike Chick]

Pretty sharp, Cataboo! I'm amazed at your wrenching skills.

[Cataboo]

I was taking apart the surly last night and doing all the last minute changes to it - so I must have had bikes on the brain when doing to sleep - I bought two bikes to tinker with in a dream.