Have you ever built your own bike or custom?
- Thread starter lawrence281
- Start date
Built my P3 from frame.
I used a combination of new/used parts but got new shifters, cables, deraillurs so I knew it was all good and wasn’t going to have trouble there. New Rival22 stuff is cheap anyway, the shifters were easily the most expensive part.
Headset already installed but I cut the steerer and hammered the star fangled nut in more.
Hardest bit probably routing the cables and getting the housing lengths right for a TT bike. Want to be neat and tidy and not have huge loops. I used an old spoke to help hook the cables inside the frame and guide them down to the B.B.
I used a combination of new/used parts but got new shifters, cables, deraillurs so I knew it was all good and wasn’t going to have trouble there. New Rival22 stuff is cheap anyway, the shifters were easily the most expensive part.
Headset already installed but I cut the steerer and hammered the star fangled nut in more.
Hardest bit probably routing the cables and getting the housing lengths right for a TT bike. Want to be neat and tidy and not have huge loops. I used an old spoke to help hook the cables inside the frame and guide them down to the B.B.
Caporegime
When I was building up my CX bike I used a cadence magnet on the end of a cooking skewer! Necessity is the mother of invention...
Soldato
How did you road test your bikes for safety to make sure nothing is loose etc?
Also, how do people run the break and gear cables inside the main frame? easy to do?
Soldato
Push on the pedals. If you go forwards the gears work.
Pull on the brakes. If you stop the brakes work.
If you end up face-down on the road, something was loose.
Depends on the frame. Some have internal channels for the cables to go in and it's really easy to just push them through. Others dont and it can be very fiddly to get it in the right place. If you buy a new frame, it'll probably come with something already threaded through the frame (like a plastic wire or something) and you just tape your new cables to one end and pull it through.
Soldato
nice one thanks. How long roughly does it take to build a bike from scratch for a novice? a full day you reckon?
A good question. I don't remember going around doing specific checks on each bolt. But since the bike was in its constituent parts to begin with, every bolt had to be tightened by myself and when when I installed anything I ensured that each bolt was tightened to the correct torque. This ensured everything was tight enough.
The frame came with cable liner pre-installed for the read brake so that was easy enough. The derailleurs required a little more effort. I had to feed the sable down the frame and out of a 15mm x 30mm hole at the bottom. A little fiddly as the cable tended to bend away from the hole, but got there in the end.
Associate
mine was like that too, was all easy enough as long as you tighten it all up as you go along. All i did was a quick once over after I had done a few miles, just to make sure that nothing major was loose with the shaking and rattling of the bike in use.
Soldato
Im pretty thorough and used a torque wrench to make sure everything was up to the correct tightness.
My frame came with plastic tubing pushed through the brake cable routing, so you just push the brake cables through the center of the tubing and then pull the tubing through. No gear cables because of eTap
Soldato
Half a day if that if you are mechanically minded. To be fair eTap simplifies things and saves you a fair bit of time in terms of setup (cables and indexing)
Soldato
what is a eTap?
this? https://www.sram.com/sram/road/family/sram-red-etap#sm.00000rg43sgund0yrv121t0mc1chc
this? https://www.sram.com/sram/road/family/sram-red-etap#sm.00000rg43sgund0yrv121t0mc1chc
Caporegime
You can build a bike in a day, easily. Taking one apart and putting it back together is a longer job, but that's a story for another day.
In terms of safety, if you've got it in a stand you can test most things there. If the back wheel turns when the pedals go round then you're off to a good start. Then you pull the brake lever and hopefully it stops. Check the front brake as well. Beyond that it's a question of whether the seatpost or bars are loose, but you can check them by hand.
Inevitably when you first get the bike out on the road, the chain will fall off the top of the chainring or the indexing will be messed up, because these things always seem to be different when you're actually on the bike compared to when it's in a stand.
In terms of safety, if you've got it in a stand you can test most things there. If the back wheel turns when the pedals go round then you're off to a good start. Then you pull the brake lever and hopefully it stops. Check the front brake as well. Beyond that it's a question of whether the seatpost or bars are loose, but you can check them by hand.
Inevitably when you first get the bike out on the road, the chain will fall off the top of the chainring or the indexing will be messed up, because these things always seem to be different when you're actually on the bike compared to when it's in a stand.
Soldato
After a new build or spanner-session, I'll take a bike for a quick spin round the village to make sure all is well. Few progressive brake tests at different speeds, gear changes etc. If anything falls off, it's not far back home to fix it!
Deleted member 11679
D
Deleted member 11679
I built my first bike in the summer, a Planet X London road. to be honest, I used most of the parts that were listed on the site for their full build of the bike, but interchanged parts with knowledge I had already. For instance I was happy putting on different brakes and a different group set, however I purchased the wheels, handlebars and stem as if it were the retail bike they sell. Overall I paid about the same price as their entry level version of the bike, but ended up with equipment on it that would have made it the more expensive model (e.g. mine has disc brakes).
I learnt a ridiculous amount from doing it. Made one or two small mistakes which have cost me about £30 since (spoke protector, need I say more). Overall though, this is the way to go for me now. So much so, I have just finished overhauling my Dads bike for him.
I learnt a ridiculous amount from doing it. Made one or two small mistakes which have cost me about £30 since (spoke protector, need I say more). Overall though, this is the way to go for me now. So much so, I have just finished overhauling my Dads bike for him.
Associate
- Joined
- 7 Nov 2017
- Posts
- 1,901
built my last three bikes up from frames. ghost asx, Dartmoor hornet and transition suppressor. It means I have the spec I want and could resuse parts I already had. only thing I didn't fit was the headset