Basic questions on old frame from a MTBing 'road newbie'...

The BIG GT

Hi all,

I have been a MTB-only rider for some years and haven't ridden a road bike since I was 18 (the usual story after getting first car!) but when my Dad moved recently the old bike was unearthed and I was thinking of restoring it enough to use it again (and join my 3 MTBs!)...

However, despite being pretty knowledgeable in the ways of off-road bikes and components, I know next to nothing about road kit so could you help?

The bike is a Raleigh Reynolds 531 frame and forks, in blue and white, from (I think) around the late 70s/early 80's (I bought it 2nd-hand in about 1983-4). It has 'Raleigh' engraved into the flattened, 'sliced' sections of the seatstays where they meet the seattube/toptube and seems to have eyelets for mudguards and/or panniers both front & rear. There are no wheels as my Dad asked a bike shop (1 or 2 years ago) what he could do with the tubular-rimmed wheels (the tyres were perished) and was told that they were no longer made and were scrap!!

Is this a frame worth persevering with? Will it take my now substantially heavier lump safely? I'm guessing that the cassette was a 6 or 7 speed? The rear mech is a Shimano600 SIS model, in excellent condition (as is the chain!), would this hint at the gears it had? The shifters are obviously non-indexed and are levers on the downtube.

It seems to be decent kit (for the early 80s!) so it might be worth it? Also the front dropouts are spaced for a 100mm hub which I expected but the rear is 125mm (inside to inside) which seemed too small, or is this just how road wheels are?!

All info/opinion gratefully received!

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Dorian Gray

Tubular tyres are still made, and in fact, used by pro racers and enthusiasts everywhere! The wheels might have been heavy but you could easily have found tyres for them.

The rear spacing will be for 126 mm hubs, which are limited to 6- or 7-speed. Today's bicycles with 10-speed cassettes have hubs of 130 mm width. Steel frames can usually be widened by "cold setting" which you could look into if you want to upgrade to a modern groupset. There's even a decent chance you could just spring the stays open to fit a 130 mm hub, though I wouldn't really advise that.

lateralus

alternatively, a lot of people use these frames to build up singlespeeds or fixed gear bikes - have a look in the "Special Interests" forum in the Road section and you'll find plenty of info about this.

The BIG GT

Dorian,
Thanks for the info about the hub widths. I had a funny feeling that I'd be looking for 6/7 speed wheels. I am doing this on a shoestring (the same as my MTBs!) so want to keep the original front and rear mechs, chainset and even chain (as good as new) and thought that due to their age, I'd be limited to 6/7 speed at the rear.

Having trouble finding straight and true 2nd-hand wheels that will fit as most wheels for sale are 9/10 speed. I hope that I can find the seatpost as I've no idea of the size and don't think that I can measure to 0.2mm accuracy!

Lateralus,
Thanks but I want to keep as much of it as I can for both money-saving and looking-retro reasons! I also like gears and am not sure a fixie for my '1st' road bike would be a great idea. I don't get the big SS/fixie thing (in MTBs either) as you have gears for a reason, why get rid of them?

It's like riding with the brakes on, you're just making it more difficult for yourselves!!

Cheers
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John Stevenson

The BIG GT wrote:

Dorian,
Thanks for the info about the hub widths. I had a funny feeling that I'd be looking for 6/7 speed wheels. I am doing this on a shoestring (the same as my MTBs!) so want to keep the original front and rear mechs, chainset and even chain (as good as new) and thought that due to their age, I'd be limited to 6/7 speed at the rear.

Having trouble finding straight and true 2nd-hand wheels that will fit as most wheels for sale are 9/10 speed. I hope that I can find the seatpost as I've no idea of the size and don't think that I can measure to 0.2mm accuracy!

If it's butted 531 it will almost certainly be 27.2mm.

Bending 126mm drop-outs to 130 mm is trivial (call it cold-setting if you want to sound posh, but it's bending). You get a length of 2 x 4, lever the drop-out with the seat tube as fulcrum and gently bend. Move it a tiny bit at a time and stop when you get to 128mm spacing. Then do the other side. If you want to be fussy, get a bike shop to correct the alignment of the dropout faces for you with a set of these:

You could then drop in an 8/9/10-speed rear wheel. A 7-speed cassette should fit with a spacer behind it.

The BIG GT

Thanks for the advice.

Another (probably obvious) thing: I assume that if I want to run 23mm tyres that I must have a wheel that's no more than 23mm across? I expect that you can't run 25mm tyres on a 23mm rim?

Also, do road rims have a standard size, as most advertised wheels do not give width? On MTBs the wheels vary greatly so most people specify this when selling or advertise by the useage, i.e. (roughly) Race XC means 17mm+ , XC means up to 23, Freeride means 27mm+, DH means 29mm+, etc.

Actually as I typed that I thought that supposedly XC wheels can be as low as 17mm, yet they are nowhere near as skinny as road whees!?? Does this mean that road wheels are measured by the tyres that fit it instead as MTB (xc thru DH) tyres can vary from 1.5" to over 3"!!

Thanks again for your help!
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The BIG GT

Anyone?

Should I ask these questions in the know-how section to get more responses or does this count as Beginner stuff? :?


Maybe I should not have admitted to being a MTBer? :oops:

Cheers,

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acorn_user

Internal rim width is usually 13mm for "road rims". You can get wider rims too, which are usually called "trekking" or "touring". I would counsel against old wheels which took a five speed block, since these would have to be redished, and would probably have steel rims. You should be able to find something decent on ebay. Why don't you search for Campagnolo in the wheels sections and find a nice wheelset with 1980's vintage Chorus or Record hubs? Cheaps as chips now.....
This is probably know how though..

formerlyknownasbonj

The BIG GT wrote:

I also like gears and am not sure a fixie for my '1st' road bike would be a great idea. I don't get the big SS/fixie thing (in MTBs either) as you have gears for a reason, why get rid of them?
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EXACTLY my son, right attitude.