Can I to convert my tourer to a fixie?

Keiron Curtis

Is it possible to convert my Venture GT 27 speed touring bike to a fixed wheel style?Sadly, I don't like all those gears,and,though it's anathema to some of you experts,I prefer internal gears anyway,so I would even consider converting it to such a system.Primarily it's for commuting use,currently the bike is stuck in the shed looking very sorry for itself,and it seems such a waste.Hope you all can make some suggestions to help.

redddraggon

You need horizontal dropouts for a fixie,

however for singlespeed vertical dropouts and a chain tensioners can do it.

Lif30057840

its possible on vertical drops either by spending a shedload of money on 1 of those hubs with off-centre adjustment thangs (starts counting till sum1 posts with a correct name :P ) or by changing sprocket/chainring size till u get proper chain tension.

Sea_Green_Incorruptible

I played around with the idea of a fixie conversion on vertical dropouts but it just ended up too difficult or expensive - particulalry as I'd vowed to do the conversion as cheaply as possible using bits from my existing bikes as far as I could.

The single speed conversion actually proved to be pretty easy though. After a lot of messing around with sprocket sizes and chain length I even ended up with a chain tension that I could live with. It's still probably a bit too tight, but nothing too bad as the freewheel can still spin freely. In the end, all I ended up spending on the bike itself was £15 on a spacer set for the rear cartridge (though I probably spent an additional £30 or so on tools like crank pullers and cartridge removers). And even then you could ride it with the old sprockets on if you didn't mind how it looked.

Well worth doing though. I don't actually use it for my commute (too far and too many hills) but its great for just cruising around on with the family - particularly on cycle paths and the like. So smooth and silent, and my conversion is very very light. Pics below if you're interested:

[By the way, for loads of detailed advice, try posting this question on the specialist interests section of the road forums... ]