A new bike for the missus

fivethirtyonepm

Having built the missus a mountain bike last summer (Giant Talon frame with various parts swapped out to make it substantially lighter), she has been nagging at me to build her a road bike. As she is quite short (5’1”), finding something off the shelf for sensible money was not really an option (the Giant/Specialized et al options are lovely, but weigh tons and have a pants spec unless you pay millions), I decided to build from scratch. This is what I ended up with:-

Ambrosio Rapide Compact R81 frame – size small
Ambrosio A8C carbon fork
Cane Creek integrated headset
Planet X ultra-light seatpost clamp
Braze-on front mech clamp

Shimano WH-R500 wheelset
Skewers (pink!)
Schwalbe Ultremo R1 folding tyres (pink!)
Ultralight butyl tubes

Deda Logo 70mm non-oversize stem
3TTT Morpheus 38cm non-oversize bars
Velo cork tape (pink!)
Token stem top cap (pink!)
Maxm carbon inline seatpost
Madison Prima ladies road saddle
Shimano A530 SPD pedals
Specialized bottle cage
Alloy (pink!) bottle cage bolts

Shimano 105 5603 triple groupset
170mm cranks
Specialized STI reach-adjuster shims (for small hands!)
Tekro calipers with Halt Gooey (pink!) cartridge pads
Jagwire ProRacer cable set (pink!)
Alloy chainring bolts (pink!)

Future upgrades will be a sub 1,500g set of wheels, a lighter chainset, lighter pedals (once she gains her confidence with SPD’s), lighter quick releases (Planet X Ti-sticks) and lighter stem. This combination should save precisely 1kg (2.2lbs), bringing the total weight down to circa 16lbs. But for the time being, there is no hurry.

In terms of build cost, all-up it was nicely under £600 which isn’t bad considering that everything bar the frame & forks (ebay steal) and wheelset (from the spares box) was brand new.

I just hope she rides it now!

Harry182

V nice. Mrs 531PM is one lucky lady.

Never thought I'd hear myself saying 'I like pink' but I think it's working really well in juxtaposition to the understated raw alu frame and black decals + groupset.

PS - Please let me know how your missus gets on with the 70mm stem. I was loath to go shorter than 90mm on Mrs Harry's bike for theoretical handling reasons but now think she feels slightly overstretched on the hoods.

Lord Jimmy 7th

is that the token bling kit i spy on there? looks good for the pink in contrast to the aluminium though, and the pink tyres work with it!

robbo2011

Well if she is anything like mine, having spending the best part of £1k on a nice road bike, she'll ride it twice and that will be it.

fivethirtyonepm

re. Token bling kit.... i might be mad, but i'm not mad enough to spunk away the best part of £70 on bling! lol...

the stem cap is token (about £6), the chainring bolts, bottle cage bolts and qr skewers were all of £22.00... job done, okay without the jockey wheels (which would have been overkill on this build and tbh, the standard shimano jockey wheels will run better), but at a fraction of the price of the bling kit.

i like nice bikes, but i'm tighter than a tight thing! lol... am particularly proud of the frame (genuine 1kgs on postal scales!) and carbon fork for just £98.00 via fleabay.

petemadoc

Nicely done

I bought my Mrs a road bike last Summer, she's only 5,1 too so I went through a similar buying process. I considered all sorts of weird options like buying frame to take 650c wheels, maybe even a TT frame, then in the end I found a small 2010 Bianchi for £550.

The problem I found was that as frame sizes got smaller the top tube length didn't change but in the end I accepted it was just better to accept some toe overlap, I think her frame has a 50.5 TT length and she doesn't look stretched out on it at all. What TT does this one have?

And after all that careful consideration, she's ridden it only a handful of times. To be fair it's since the weather had gone sh1t and she says she'll be back in the saddle come spring, we'll see.

Love the pink cables BTW

petemadoc

Here she is



A few changes since this photo

Lord Jimmy 7th

oh yeah, i see the jockey wheels not on there lol, the pink parts of it look awesome though!

clarkey cat

Well if she is anything like mine, having spending the best part of £1k on a nice road bike, she'll ride it twice and that will be it.

amen to that.