What to do with this hardrock

Gibbo3771

So I cleared out the shed and found my father in-laws Specialized Hardrock 1996, it is still in working order.

I stripped it down to the bare frame, cleaned everything as best as I could, the rear cassette and jockey wheels had SO MUCH mud and grass in them they struggled to freewheel without weight on them lol.

What can I do with this bike? It is full rigid, the frame is fairly scratched, the stem/handlebars are scratched/scraped to hell tbh. The wheels seem a bit funny, they move left and right by around 1/2mm despite being tight and the rear brake has no pad left on it lol.

Safe to say, he has used it quite a bit!

After cleaning it up I took it a little ride around the block and it feels pretty good considering it's age .

What am I best to do with this? On a budget? I want to keep it rigid which obviously make it cheaper as well.

I was thinking getting a rigid fork that supports disc brakes, I have old mechanic ones off my Carrera and replacing both wheels + cassette + front drive for all single speed.

Is this frame worth putting a little money into? Think it can do trails/offroad pretty well given its era?

97th choice

Have you tried asking the same question here?

http://www.retrobike.co.uk/forum/

cooldad

I wouldn't bother. Got one lying around - very heavy. I also have an old Rockhopper, the weight difference is dramatic.
I would just spend as little as possible to get it moving.

Gibbo3771

cooldad wrote:

I wouldn't bother. Got one lying around - very heavy. I also have an old Rockhopper, the weight difference is dramatic.
I would just spend as little as possible to get it moving.

See the weight was my main concern, that's why I was going to keep it rigid + get it single gear, try and make it light as possible without spending a ton of money.

I mainly want it to look nice and run well, the frame and that can all be spray painted without spending a lot of money.

Is it really not worth putting say £100 into it, new forks, wheels and single speed? Surely that would cover it if it was all entry level gear?

cooldad

Don't know, my Rockhopper cost me a tenner all in, and the Hardrock was in a skip.

Gazlar

Whack some new pads on it, clean it and lube it, stick some semi slicks on it and use it as a commute bike, you can make it single speed quite easily by not changing gear

unless you really want to make a good retro project out of it, just get it running as cheap as possible

The Rookie

I have 2 1997 bikes, the worse condition farme is my hack/pub/grocery shopping bike, the better I have kept as a retro MTB, only mod is decent tyres.

cat_with_no_tail

Kill it, kill it with fire!

In all seriousness though, just clean it up a bit, get some new pads, re-do the wheel bearings. Assuming the gears work ok, leave it as is, and as suggested above use it as a pub hack / communter.

njee20

In all seriousness though, just clean it up a bit, get some new pads, re-do the wheel bearings. Assuming the gears work ok, leave it as is, and as suggested above use it as a pub hack / communter.

This.

You'll spend a silly amount of money if you're not careful, and it'll still be crap.