DIY Build of a CX Type bike - Help with Spec

wytco0

Hi All, I have been looking at CX bikes mainly as a winter road bike but also to allow me to ride trails, nothing very difficult just gravel tracks and the odd bit of off road. Trouble is I am short 5ft 4in (162cm) and not may makers seem to cater for my size.

However during my research I cam accross this frame: http://www.kinesisbikes.co.uk/technical/decade/tripster-atr

It looks like an ideal match both for what I want to use the bike for and also my size. Kinesis do also sell it as a built bike but I thought it might be fun to build my own using just the frameset. I have not built a bike before but over the years I have changed or repaired most bits of my bikes and so I think I know how they are put together. I also know that its unlikely to be cheaper to build my own.

However I don't know what bits would work well with this frame so I am looking for some ideas about all the other parts I would need to build a bike based on this kinesis frame. As far as budget goes I would like to good quality but I also want to get good value, I dont know if its possible but I would like to think that £1.5k on top of the frame proce should enable me to end up with a decent bike.

Thoughts etc appreciated.

samsbike

Firstly I would get one of the discounted 105 groupsets from merlin/ ribble.

Then some nice wheels from Ugo. Should have enough let for the finishing kit.

jomoj

why not join in this thread:
viewtopic.php?f=40114&t=12969731

pretty much covering what you're interested in

simonj

samsbike wrote:

Firstly I would get one of the discounted 105 groupsets from merlin/ ribble.

Then some nice wheels from Ugo. Should have enough let for the finishing kit.

Work out what chainrings you want (50/34 or 46/36 etc) before committing to a whole groupset. You don't need the brakes anyway if you're going the disc/canti/v-brake route, so buying a crank you can't use all of may also add waste. If you want 50/34 then a whole groupset may still work out best route even if you have to sell the brakes. If you don't need a full groupset, then many places do a bundled gear kit, so levers and derailleurs, which may be a good option if not needing the brakes. Shimano tend to do Road 50/34 etc cranks series and keep CX 46/36 cranks seperate and do not mix two two, that's not to say you can't put road rings on a cx crank and vice versa, it just may not look the best and matching. Also not sure if you went Ultegra 6800 11 speed crank if you can get 46/36 rings to fit. Others tend to use the same crank but just have seperate rings, so an SL-K crank for instance can be 46/36 or 50/34 if 110 BDC, but not 53/39 as that's 130 BCD. The new K-Force crank can be all on 110 BCD.

Next choose wheels - H Plus Son handbuilts or Kinesis CX Disc may be a good options, but there's more, although limited for discs. If you already have a road bike and wish to swap and share wheels and so going disc on this and rim on the road may make things difficult as you'll need dedicated wheels for each.

Next brakes is a choice and if you have £1500 to spend I'd personally choose Hydraulic brakes, so select either full hydraulics from hydraulic levers (not sure if this is an option without Di2 on Shimano or only on Red £££ in SRAM), but if an option may mean choose your groupset carefully as you'll need hydraulic levers, or go for TRP Hy/RD (~£200 for a fr/re pair) which can use standard levers to give extra flexibility on groupset choice.

Once you've picked that work out what you have left to split between finishing kit, tyres and groupset.

One thing to note is if you don't go the whole full groupset way, you can buy other options for the crank such as Rotor or FSA which both do more flexible BB386/BB30/86 options, i.e. you don't have to pick which way to jump - 24mm Shimano crank or BB30 type 30mm crank as they'll fit either and give options so that if you ever transfer the crank to another bike with different BB standards they'll still work with the appropriate BB.