PX London Road - 1x9 - build complete (p2)

ravey1981

Late last year I bought my first CX bike, a Verenti Substance CX1.1, to use as a winter road bike and to get off road with it a bit too. I've put plenty of miles on it both on tarmac and off and now I fancy a bit of racing (Just missed the end of the season last year). The Yorkshire summer series starts at the end of April so thats what I'm going to be doing. The Verenti is a bit of a heavy beast having a steel (Reynolds 520) frame and forks and a full Sora groupset so I have decided to build something a bit lighter for racing and general off road use. The summer road bike is out now so it wont have to do much road work.

I picked up a Planet X London Road frame and forks when they were on sale at £209 which I thought was a bit of a bargain for an alloy frame with carbon forks, its bright green too which can only be a good thing, right? The initial plan was going to be to borrow most of the parts from the old bike, but as usually happens I've got carried away and now have a stack of new bits waiting to go onto the frame. The bars/stem/levers from the Verenti will be going on though so that means sticking with 9 speed Sora shifters, which actually I think is a good thing as they work really well (only used ultegra level stuff before so was pleasantly surprised), 9 speed is mud friendly and they are cheaper to replace if they get crash damaged. Borrowing the wheels and brakes for now too.

Build is going to be as follows:

Planet X London Road F&F (Medium)
Alex Rims/Novatec wheels - from current bike
Sora 9 speed Levers
XT shadow 9 speed rear mech
SLX triple chainset, rings removed and 38T narrow/wide superstar ring on
Bottom Bracket to match above
11-30 Cassette
KMC 9 speed chain
Avid BB5 brakes - will upgrade to TRP spyres when I find some at a decent price
Generic carbon seatpost (ebay special, got on on the road bike, can't fault it)
Charge spoon saddle (white, as is the bar tape, which will probably split opinion here)
Compact bars and stem from current bike (4ZA I think, nothing special but will do the job)

So basically going with a 1x9 setup, using mainly MTB parts other than levers. XT mechs are pretty bombproof and have much stronger springs than road based stuff (Ugo uses one on his shimpagnolo bike). SLX cranks/bottom bracket I picked up reasonably cheap and I can keep the rings for spares for my MTB, winner.
For those not in the know about MTB parts XT is roughly equivalent to Ultegra level and SLX would be 105ish.

Should get this built up on Thursday night/Friday I hope so I can get it out for the weekend. No idea how what weight it will come out at but its got to be lighter than the 25/26lb bike I have now....

The Verenti will get built back up as a purely winter road bike eventually but will be getting a rest in the garage for a while, it's served me very well this winter, probably the best £300 I've ever spent (second hand but in practically unused condition)

On_What

are TRP's lighter than BB5s?

Chris James

Personally I would avoid a 'Generic carbon seatpost' for cyclocross. Remounting puts a lot more hammer on saddles and seat posts than in road riding, and a snapped seat post doesn't bear thinking about!

ravey1981

Not sure if TRP's are lighter, maybe a little, the main advantage is that they are a twin "piston" design, i.e. both pads move towards the rotor. They look nicer too.

Seatpost should be fine, the bolts at the head will fail before the post itself would snap. I have an alloy one that will fit in any case if I do decide I don't like it.

MountainMonster

It's a great frame, see the link in my signature.

I wouldn't worry too much about a generic seatpost. Plenty of people use them in mountain biking with no more ill effects happening than branded posts.

ravey1981

Build is delayed as some vital parts that I thought would come with frame are not included.... how annoying!

Edit: Here are a couple of WIP shots, love the colour of this bike, just the saddle, chain and cabling up to do. Feels quite a bit lighter than the old bike which is good and the flattened top tub makes for good shouldering. Can't wait to get this finished. Better wheels will be on the shopping list at some point. Note: I'm missing the cable guide that goes under the BB shell, until it arrives this is as far as I can go

MountainMonster

That's starting to look good. Shame not all the parts arrived, but I'm sure they'll be with you in due course. Have you spokento planet x about the guides?

ravey1981

Yeah spoke to PX and they aren't supplied. I've suggested they mention this on their website which they agreed to do. Should avoid any further confusion.

N0bodyOfTheGoat

Look forward to seeing how this build goes. Looks great so far, lots of steerer there that could give a more upright position (making my lower back happy).

What size frame did you go for and did it work for you, or did you have to tweak saddle post and stem sizes?
I'm ~178cm with very short legs for someone this tall (I look for 29"/30" length trousers), which always tends to make judging frame sizes a bit tricky for me.

Part of me fancies making use of their London Road "pick n mix" bundle to get an LFS to build it up as singlespeed initially, with TRP Hylex brakes. But I worry at how much it might cost to go this route.

Alternatively, I could go for a Pinnacle Arkose Singlespeed or the currently reduced Arkose Two, but there have been no reviews commenting on how the 2015 triple butted frame improves on the 2014 double butted that BR were a bit wary of in their review. Plus the Pinnacle lacks mudguard (and panier?) mounts.

HebdenBiker

Watching this thread with interest. I'm planning on building a London Road myself later in the year. Keep the pics coming :-)

ravey1981

Its a medium frame which should work out fine for me, I'm 5'10. Its a self build using a mixture of old and new parts. Stem is currently 100mm and seatpost is an inline type. Once its fully built (hopefully midweek depending on the postman) I might have to change the stem etc but it will be somewhere very close.

Its top tube length you should look for anyway when deciding on a frame size, there is usually plenty of adjustment in the seatpost to allow for differing leg length.

I've gone down the self build route a few times now and I'll tell you this, it nearly always works out more expensive than buying a full bike, all the odds and sods such as cables, seatclamp, headset etc all add up pretty quickly... I had the parts from the other bike to stick on which should keep the cost down but even now I wonder if I should have bought the full bike at £799 and then just put a single ring on.... The upside is you do get to pick what parts you want and, for me at least, my bikes feel special to me because I built them.

MountainMonster

I switched my stem out for a 90mm one, and I'm glad I did. It has made the bike much more comfortable. I'm same height as you and I am also on a medium.

ravey1981

I'm used to a pretty stretched out position on the road bike so 100mm should be fine, In any case these things can be swapped out if I decide I need something different. All the parts have now arrived but I had a massive hangover today so haven't finished the build yet. Got some blue floating rotors for it for no reason other than I like the look of them. Here is a pic of road bike showing handlbar stretch, drop from saddle:

MountainMonster

Jesus, that's a hell of a drop and reach! At least you enjoy it!

ravey1981

Its not that much of a drop to be honest, tried getting rid of the last two spacers but my back wont have it, I do drop it down when I put clip-on aero bars on for the odd TT though.

These are the rotors I've got for the new build, blue to match the chainring. I will probably get some blue QR skewers at some point too.



I also picked up a set of TRP spyre brake calipers on ebay last night, should be a nice improvement on the BB5s.

I have somehow managed to lose part of the seatpost so I've had to order another one ... Build will be finished sometime this week. Can't wait to take it for its maiden voyage. For today though I'm watching Paris-Roubaix!

MountainMonster

That's turning out well. What colour cable outers are you going with? What did you lose for the seatpost?

ravey1981

Just black Jagwires, I have white on the roadie but I'm not a fan of coloured cables. Lost the bit that the bottom rails sit in. Entire new seatpost needed. That will teach me....

veronese68

ravey1981 wrote:

These are the rotors I've got for the new build, blue to match the chainring. I will probably get some blue QR skewers at some point too.

Tart.
Looking forward to seeing the finished article, although not as much as you are I'm sure.
Self build is definitely the way to go, and clearly I think ridiculously green bikes are a must.

ravey1981

Guilty as charged!

Love those green Kinesis's ( is that the correct plural?). Was eyeing one of those frames up before this one came up ridiculously cheap. I know its not a full on cross frame, the sloping top tube hinders shouldering a bit and the gear cable is on the downtube so exposed to crud but it will do what I want it to do just fine. Brakes should arrive later this week and new seatpost came today so will be good to go soon.... No sure what weight it's going to come out at, hoping its under 10kg or I should have just bought an off the peg London Road bike. The current wheels and tyres could be letting it down massively, I will have to have them off and weigh them at some point. It will be getting a nice set of handbuilts to run tubeless in due course. I have a feeling the Sora cassette could be a bit of an anchor too.... Time will tell!

veronese68

Kinesii?
Yes, I was about to order a black frame when I saw the new green at the London Bike Show a couple of years ago and had to have the green. Front mech cable is on the downtube on my bike, never had a problem with it sticking. For the rear mech, which is along the top, I use an XTR cable which has quite long sealing ferrules to keep the crud out. I thing the XTR sets were cheap on CRC. Should come out under 10kg, I think mine is just over 9 with 105 and not being too picky about components. I'm sure I could get it lighter if I tried.

bendertherobot

The built up London Road comes with Vittoria Hyper Voyagers. Which is just the best reason for everyone getting out there and buying one

veronese68

bendertherobot wrote:

The built up London Road comes with Vittoria Hyper Voyagers. Which is just the best reason for everyone getting out there and buying one

I did just get a funny look from my colleagues for sniggering for no apparent reason. :oops:

ravey1981

Today I weighed my wheels...

Brake calipers still haven't arrived but I had a bit of garage time tonight, swapped the new disc rotors onto my wheels and they look great. (no photos, forgot to take any)

While I had the wheels off I stripped them down to weigh them and was both horrified and pleased with what I found...

Front wheel 1020g
Rear wheel 1250g
Pair 2270g !!!!!! :shock:

Cassette 320g
Skewers 100g (pair)

New rotors 150g (pair)
Old rotors 225g (pair)

So obviously the wheels are VERY heavy. They are Alexrims Race 28 rims, Plain gauge black spokes and Novatec hubs (unsure which model but I assume cheap). I was surprised how heavy they are but on the other hand it means I can easily save at least a pound on the wheels when I eventually upgrade so I'll look at that as a cloud with a silver lining....

Cassette seems heavy. I will have to see what else is available but I know decent 9 speed cassettes are getting hard to come by these days....

Fingers crossed it will be finished for the weekend.

MountainMonster

That is not soooooo bad of a weight. I had a pair of wheels that were nearly 3kg a few years ago. Needless to say they got swapped out real quick.

Did you weigh them with or without tyres?

np1969

Hi,

If you were to think of changing the wheels I can highly recommend the Stans Iron Cross on Novatec hubs that you can pick up from a builder on ebay. The rims give you the option of tubeless or tubed and they are bombproof. They come in quite light as well, the set I had with Sapim D-Lite spokes was 1700 ish and you could go lighter on the hubs spokes at cost.

Enjoy the bike, looks great already.

ravey1981

Thanks for the info, I've looked at the Iron Cross rims but I've seen elsewhere that they are limited to 40psi? The bike will be used not for just cross racing but also for longer rides with a bit of road work, I usually put a bit more pressure in for those types of ride. Have been looking at the Stans Grail rim, they are rated up to 100psi as far as I remember..... I will have to run these wheels for a while though, I've already spent too much on this.... I'm no good at sticking to a budget when it comes to bike builds...

In other news, these arrived today....



They are quite a pretty thing (as far as brake calipers go), certainly sleeker than the bb5s that are coming off. I now have all the bits I need so bike will be finished tomorrow night, unless I go riding.

ravey1981

Tonight I fitted the new brakes which turned out to be more of a task than I had been expecting, tricky to get a good lever feel with the spyres and they still feel slightly mushy. They need bedding in properly so I will take it out for a spin tomorrow then do a final adjustment. Saddle position needs tweaking as do the bars and I need to chop an inch off the steerer when I'm happy with the setup. Pictures are a bit rubbish as it was going dark by the time I finished....

First race is next week! Can't wait.

bendertherobot

My Spyres went on fine last week. Very bity. Why the spacers? If those are 160 rotors front and rear they should just be direct mount shouldn't they?

ravey1981

Hmm that might be why I was having issues.... I got them second hand (just come off a new bike) and they weren't supplied with bolts so I reused the ones from my avid BB5s complete with wobby washer spacer things. I thought they were necessary :oops: I'll have another look tomorrow night then. I was expecting good things from them since I've heard plenty of decent reviews from people on here.

Thanks for the heads up

Edit: I've just looked up the fitting instructions and it turns out I've clamped the cables in the wrong position at the caliper too.... should have read them before I started really....

veronese68

Yes, I think only Avid calipers use the wibbly wobbly washers. Really must sell my BB7s.

HebdenBiker

Mate that's a very nice bike. You've inspired me to get one now, although I'll be using road mechs and a Stronglight triple.

Have you weighed it?