# My first bike restoration....pics added



## bing! (Jul 8, 2010)

A restorabike story.

I bought my first old school bike two weeks ago. A 1989 Wicked Fat Chance. I thought over the restoration, got a quote for a tear down, degrease, detail, tune up, replace parts, check and correct job. The total went a little south of 300 dollars  I could afford it, but it felt practical to finally buy myself some proper bike tools while doing the rebuild myself. After all, I'd done the same work..............25 years ago 

It all started with a bike wash. I saw that the derailleurs were gummed up in grime, so I took them off and brushed them over a tub of solvent. I also rebuilt the lower pivot, inspected and greased the pulleys, relubed the whole unit and torqued the cage. The front required more work. The cage was pitted and a little rusted on the inside. Being that the rusted parts are high friction surfaces, I didnt think the rust would progress with proper care and lubrication. So I went in there with a dremel tool and wire brushed the corrosion off. Done did it.

Next up, were the Magura brake levers, broke them down, cleaned them up and greased the pivots. The rubber boot lever covers were still in very good conditions, nice!

I worked on the seat post too. This bike came with a Joe Breezer Hite Rite seat adjuster spring mechanism. I sprayed Corrosion X inside the seat tube, reached in with a rag attached to a rod and cleaned it out. The rag came through smooth, so I don't suspect any major corrosion in there. Using a used a wire brush, I removed rust from the hite rite seat adjuster spring. She'll get re-chromed in the future. For now, I used light oil to keep the gremlins away.

Both hubs were rebuilt. The Shimano xt 730 hubs have survived the last 22 years well. None of the bearing races showed any sign of wear. No glazing either. After a thorough de-greasing, polishing, relube and adjustment, they felt like new. Sweet! The outer cones and spacers had to be wire brushed with a dremel tool to remove light rusting. The rear m730 freehub, I didnt have a tool to remove it, was blasted with carb cleaner and carefully relubed with dry chain lube. The cassette (sprockets?) cleaned up nicely with almost no sign of wear.

Trued the wheels. The front wheel wasn't dished right. That took some doing putting it back to proper. Being that this my first time to use a truing stand it took about 2 hours. Shes lined up and trued perfectly. The rear wheel, my second truing effort ever, took only 30 minutes.

I found one dent on the lip of a rim. I used an iron shaft, wrapped the tip with rubber and struck it with a mallet to straighten it out. I used a wood base on the other end to keep the rim from scratching. You can't even tell the dent was there.

Cleaned up the cantis, the u-brake and brake posts. Installed new Kool Stop pads, XTR cables and cable housing. I had to relearn how to adjust the brake pads. Took about an hour for the whole brake job.

The thumb shifters were polished, replaced the cable housing and lines using a neat Jagwire kit, complete with rubber frame protectors and waterproof fittings. Adjusted the deralleurs.

After I installed the new chain, I tried out the shifting and "kaplunk, kaplunk" the bike shifts just like new.

BTW, I took out the crank arms and detailed it. Did some light polishing and replaced the two inner chain rings from biopace to sg. Kept the outer one for a period look and as a pseudo chain ring guard.

Lastly, this took me a while to learn, I rebuilt the 20+ year old mag 20 fork. Dust wipers were in so-so condition, but none could be had. I cleaned them with light silicone oil and re-installed them. When i got to the main seal, I discovered that they required a special tool for removal. A little research revealed that I could pop off the seal using air pressure and wrapping a towel on the stanchions to prevent them front flying off. It was a little unnerving, but youse got to do whats youse gots to do. It worked out well on the first one. The left stanchion required 130 pounds of pressure to remove, and flew about 8 feet across the room. Good thing I had it wrapped in cloth or it couldve flown farther and actually got ruined. The internal bushings were in perfect condition. The original seals were in holding pressure so I decided not to use the vintage seal kit I was able to purchase. I degreased the whole unit, again with light silicone oil, greased up the bushings and seals with Slikoleum, reassembled, and filled up with the proper amount of 5wt oil. The air caps were also opened up, inspected, cleaned and lubed. The indent knob had to be cleaned up and lubed. I do hate working with those tiny ball bearings and springs. The shock was reassembled and torqued down properly with thread lock applied.

The last major work was the headset rebuild. The headset seems ok. No marring on the races. I de-greased it, inspected and reassembled. A little touchy on the adjustment, but works fine.

I decide not to mess with the bottom bracket. It was a sealed, pressed-in unit. I just polished up the retaining collars and removed rusting off the c-clip retainers

Installed new grips and tires. Whew!

One truing stand, assorted bike specific wrenches, crank puller, two chain rings, new chain, new tires, new cables, new pads, new grips and a completely rebuilt fork, half a gallon of camp gas and 16 man hours later, shes ready to ride.

All i need now is a period bike saddle. Maybe a good used selle italia flite or brooks saddle complete with road rash.

Thinking of new spoke nipples, maybe in the future. New paint job? Maybe after the bb fails.

Cant wait for the rain to stop and ride


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## Shogun700 (Jun 15, 2009)

Looks great! I love the bars, and am a huge fan of the wheelset as well. Enjoy it!


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## Rumpfy (Dec 21, 2003)

Normally I don't read long diatribe posts like this, but I read yours. Good on you for your time and effort into getting this bike back on the trail. Doing it all yourself I'm sure adds to the satisfaction.

A proper Flite or Turbo saddle shouldn't be too tough to track down to round out your effort. 

Enjoy that first ride and let us know how it goes!


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## KDXdog (Mar 15, 2007)

NIce job! 

Yes a proper seat shouldn't be too hard to find. Just being picky, but tan wall tires would be a plus!

I had the same forks on my Monster back in the day. I liked them, until I blew them during a Mt Snow NORBA race.

Some top caps were defective, hopefully yours are latter ones. 

I also like the Magura levers, seeing yours remind me that I have those someplace in a box too!

Have fun!


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## KrisKringle (Mar 17, 2011)

very nice. Love the magura levers


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