STBO Mixte Feelings

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SwissGuy

SwissGuy

Professional Amateur Tinkerer
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Since about three weeks now I tried to pick up this frame. Today I finally made the two hours roundtrip on bike to get it home...
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I went there with to spare wheels...
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When I came back home, it was dark already...
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It's a nice Motobecane mixte frame, that's in need of some love (and grease). As there is a pretty close deadline (30th of September), I hope to get this one done quick. The bones seem to be good (ok the BB needs serious attention, as it barely moves). So I mostly need to clean it up, get some spare parts over from the campground stash, like handlebar, break levers, chainguard, but that's about all this bike probably needs. But the pick up at the campground might be the biggest problem, as the car is beyond repair, so I have to do everything by bike for the next few weeks. We will see...
Good thing is, that last week I scored a nice donor bike. The frame is heavy as heck, so it most probably will get tossed, but the wheelset and maybe some other parts will move over to the Motobecane frame.
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The mixte looks like it was cannibalized for another bike, as it doesn't show any signs of abuse, the seat isn't scuffed and the fenders aren't dinged up. The BB might be good as is, just needs lube and adjustment, making it an easy task to cannibalize the donor bike.
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Not the slightest chance to make my personal deadline. My wife will have to use her old bike then tomorrow...
But I at least started to dismantle the donor bike and got some good parts out of it.
The wheels will move over to the Mixte (but with smaller tires)
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Fender, carrier,and saddle go into the stash (or will be sold), as well as amost of the small parts.
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Once the frame has let go of the fork, it will go to the PoP of the blue frame with the deep fenders I acquired a few weeks ago.
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The frame itself will go to the scrapyard. It's waaaay to heavy to build something nice and fast out of it...
Sorry for the bad basement pictures...🤷
 
metalchewy said:
Sorry you didn't make tour deadline.

Loving that saddle. 😍 it's sweet!
Click to expand...
That saddle will hopefully make a good price to finance this project, once I cleaned it up a bit. At the moment it's a bit filthy...
 
Today I got some time to spend in the basement with Mixte Feelings.
I put on the new wheels and tires, a new stem and handlebar, new brake pads, cables and brake levers.
I also could save the bottom bracket. All it needed was a bit of cleaning, some new grease and a counter nut on the non drive side. Luckily I had a fitting spare in one of the boxes...
Now she needs chain wheel, chain, pedals and also the shifter needs to be mounted and grips....
But I must say, she looks nice so far and is fairly light compared to my other rides...
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After I had picked up my score of today, I went at it as soon as I had time.
I had to fit this nice crank set to the bike:
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When I wanted to install the shifter, I realized that that handelbar I had put on yesterday was to thick so I had to swap to the one from the donor bike. I liked the other style more but I have to use what's on hand here, as I'm on a clock to get this one ridable!
So different handlebar, another comfier saddle, grips and chain and we have a rider...
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It has a completely different attitude than yesterday, and I must say, that the black saddle doesn't look as bad on it as I thought...
When testing it out back, I realized that I hit the front wheel with my toes. So I'll probably need shorter cranks. But besides that, it rides very smooth!
 
SwissGuy said:
Just visited my campground stash.
View attachment 280594
I think this, together with the donor bike should give me some nice options...
View attachment 280593
Click to expand...
The BB grease just might be dried out, or missing. Try penetrating oil. That should do it, put the evaporated volatiles back in the grease. You can repack it later and the grease will be easier to remove. I was given two Raleigh bikes and neither one of them had grease anywhere, including the hubs. It wasn’t uncommon for bike boom bikes to be so quickly assembled that the grease step was eliminated. Peugeot was notorious for selling misaligned frames and greaseless bikes back then.
 
us56456712 said:
The BB grease just might be dried out, or missing. Try penetrating oil. That should do it, put the evaporated volatiles back in the grease. You can repack it later and the grease will be easier to remove. I was given two Raleigh bikes and neither one of them had grease anywhere, including the hubs. It wasn’t uncommon for bike boom bikes to be so quickly assembled that the grease step was eliminated. Peugeot was notorious for selling misaligned frames and greaseless bikes back then.
Click to expand...
Thanks. The BB is saved. As you said it was completely dry. I gave it a cleaning and some readjusting and now it runs smoothly! 👍
 
Today's test ride was good. She said she likes it better than her other one. From someone who doesn't like to ride bikes this is as good as a compliment you can get...
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But I ordered some shorter cranks already, as even with the saddle all slammed down she needs to stretch her legs too far...

Btw: The rattling sounds in the video come from the fenders of MY ride, the IronPig, and the squeaking is my saddle. Her new ride is almost fully silent, you can only hear the 7-speed-hub clicking...
 
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The new owner had another request: She wanted a basket to put her stuff in (she doesn't like to ride with a backpack or saddlebags). As I wanted to check out a nearby goodwill bike workshop anyway, that I recently discovered, I headed there an guess what I found: a basket (for free).
With a ton of zip-ties I fixed it to the rack and realized that the sides of the basket have almost the same angle as the stay of the rack...
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While at it I also mounted better grips. The ones from yesterday slipped off, so I had bought some better ones today...
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No big update (yet), still waiting for the new crank to arrive. But it slowly makes its way towards Berlin...

Paketstatus: Im transit​
Land: China -> Deutschland​
Zielort: Berlin​
​
Herkunft:​
2024-10-30 17:17 LIEGE, AVALON, BE, Departed from facility​
2024-10-30 16:44 LIEGE, AVALON, BE, Arrived at sort facility​
2024-10-29 06:43 BE, International flight has arrived​
2024-10-27 00:42 CN, International flight has departed​
2024-10-25 17:00 CN, Arrived at the origin international airport​
2024-10-25 07:00 Mainland China, CN, Shipment is in transit to next facility​
2024-10-24 07:00 In transit to Hermes.​
2024-10-24 06:40 Mainland China, CN, Departed from sort facility​
2024-10-24 02:53 Mainland China, CN, Arrived at origin facility​
2024-10-23 18:53 Order has been created.​
2024-10-22 16:04 Shipment information received​
======================================​

In the meantime my wife already took it on a bigger tour with a friend of hers. They managed to get about a third of the Berlin Wall track done in one day. After that she confirmed, that the bike handles well and is much better and lighter than her old one. Nothing better than a happy customer!:grin:
 

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