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The whole package works together well! See if you can find an old bike with yellowed / mellowed white cable housing for your shifter and brake lines. Soak the inner shield with penetrating oil to make sure you have smooth cable movement. It will be friction shifting, so it doesn't have to be perfect.

A quick rub over your chainring with steel wool can dull the shine. Put some white vinegar on it for the second round of rubbing, and don't rinse it off, and it will leave that chrome kind of musty looking.

This bike has 'the look'! RaT look, that is!
 
Really like the drum/casette hub, that's cool stuff. When you said 10 speed derailleur, I thought, "that's a little bit of overkill"

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Then I realized that you meant "10 speed", not "ten speed". Phew
 
OddJob said:
See if you can find an old bike with yellowed / mellowed white cable housing for your shifter and brake lines. Soak the inner shield with penetrating oil to make sure you have smooth cable movement.
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I think I might have some that I can borrow from a future project. That would look good on this one.
OddJob said:
It will be friction shifting, so it doesn't have to be perfect.
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True that!
OddJob said:
A quick rub over your chainring with steel wool can dull the shine. Put some white vinegar on it for the second round of rubbing, and don't rinse it off, and it will leave that chrome kind of musty looking.
Click to expand...
Great idea, I'll give that a try this morning. Thanks for the tips!
MattiThundrrr said:
Really like the drum/casette hub, that's cool stuff. When you said 10 speed derailleur, I thought, "that's a little bit of overkill"

View attachment 271374

Then I realized that you meant "10 speed", not "ten speed". Phew
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Haha! I thought about doing modern gears on this one but it just wouldn't look right. Low tech is the way for this rat. :cool2:
 
I wound up adapting an old Raleigh brake cable to this old Sturmey Archer drum hub. About 2 1/2 hours out in the sun and a little creativity is all it took.
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I wanted to use the cable housing from the Raleigh as it had that ratty look. It was too short so I used the connector from a brake noodle to add a short piece of modern housing to fit. Then, of course, the standard cable was too short. Fortunately I had a new tandem cable.
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Using the adjuster and clamp from the Raleigh brake I was able to bodge up a serviceable connection.
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I decided to use a more modern lever as I had it and it works.
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All adjusted and functioning. Though I have to say, the performance is very underwhelming. It’s a small drum but I was hopeful that it would be enough. It’s only good enough for flat terrain and taking it easy. I’m going to have to add a front brake at some point.
 
I've only done a drum brake once and that was a Worksman front drum. One thing I remember was regular cable end clamps didn't work very well. Apparently there is a lot more pull tension going on. Be careful with that setup because you may end up pulling the cable right through the clamping nut. Then you won't have any brakes at all.
 
I looked back at my starsNbars build thread and saw that I got this part from @ind-chuckz that is meant to hold the brake cable end.


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kingfish254 said:
I looked back at my starsNbars build thread and saw that I got this part from @ind-chuckz that is meant to hold the brake cable end.


View attachment 271443View attachment 271444
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Thanks KF, that’s exactly what I needed here. I am concerned about my cable pulling out so I’m going to keep it slow and mellow. Just need to keep pushing forward for now to make the deadline. Then I’ll fix the rear brake and add a front. I have a couple more modern Sturmey front drums that would work. I’ll have to dig up one of those barrel clamps. Don’t even know what to call them. :bigsmile:
 
Ran into some issues. I tried the chain guard and the cranks didn’t even come close to clearing it. These cranks aren’t the right ones for this frame but I don’t have a set that would fit better. The Shelby chain guard is out. I’ll try to figure something out after I deal with the fenders.
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The next issue was the freewheel being unwilling to freewheel. The bearing is super crunchy and just unusable. I found a 6 cog freewheel on an old 27” wheel with a Shimano 600 hub. It went on and works so I’m just going to use the 5 lower gears. Got the shifter hooked up via some old white cable housing. It shifts the gears so I’m going to give it a try. Hopefully I can stop this thing on the flat. :grin:
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