It's ALIVE (Kinda)

I've been slowly and surely amassing parts to get The Goat back on the road. Back in September I had decided that I'd kind of like an internally-geared hub. I'd been thinking about it for a while longer than that. I have a few hookups and could score the Nexus 3 pretty cheap. Then, there's the spokes, the rim, the labor to assemble the wheel (I'm not ready to do that myself yet) and other stuff.

My Diamondback Sorrento did pretty well the past two winters, but it's taken a lot of abuse. it's still on its original derailleurs, crank, shifters and chainrings. Also, the cables and housings were new when I bought it right before Thanksgiving '06 but now they're more than 2 years old. Also, the good wheels I bought for it had been moved to Hybridzilla, so they're gone.

A few weeks back, I started looking into what it would take to build it up again. The derailleurs barely budged, and wouldn't spring back. The cables were in need of help. Obviously, new wheels (one I figured would be built on a Nexus 3-speed), a new chain, and probably a new single-chainring crank. The v-Brakes were also sticky. Basically, she'd seen a lot better days.

I found some old tattered (and seriously wobbly) wheels in my parts closet. I found a bunch of brand new cable and housing as well. I took the brakes apart, cleaned them, and greased the pivot points. They worked nicely again. I painstakingly trued the old wheels, replacing two spokes that were broken. I found a never-used SunRace 8-speed cassette bolted to an old hub. JR gave me the hookup on an old rear rack, too. It took some creativity to get it home earlier this week, as shown above.

It became quite obvious that buried in plastic tubs I keep in my "junk closet", I really had most of what I needed to kludge together a working winter beater. I just needed one more shifter cable and a chain. And maybe a pair of derailleurs.

After reading this post on Blue Collar MTB, I emailed Guitar Ted (who wrote it) and asked for advice on the derailleurs. He told me to soak them in solvent, clean them up, and work them by hand to see if they'd quit sticking and spring back like normal. If that worked, then he said to use something like TriFlow all over the moving bits to make sure things slide nicely. Sure enough, it worked like a champ. In fact, my front derailleur has never liked shifting to the small chainring, even when I bought the bike 2 years ago. Now? It's smooth like butter. It shifts better than the day I got it.

I was too busy with family to make a "give thanks" post yesterday, but it's obvious that I have many friends here who I'm thankful for. It's easy to be thankful for those who donated some of the essentials I needed when a bunch of my gear got stolen. I'm also equally thankful for those who offer advice and kind, encouraging words. Thank you, all.

Oh, and I suppose I should let you see the current incarnation of The Goat. I need to get some metal bracing to finish attaching the rack to the seat stays, but this should be all I need to keep me rolling through winter.