Campagnolo hubbed 8spd wheels $80

Like I said - these are Campy hubs with an 8 speed cassette in excellent condition. The rims show some use, but they are true as anything. The cassette looks like it's barely used. The hubs are smooth. The tires are in useable shape, and the tubes work too. Grab the whole deal, and finish your project. Or, better yet: vastly improve the tired steel wheels on your city bike. If you have compatibility questions, just ask. Hint: if you have friction shifting, they'll work.

SOLD: Ross Eurosport ladies $30

Here's some great 'beater bike' action for mid 5' people. You can lock it outside (where it's kinda safe-ish... the corner?) and not lose sleep over it. That said, it runs smooth, and will get you all over the city - no headache. I got it with a completely frozen rear cable. I replaced the rear cable and housing, and now the brakes work well. The Shimano Tourney brakes - to me - seem almost too nice for the bicycle. They work well.

The rear tire is pretty gnarly, with the side wall rubber coming off. The tire holds air, and the sidewall isn't weakened. You can get away with this for a pretty long time in my estimation. Cost of new tire: $10-15 plus $6ish for labor at all better shops.

SOLD: Ross Eurosport Compact $30

This bicycle would make a good 'beater bike' for a small girl. Everything works, and you can lock it outside. I didn't change any parts - I just made a few adjustments. This is basic A to B city transportation.

Schwinn Prelude Fixie $300

This is the perfect bicycle for tall hip Philly men. The wheels are brand new with zero miles. The rims are Mavic CXP22 laced to Formula sealed bearing hubs. The rear hub is a flip flop with a 14 tooth Dura Ace cog and lock ring. The chain ring is a 40 tooth - that makes 76 gear inches. The tires are Specialized Armadillos that I rode from Philly to Val D'or - so they're not new, but they still have a few hundred miles before they're kaput. If you want brand new 700x28c Paselas, I'll install them for $40 - that's cheap, look around.

The frame is a 61cm Schwinn Prelude. It's a higher quality Chicago-built Schwinn with Columbus tubing. Not the holy grail - but highly respectable. If you're at least 6' tall, and don't have specifically short legs, this is for you. Preferred applicants will like pink.

I converted this myself, and I've done plenty of fixies and conversions before. This bicycle was in awesome condition when I bought it. I converted it to fixed gear because it had Phil Wood freewheel hubs, and I snabbed those for my personal bicycle. I had these wheels waiting to be used - and this was the perfect opportunity. I left both brakes on for several reasons. 1) safety 2) it's nice to rest your hands on the hoods 3) if you want to put a freewheel on and make it a single speed, you should really have two brakes. Now you're ready(!)

If you can pick this up in West Chester or Kennett Square, I'm going to sell it to you first.

SOLD: Jazz Latitude city bike

Cheesy 80's decor at it's best. Set up as a super-comfortable swift city machine. The handlebars and stem were replaced so you can sit up. All of the cables were replaced. The chain is new. The tires were upgraded to Paselas.

This friction shifting smooth city machine doesn't look like much more than an 80's throwback - but it is tuned up, silent, and ready to roll forever. Simple as a bicycle gets, and anything can be fixed for about $.04 in 30 seconds at a shop or in your living room.

When I acquired this bicycle, it was in a serious state of disrepair. I almost nixed the idea of fixing it up, but with a radical name like Jazz Latitude, I couldn't resist. The frame is straight, and TIG welded steel tubed bicycles can last forever. The good news is you can lock it up without looking too fancy or worrying about scratches - but you don't have to sacrifice the perfectly smooth operation. This one is a true sleeper.

Derailers (derailleurs)

Derailers come in two types: nice and crummy. With friction shifting, even the crummiest derailers tend to work just fine. If you upgrade to one or two tiers from the bottom of the product line, you're living large. I use cheap, super-outdated, high end derailers, or failing that, whatever is free - preferably the stock derailer. A truly crummy derailer usually doesn't work well with the also-probably-crummy shifters found on millions of bicycles. The best remedy for this disappointing setup is to switch to friction shifting. Derailers are all capable of moving the chain from side to side. With friction shifting, rider input determines where the derailer moves. You don't want to leave this task to cheap index shifters with squirrely indents moving a cheap dry cable through a maze of dirty cable housing. Cheap derailers will breathe a sigh of relief when you stop trying to put them on a mission of precision.

If you're trying to get better performance from a bicycle, the derailers are not the first thing to throw money at. A Dura Ace derailer will still shift like junk with tired knock-off grip shifters, tired friction-ladden housing or a bent derailer hanger. Put the money (a very small sum) into friction shifters, and learn how to take control of your shifting back. When you do this, you'll find that a twenty-year-old bottom of the line derailer actually works very adequately. If you want to upgrade the derailer, wait for the swap meet when index shifting riders are getting rid of their nice old derailers for $10 each.

When I'm fixing up a bicycle to work great, I use the stock derailers 99% of the time.

Chains

One of the best ways to make an old bicycle feel young again is to change the tired old chain. Sometimes adding some bicycle lube will suffice, but if the chain hasn't been changed in years, you might as well just start fresh. It makes a big difference. My favorite chain right now is the SRAM PC-830. It's just like the PC-850 (formerly the PC-48), but it's cheaper. Why? I'm not quite sure. The PC-830 is a cheap but good chain, with SRAM's 'powerlink' connector which is nice if you don't want to fool around with pushing a pin out just enough with a chain tool and then getting a stiff link when you push it back in. That method takes practice to master, and you might as well avoid it.

The PC-830 is an 8 speed chain. That means that if the rear set of gears (freewheel or cassette) has six, seven, or eight cogs - you're all set. I suspect you'd be all set with a 5 speed freewheel too, but for that I use a different chain. So I dunno.

I ride bicycles almost exclusively with 6, 7, or 8 cogs on the back. That's all I want, and that allows me to use really cheap chains so I have no financial cringe when I want to keep a bicycle running smooth and quiet. If you ride with 6-8 cogs on back, the PC-830 is probably as good as you'll ever need. Look how expensive a 10speed (10 gears on the back wheel) chain is. There's no way I'm going to deal with that.

Northroad handlebars

At the time that I'm writing this, I don't own a 3 speed. Just need to get that admitted, sheepishly. By the time you read this that might have changed. I don't spend much money on bicycles (relative assertion) - I like waiting for them to drift toward me like a slow magnetic process.

I might not have a 3 speed at the moment, but I have a lot of 3 speed handlebars. Old 3 speeds, mostly imported from England "back in the day" (50's, 60's mostly) used "northroad" handlebars. These handlebars have a slight rise, and curve back so you can feel like you're riding a bicycle in an old movie. In addition to goofy nostalgia, this allows you to sit up straighter and have a comfortable position. I use these handlebars with a tall stem to get a very comfortable upright position. I rode my City Bike for 120 miles like that one day - my legs were pretty beat, but no complaints about the handlebars. If you want an aero position, try just leaning down and tucking in your elbows. Northroad handlebars are great.

I think the best place for some Northroad handlebars is on an old mountain bicycle that you want to make more comfortable. Adding Northroad handlebars and a long stem can get a bicycle a lot closer to being the machine that you want to ride everywhere and can carry anything with. Let me talk more about this machine: after the Northroad handlebars and stem, add Panaracer Paselas and friction shifters. Then put on a rear rack, and use hose clamps to attach a milk crate. Now you can easily ride around with a case of beer. You know when you're riding a bicycle with a jacket on, then you get too hot for the jacket? Milk crate it. You don't even have to stop.

Where do you get Northroad handlebars? I'll tell you what I'd do if I were you. I'd go to the local bicycle co-op. They will probably have some that they really don't care about. I'd go for the ones that look beat up but not bent. That's 'cause I like resurrecting stuff like that and giving it a totally unexpected new shot at life. It also looks low key. If you don't have a source of used bicycle stuff, no problem. The J&B wholesale catalog - carried by most bicycle shops - lists "Pyramid" or "Sunlite" brand Northroad handlebars. These brand names don't instill much confidence, or get much respect inside the cycling community: but don't worry. These handlebars are fine and good, and maintain the original classic shape. They come in steel or alloy (aluminum). The steel ones can fit bar end shifters with a little bit of forcing or sanding inside. That's just FYI - bar end shifters are pretty cool. If you have a lot of money that you like to spend, Nitto also makes some Northroad handlebars that look nice. I'm sure they're great - I like Nitto stuff.

Panaracer Pasela tires

Panaracer Paselas are a top choice for touring cyclists and generally smart people who know about bicycle tires. I found out about them from smart people, and I've seen them used by a lot of people who look like they ride their bicycles for a lot of miles.

These tires are available in all kinds of sizes - so if you like them, you can use them on all of your bicycles. I have a quickish old racing bicycle, and a mountain bicycle that is re-configured to cover lots of distance carrying stuff to sleep in and stuff to cook on. Both of these bicycles have Panaracer Paselas. The road bicycle has 700x32c Paselas. These are the fattest tires that will fit the frame. These tires make for a very comfortable ride, and they feel fast. "Fast" here is not a scientifically measured variable, but I feel fast and comfortable, and that makes me happy. My Diamondback "City Bike" (touring, riding everywhere) has 26x1.5 Paselas. If you want wider, there's 26x1.75, or you can get 26x1.25 if you think skinny tires make you super fast. That's a great range! I like the 26x1.5 tires because they are 37mm wide, and that's the same width as tires on almost all old 3 speeds. I love old 3 speeds, so knowing that my tires are 37mm wide makes me feel in touch with an aura of old reliable perfection. 37mm might possibly be the perfect width. Panaracer - seeming to know that I feel this way - also makes a 700x37c version of the Pasela. If I ever tour on a 700c bicycle, that's what I'm using. If I thought that skinny tires would make me super fast, I could also buy 700x25c or several sizes inbetween. If I had some nice old 27" wheels, I could still use them with my favorite tires. Paselas come in several widths for the 630mm bead seat. I only wish one thing: why not make them available with the bead seat measurements of 590mm and 584mm? They already make some that are 37mm wide - so why not make them available to 3 speed nerds and this new breed of 650b cats I've been hearing about?

These are good tires that are slightly meaty without feeling clunky. They are way cheaper than expensive tires, and just a little more expensive than really cheap ones. This is the only tire you need to know about if you want to stop thinking about tires for the rest of your life.

Shifters: friction vs. index

I'm a lifetime fan of friction shifting. Friction shifters (as opposed to index shifters) are simple shifters with no indents to automatically 'find' the gear and put the derailer in the right spot. They have no clicks to put you in a certain gear - you can shift anywhere in the range of the derailer's sweep. There are several reasons this is good:

1) Less to tune up: when you change a gear cable with indexed shifting, there is a slight process to getting the derailer to land on the right gears when you shift. The cable tension needs to be just right. This is pretty easy if you've done it a hundred times, but most people haven't. Most people have index shifters, and when there is friction in the cable housing, or the derailer hanger is a little bent, they are powerless. The bicycle now rides noisily and "certain gears don't work." With a friction shifter, anyone can replace a cable and the setup is ridiculously simple. Remove the slack from the cable and tighten it. Done.

2) Compatibility freedom: Campy doesn't work with Shimano. Some SRAM works with Shimano, some SRAM needs SRAM. You need shifters with the right number of clicks to correspond with the number of gears. Basically, you need very specific and expensive stuff to ride your bicycle. With friction shifters you can have any number of gears from any company and you almost never have an issue. I've used Shimano 600 friction downtube shifters with a SRAM 4.0 derailer. Pretty stupid combo, but it worked fine and that's the point. This is especially useful when looking for super cheap parts to fix up your bicycle and keep it running perfectly for next to nothing. You get whatever's cheap with complete disregard for compatibility getting in the way. You still have to worry about some compatibility - but very much, and it's the easy stuff. Don't get a Campy cassette for your hub that needs a freewheel anyway. Then you're basically set.

3) Cheap: You can find friction shifters stupid cheap. Any bicycle shop can get friction thumb shifters for under $10 that you can put on any bicycle. They're made for straight bars, but they'll work on drop bars too with a longer bolt. Want some beautiful shifters? Shimano 600's looked hot, and those are still dumb-cheap. Want some friction shifter bling better than that? Rivendell has their "silver" shifters and there's a ton of ways to mount them. They can be: bar end shifters or downtube shifters - or you can mount them on Paul's thumbies or Kelly's takeoffs. Some of these nicer setups cost some bucks, but no matter how you set up your friction shifting setup, it's going to be worlds cheaper than the new 10spd STI or Ergopower nonsense. There's a place for that stuff, but to me it's nonsense. Like a $1000 ice cream sundae that everyone is eating because they don't know about the place that has homemade ice cream being sold right next to the cows that help make it. Personally, I don't see a problem with the super-cheap "Xundah" brand ones that you get from the J&B catalog. This catalog is carried by 99.9% of bicycle shops. You need to go through a shop to order something from it. Those are some cheap shifters, and they work great.

4) Reliable: the second your derailer hanger is slightly bent, or the second you get slight corrosion inside your cable housing - is the second that your bicycle will shift like crap. Not so with friction shifting. Friction shifting will put up with a lot more of this stuff - so if you're on a long tour, or just want to ride a bicycle without constant tweaking - go with friction.