Thought I'd be better off starting my own thread than diverting al-fresco's thread, so here goes.
So before Christmas I bought a Dolan Track Champion frame second hand with the intention of building a nice, lightweight fixed road bike which I might have a go on the track with, too.
I've got the impression that a good starting point to work out what additional parts I need is the crankset - from there I can work out what my chainline will be and thus what bottom bracket and
then sprocket I should get to suit and what to be mindful of when choosing wheels.
My experience looking so far has led me on some long and fruitless paths. Find one set that look nice, then after looking and looking discover they are unsuitable, too expensive, too heavy or there's some major flaw with them.
I guess I'm after something fairly midrange/upper-midrange - I want something that performs well and is nice to ride, but can also handle a bit of weather and amateurish maintenance. I'm unlikely to ever try track riding seriously competitively so I don't think I need to be splashing out £300 on a Dura Ace crankset, especially if I need to spend another £100 a year on new chainrings - and conversely I don't want to spend £35 on budget stuff to find it gives me a bike no lighter and better to ride than my steel hack-fixed commuter.
Other stuff I've looked at also seems to limit what other parts I can get. For example, it seems if you get Miche anything, then you have to get miche everything else, and while say Miche cranksets are alright, their sprocket fittings and bottom brackets are crap. Similar with Sugino, and while I hear their bottom brackets are good, I'm not sure they make british-style fitting BBs that my frame requires.
Any suggestions? Only definite criteria I've established so far is that I'm probably going to run 48/17 (unless anyone thinks there's a better way to achieve the same ratio), I won't (well, can't) run a rear brake so it'll need to be capable of withstanding the forces involved in leg braking / skidding. Oh and it would be nice if it's not entirely silver - some black would be nice
So before Christmas I bought a Dolan Track Champion frame second hand with the intention of building a nice, lightweight fixed road bike which I might have a go on the track with, too.
I've got the impression that a good starting point to work out what additional parts I need is the crankset - from there I can work out what my chainline will be and thus what bottom bracket and
then sprocket I should get to suit and what to be mindful of when choosing wheels.
My experience looking so far has led me on some long and fruitless paths. Find one set that look nice, then after looking and looking discover they are unsuitable, too expensive, too heavy or there's some major flaw with them.
I guess I'm after something fairly midrange/upper-midrange - I want something that performs well and is nice to ride, but can also handle a bit of weather and amateurish maintenance. I'm unlikely to ever try track riding seriously competitively so I don't think I need to be splashing out £300 on a Dura Ace crankset, especially if I need to spend another £100 a year on new chainrings - and conversely I don't want to spend £35 on budget stuff to find it gives me a bike no lighter and better to ride than my steel hack-fixed commuter.
Other stuff I've looked at also seems to limit what other parts I can get. For example, it seems if you get Miche anything, then you have to get miche everything else, and while say Miche cranksets are alright, their sprocket fittings and bottom brackets are crap. Similar with Sugino, and while I hear their bottom brackets are good, I'm not sure they make british-style fitting BBs that my frame requires.
Any suggestions? Only definite criteria I've established so far is that I'm probably going to run 48/17 (unless anyone thinks there's a better way to achieve the same ratio), I won't (well, can't) run a rear brake so it'll need to be capable of withstanding the forces involved in leg braking / skidding. Oh and it would be nice if it's not entirely silver - some black would be nice
