Gravel commuter / tourer build

[ChrisEyles]

After being tied up moving house for some time, a smidge more progress!

Swapped the MTB FD for a road FD - shifting up front now actually works!

Had a play with tuning the fork and it now feels pretty good, though in the long term I'd quite like something with lockout and maybe even adjustable travel.

Need to give the whole bike a thorough checking over at the weekend as I can't remember which bolts I'd fully tightened and which were left loose!

 

[ChrisEyles]

Went for a test ride last night with the new FD fitted, and first impressions are still very good

It feels far more sprightly on the road than I expected, similar to my touring bike in terms of effort/speed but with a real magic carpet ride over bumps and poor road surfaces.

Off-road it livens up the relatively tame bridleways & byways around me that are in all honesty a bit boring on a full-on MTB, but still feels capable enough to tackle pretty much anything (albeit maybe a tad slower until I get used to the drop bars and shifting my weight waaaaay back on steep steppy stuff).

I'm really pleased with the Avid BB7 brakes, they feel incredibly good.

The Marz' MX Comp fork also feels really good after rebuilding it. I'm running it quite hard (50psi) and swapped the negative springs for foam top-out bumpers, which keeps it high in its travel and gives a platform-like feel. But the speed sensitive valving works well enough to still get a decent amount of nicely damped travel on rougher stuff. It seems particularly good on bigger hits, which is nice as I feel like I need a safety net in case I'm a bit front-heavy on the drop bars.

The cheapo Chinese dropper post is great too. I've put the seat up a bit from the pic below to pretty much full road pedalling height, which would be properly sketchy on off-road descents without the 100mm drop.

Shifting is now much, much better, but still not quite perfect. Because the road FD is designed for big 50t+ chain rings, it won't mount quite low enough on the seat tube - the water bottle mounts get in the way of the clamp. This means the FD cage is rubbing against the chain in gear combinations where the chain is slightly crossed.

If I can't fix this with fettling the cable tension (which I don't think will be possible as I've already spent a bit of time on the road fiddling with this), I think the only fix for this is going to be to (carefully!) file flat the protruding bottle mount on the seat tube so that the FD clamp can be set at the correct height - should be do-able!

Also need to figure out a way to fit a decent length front mudguard so that it will be stable off-road, which is proving to be a bit of a challenge!

 

[Pale Rider]

Also need to figure out a way to fit a decent length front mudguard so that it will be stable off-road, which is proving to be a bit of a challenge!

Suspension forks and mudguards do not go well together.

My factory fitted Riese and Muller ebike front mudguard uses a U-clamp over the fork bridge, and P style bands to hold the stays to the fork legs.

Sturdy enough for its intended road and gravel track use.

Not sure how long the mounts would last on a black route.

 

[ChrisEyles]

@Pale Rider that's what I'm struggling with. While I won't be bombing any black runs on this bike, it is going to be thrown down some reasonably chunky trails from time to time and any longer mud guard has a tendency to flap around a bit alarmingly close to the front tyre under these conditions.

Might need to get a special MTB specific guard, something like this (Zefal FM30). But I'd rather get what I've currently got in the shed to work with lots of zip ties if possible!

 

[Pale Rider]

The MTB guards are too short to be of much use, as I'm sure you know.

You could hang the guard from the fork bridge quite firmly with a couple of wide zip ties.

The stays on my bike are attached by a fairly wide P clip band, the width probably being key to the job working acceptably.

 

[ChrisEyles]

Yes, the MTB style guards are OK for keeping spray out of your face in my experience, but that's about it.

The front mudguard I've got doesn't have stays - it slots/locks into a bracket that would normally be bolted onto the wheel arch. Not only does my fork not have a mounting hold in the arch, since it's a Marzocchi it's also that iconic/silly "M" shape which makes it difficult to zip tie the guard securely underneath.

I reckon I'll be able to figure out something workable, it will just take a lot of faff time in the garage!

 

[ChrisEyles]

I'm being an idiot - will be much easier and less stressful to file a rebate in the FD clamp than file the bottle mount boss flat on the seat tube!

Managed to rig a pretty sturdy front mudguard mount out of zip ties and some sheet plastic, will test it out tomorrow.

Swapped the cushy saddle out for a nicer one, and fitted some new tyres - puncture resistant ones, as I've had about a dozen visits from the fairy over the last two months, a lot of hedge cutting and fly tipping around the trails near my new house!

 

[ChrisEyles]

Turns out the FD clamp didn't have enough meat on it to file a rebate for the bottle mount boss, so I had to file the frame instead.

A bit nerve wracking, but worked a charm without even scratching the paintwork

FD is now clamped about 5mm - 6mm lower, which makes all the difference.

 

[ChrisEyles]

So with FD, mudguards & puncture resistant tyres sorted, a proper ride was clearly in order.

Went out from the front door for a 34 mile mix of back roads, green lanes, bridleways and byways.

With all the recent rain it was stupendously muddy on the off-road sections (and some of the road sections too!).

The mudguards worked amazingly well. This is the first time I've tried full length mudguards on a MTB and I'm very pleased with them - no spray in the face at any point, no wet arse, and incredibly, my water bottle stayed fit to drink from the whole way around.

I was a bit worried about the guards flapping around on rough terrain and contacting the tyres, but so far this seems to be unfounded. The mount I devised for the front guard is rock solid so far, though I'll be keeping a close eye on it for a while yet. On one particularly muddy descent the build up of crap acted like a dragging rear brake until the backlog could clear, but other than that, no clearances issues, and the tyres shed mud well.

Ah yes, the tyres... I've had about a dozen flats over the last 8 week so I forked out for some Schwalbe GT 365s in 26 x 2.0. I really rate Schwalbes puncture resistant tyres, being a big fan of regular marathons for road use. I reckon about half of the time today I was riding through hedge clippings or bramble cuttings, so if the tyres are still at full pressure tomorrow, they've already been worth it! They feel nice and cushy, not too cumbersome on the road and surprisingly capable in the mud off-road. Need to experiment with tyre pressures a bit to find the sweet spot.

Road down a few impromptu streams and the mudguards did their thing nicely.

The fork feels lovely. Since servicing it I've not had to tweak it much, it just works and you forget that it's there, which is how things should be.

Will admit to getting off and walking on the trail above though. I've ridden it on my MTB and it's a blast - big (but still roll-able) root steps and lots of big loose rocks. Although I really like the feel of the drop bars off-road, they don't give the same confidence as a wider flat bar paired with a shorter stem.

The OS map came out quite a few times en route...

As did the thermos & snacks!

 

[ChrisEyles]

All in all a cracking ride and I'm very pleased with how the bike's turned out.

I really wish I'd finished this while we were still living in Devon, as it would have been ideal for riding up to Exmoor and turning off onto the bridleways.

For the riding available from the front door of our new house, I think it should be just the ticket.

 

[ChrisEyles]

Still a few little bits of fettling left to do - the cable tidies on the shifter outers need a bit of insulation tape adding to stop them moving; saddle could go back 5mm - 10mm; crank arms could probably do with some heli-tape on them as the toe-straps have already created visible rub in a single ride; lower limit screw needs checking on the RD as a bit noisy in the biggest sprocket.

Also got a couple of bits left to sell on as part of the project. At some point I'll add up the final costs and put them up on here, though it will be embarassingly over the intended budget!

 

[ChrisEyles]

Sorted the RD lower limit screw setting, popped some Heli tape on the cranks to protect from rub, and tidied up the shifter cable routing.

Final touch - £3 well spent on the 'bay

 

[ChrisEyles]

Just done some adding up and the total net cost for the bike came in at £314 - so a bit over the intended budget, but not quite as bad as I feared.

The bike came out a little different than my initial vision (which included a rigid fork and pannier rack) and seems to have ended up as a proper mongrel mish mash of MTB / touring bike.

Having ridden loads of different styles of bike over lots of different terrains, this build does seem to tick a lot of boxes for the riding I most enjoy doing. I wonder if something similar would work for a lot of other cyclists, or if it really is just an odd-ball one-off that I happen to like!

Gravel bikes do seem to be going this way, with suspension and dropper posts gradually being adopted, thoughI can't be dealing with 27.5" wheels or 1x12 gearing.

Given the current trend for creating a new name/genre for every bike model that's slightly different from most other bikes, what should it be called - Monstergravel perhaps?

The bike itself has already been christened by my friend who I went out for a ride with last week. Without giving me a chance to consider or object, it's now called "Doris"

 

[ChrisEyles]

Went out for a nice mixed road and bridleway ride with a friend this afternoon. After all the rain we've had, one of the bridleway rocky descents had turned into a river, it was an absolute hoot to pick our way down

The drop bars make it feel like you're riding a road bike down something you really shouldn't be