converting a small mtb to a road bike

My daughter saw a crit two weeks ago, and is now interested in entering a crit herself in the 10-12
age group. Being on a constrained budget, I'm thinking how to convert one of yet to be used bikes to
an appropriate contender without spending hundreds of dollars to get her started.

Here's what I have. A 15" Giant triple butted MTB, 26" Fat Boy 100
psi tires. 7 speed, shimano compact rear hub 36 spoke, and Specialized/Wheelsmith 36 spoke front.

I have a number of road bars and stems that will fit the 1" headset. Done.

Brakes are cantilever, shifter is underbar Deore pods index. What are my options here?

Can I use road bike brake levers on c-brakes?

I'm not certain what to do with the shifters except to go used STI. That's bucks.

Switching the chainwheel to dual road chainwheels should be no problem, I have an array of CW's.

Could this work and perform well. (I noticed that her field of competition in junior girls 10-12 is
very small. Probably so small that in medals for the first 5 places, they might have some prizes
left over).

Thanks/

Wynn

 

A shy person wrote:

> My daughter saw a crit two weeks ago, and is now interested in entering a crit herself in the
> 10-12 age group. Being on a constrained budget, I'm thinking how to convert one of yet to be used
> bikes to an appropriate contender without spending hundreds of dollars to get her started.
>
> Here's what I have. A 15" Giant triple butted MTB, 26" Fat Boy 100
> psi tires. 7 speed, shimano compact rear hub 36 spoke, and Specialized/Wheelsmith 36 spoke front.
>
> I have a number of road bars and stems that will fit the 1" headset.

Sounds like a good plan. Normally you'd want a stem with a shorter extension for
converting to drops.

> Brakes are cantilever, shifter is underbar Deore pods index. What are my options here?

Option A. Shimano Sora ergos ($130) These work very well, and are adjustable for smaller hands. Only
downside is that the front one isn't perfectly compatible with her present front derailer.

A 1997 RSX front derailer will fix that, if the bike can use a 1 1/8 or 1 1/4 bottom pull.
http://sheldonbrown.com/harris/derailers.html#front

Option B. Bar end shifters. This won't be much cheaper 'cause you also need to buy brake levers. The
Sora STIs are the only drop bar levers with a reach adjustment for small hands.

> Can I use road bike brake levers on c-brakes?

No problem.

> I'm not certain what to do with the shifters except to go used STI. That's bucks.
>
> Switching the chainwheel to dual road chainwheels should be no problem, I have an array of CW's.

Oh, if you go for a double, there won't be any problem with front STI shifting.

> Could this work and perform well.

Yep.

See http://sheldonbrown.com/parts

Sheldon "Sora, Sora, Sora" Brown +-------------------------------------------------------+
| Let us endeavor so to live that when we come to die | even the undertaker will be sorry. --Mark
| Twain |
+-------------------------------------------------------+ Harris Cyclery, West Newton, Massachusetts
Phone 617-244-9772 FAX 617-244-1041 http://harriscyclery.com Hard-to-find parts shipped Worldwide
http://captainbike.com http://sheldonbrown.com

 

On Mon, 02 Jun 2003 16:42:10 -0400, Sheldon Brown <[email protected]> wrote:

>Sheldon "Sora, Sora, Sora" Brown

Que sora, sora?

Jasper "hiding from the angry mob" Janssen