Retro & classic bicycle discussion forums, classifieds, events & news

It held off some mighty impressive builds, the power of Orange !!

Here is the winner of the April POTM competition.. CherryMatt’s Pace RC100 in a Bluebell wood, a very retro scene indeed..

This just in from Joel Smith from Tomac Bikes on the new Tomac DB10.

-The working name of the bike has been the DB10 (drop bar 10 years, 10 total to be built)
-This is the ten year anniversary of the Tomac brand, and this limited edition bike to commemorate the occasion.
-Johnny raced in drops back in 1990 and 1991. He was racing pro on the road as well as in the dirt and was very comfortable racing with drops.
-Custom build with straight gauge chromoly tubes by Chris Herting and custom painted by Spectrum Powder Works

The Background Story by Joel Smith
Johnny raced his drop bar bike back in 1990, at the time when I was racing Expert-level cross country and I saw him race the bike at Mammoth. He was absolutely flooring it, screaming by people on the descents, and I was highly impressionable when it was my cycling hero. The day I got home, I pulled an old set of bend drop bars out of a trash can at the local bike shop, took the shifters and road levers off a bike that someone had abandoned in our college house basement, and converted my mountain bike. Since that day, I’ve always wanted to make another one, but do it the right way.

I knew that Zap had the original drop bar bike that Johnny raced. It was given to him by John Parker back in the day and it is Zap’s prized procession. Anyway, I talked to Zap and he shipped it to Chris and Chris took all of the measurements off of it. We really wanted it to be a modernized version of the old bike, so while we kept the basic geometry the same, we wanted to have improvements to make it rideable by today’s standards. The DP10 has disc brake tabs, 73mm bb and standard head tube for a threadless headset. The fork was actually custom painted by Spectrum to resemble the original Answer/Manitou fork that he was riding at that time. The fork is actually a R7. The bike has original Johnny T signature Cinelli bars that we bought brand new out of someone’s private stash in Germany. The only branding on the frame is the Johnny signature on the top tube. Tomac’s Clarke Dolton managed the project throughout the process.

Click for rest of article (more…)

That’s right! Retrobike.co.uk have a half page feature in the May 2008 edition of the UK’s original MTB mag – MBUK.
The magazine is in your local newsagent now so best rush out and get it – the mag even includes a puncture repair kit as a double bonus.
A little discussion in the forum here.

A great pic to win the ‘Two Wheeled Landscape’ competition: Look out for the next POTM competition in the forum..

The winner in the March 2008 Bike Of The Month contest (Titanium special) is Skide’s Funk Ti. One rare machine!

What better to drink a cup of builders tea out of whilst spannering up one of your fine retro bikes than a retrobike mug.

After the first batch sold out in 12 hours the second batch has arrived. These are also selling out in record time.

If you’d like one please paypal £11 for UK or £14 for non UK (airmail on these is strong!!) to admin@retrobike.co.uk

Take a look at the Chat Forum and see the challenge for those who are up for it !!!

you’ll meet the Retrobike mods… so be afraid be very afraid and don’t forget your banjo….

Another winner from over La Manche (is this a conspiracy ??) Albatros’ 1995 Emery Primo

Very nice work..

Gus wins our first Action shot competition with this shot of Mrs Wu out on her Dekerf, a top pic and worthy winner..

It’s not often we feature someones bike on the home page unless they have won a BOTM vote, however I think for this piece of history we can make an exception!! Bushpig’s Cunnigham is quite a machine and an interesting story behind it, read more at Readers Bikes…..

The mighty Gump will be leading you all around the best that Afan has to offer, not to be missed !!

Independent minded.
Original.
A person with a sense of humor.
Somebody who doesn’t take himself too seriously.

Thats is how Sheldon Brown described himself and all of you familiar with his site will attest to that fact, it’s probably how most bike enthusiasts would like to be remembered. Over the years we have all come to rely on Sheldon and his encyclopedia of bike knowledge, the SeatPost chart has saved me much time and effort.

So, now he’s gone to a place where there are no cars and just miles of endless flowing singletrack weaving among the clouds, wonder if he’ll show god how to roll a steel beed tire for tight packing !!

Thanks for everything mr Brown…

BOTM winner in our KONA special is kase1983′s Kona Hot, a quality winner in a stiff competition..