Koga Miyata Ridge Runner...help info etc

Hi

As some of you may already know I drunkenly bid on this bike last night...and awoke to find I had won it! (Cummon how many of us have done that!) But for the money it seemed like a good deal! Any how I wanted it really for the DX bits (mechs, crankset, brakes etc) to upgrade my Marin Bear Valley. I struggled to find much info on Miyata MTBS seems more of a road bike brand...when I picked it up it was far from original spec and was being sold by a guy who bought large job lots of bikes...got them working then sold them on. So the wheelset was cruddy and the seatpost too small, pedals were junk etc etc. But the groupset was DX not the shifters and brake levers but the other parts so it gave me what I needed...

...So I was left with the frame. It is aluminium main triangle with cro-mo rear triangle and fat forks. From what I can see it is a bonded frame (similar to Dynatech) and has a cool cut out on the chainstay to allow clearance for the crankset. I just don't know much more about it...thinking its a 1990?? Its too small for me but as I say I bought it for a few key parts...Has a cool paint job with glitter in the black paint that sparkles in the small amount of sun it saw today...oh and anyone recognise the brake levers???

...So what is it? Is it any good? History, opinions etc welcome...

Doug

Very nice. It is a Miyata for the Japanese market, no Koga. Some of the graphics are typical Japanese (with sometimes interesting English). Not rarely the early 90s Miyata Jp mountainbikes came in very flamboyant loud paintschemes too, but this example looks relatively distinctive. Downhill champ Greg Herbold was sponsored by Miyata. He mainly raced Miyatas for the US market. Some of his frames share the graffiti like on your frame. Nice score.

For the European market Koga-Miyata had a model using an almost identical frame: the 1991 TerraRunner Carbolite. The kind of BB-yoke, the OS headtube and a couple more details explain your frame is a 1991 model.



The Koga has same lugs and tail, but carbon tubing in front triangle. The TerraRunner also has the tiny glitter particles in the paint.

Another variation was this US Miyata with aluminium front and rear triangle:

http://www.retrobike.co.uk/wiki/Miyata_ ... re_edition

Carbon front, aluminium tail and carbon front, carbon tail frames existed too.

Thanks for that I was tipped that you may well know what it was! Not sure what to do with it now as its not my size and I've stripped it of the bits I needed....

Doug

Well if you end up selling it can I get dibs - in Wokingham if that helps with postage. What does the tt measure in at?