96 Koa-splosion: budget bodge retromod

TheAntsPants

Devout Dirtbag
Finally got my hands on a smaller sized retro Kona for the shorter members of the family. I forgot to take a "before" photo, but it was original spec in barely rideable condition.

Long story short, I've torn her down and "modernised" her to 1X8 speed, short stem and v-brakes. I also upgraded a few parts pulled from my Explosif and the parts bin. To get it all working took a fair bit of hacking and some new parts.



The worst part was finding a shorter stem that would work with a threaded 1 1/8" steerer. No luck, so I (literally) hacked my own solution. Now I have my own quill-to-ahead stem adapter! I replaced the stock P2 fork with the triple butted one from the Explosif for some weight reduction, hence the exposed steerer thread. Notice the black spacer under the headset to accommodate this.


A period correct (!) light mount was modded to serve as a chain guide, so I could get rid of the front derailleur as well. It still needs a bash guard to stop the chain falling off the other side though.

More pics to come.
 

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Re:

Nice. I'm quite into a bit of budget bodge retromodding too, so will be interested to see how the Kona goes. I'm liking the period correct light mount reimagined as a chain guide – I'm running a single ring on a modded 'Sugino-alike' cheap crank and would love to ditch the front derailleur and everything that goes with it but have been wondering how to keep the chain from flying off at the worse moment, without spending a fortune. That BB has seen better days – dread to think what state mine is in. Good luck with the build.
 
Re:

Why not buy a quill to ahead adapter instead of ruining a velocity stem that could of been useful to somebody? The adapter is less than a tenner :roll:
 
Re:

SEANSTEPHENS":1k26pis2 said:
Why not buy a quill to ahead adapter instead of ruining a velocity stem that could of been useful to somebody? The adapter is less than a tenner :roll:

I did look in to that, but in this neck of the woods (Australia), retro mtb is not that big and the cheapest adaptor I could find was one quarter the price of the whole bike.

I've still got the other half if you want it :LOL:
 
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