£10 skip find - Kona Lava Dome 1997 - finished build photos

I moved house last weekend, and on a trip to the skip with various house rubbish my eye caught the collection of rusted bikes. Low and behold a 1997 Kona Lava Dome was there, rusting slightly and covered in green slime. All alone in the pouring rain.

Worth a punt for £10 I thought.

I've been looking at it when I can this week and a simple clean with muc off has shown it to be in much better nick than I thought.
The seatpost came out at only the second time of asking and the paintwork, although from from being perfect, is also far from needing a respray at the moment (imho). Original decals are also in a good state with the Kona Cromoly and Race Light decals still there as well.

Some nasty Shimano Acera parts are on it and rusting out - I'll have to junk the cassette, front mech, chain etc, but some alright finishing kit such as a club roost bar (including brace), planet x stem and a few other bits to take me back to when I first got into bikes. Also some bling green tektro brake boosters (brace things, forgive my ignorance on what they are technically called). The front wheel looks ok and just in need of a slight truing, the back is missing a couple of spokes but may be ok for parts.

Just in the process of cleaning it up, checking the headset and bottom bracket and seeing where to go from there. Tempted to look for some P2's to restore it to its orginal forked state. At the moment there are some black suntour forks but missing all decals so I'm unsure what they are. I'll take them apart this weekend and see if I can shed any light, the only thing I know is that they are black, have magnesium lower legs, made in Taiwan (think suntour moved production there in the late 1990s). They are cleaning up ok and movement is good on the traditional push down on the handlebar test so they should be salvageable!

I'm afraid my home internet isn't working until the 12th but I'll put some photos up as soon as I can. Any experts on suntour forks who can point me in the right direction please feel free to help!

This is my first build and i'm loving it, scouring around for bits. I will upset the purists by not putting original buits on it but I don't want to put cheap shimano bits which don't work back on it. I have sourced SLX shifters and levers from a 1998 GT Backwoods which should do the job perfectly well.

I have access to some immaculate Bomber (Z2's) as well so I am considering putting them on as I think they'll compliment the steel frame quite nicely.

Sounds like a good find. The frame's got to be worth more than £10!
I'm sure most people here will tell you to ditch the Suntour fork and get a P2 to replace it.

I think you'll find they're STX shifters not SLX!

Looking forward to a pic or two!

S8-Tom

Definitely agree, the suntour forks are going. Unsure of whether to go Z2 or P2 but will probably go for P2 and make it a leightweight sigletrack dream as it was meant to be

Great find!

For forks I would go for the P2's or some other forks from Rock Shox or Manitou.

I am looking forward to looking at the pictures!
Good luck with the bike.

Cheers,

Aaldert

Two things in particular I pick out of what you have said:

1. I have one of these, and I agree that the metallic paint quality is very good - better than either the Kilauea or the Explosif that year. I would just repair it if possible, and benefit from that basic good quality.

2. I was saying to myself this is a frame for a Z2 and then I read that you have one available - use it, the frame is a really good quality double-butted, the same as the Cinder Cone, and a classic upgrade platform - every bit worthy of using such a great fork.

Excellent find and well done for spotting it, but forget about value, this is one to keep.

I've always thought Kona bikes made really good all round play bikes. Great standover height, they look cool even when they are a big size.

Put on a short stem, riser bars, good pedals, brakes and forks and you've got a great bike.

I remember loads of the richer kids from another school when I was younger (around 9 had Konas setup just like this for riding DH.

Old rusting kit removed, in with my LBS to get new headset fitted. Then I can really start work seriously on getting it sorted out. Want it ready as soon as possible. Have sourced an STX front mech in mint condition for cheap as chips which is better than the original and of the era. Also have some triple butted P2's so have the choice of Bomber Z2s or P2s - think I'll decide once I have the other kit on.

My machine wasn't liking the link... so....



Looks like it needs some TLC, but a good find. Reminds me of one I had once upon a time!

Need to post the address of the pic itself between {img}blah{/img} but square brackets not curly ones