1987 cannondale SM600

Dr S

Old School Grand Master
At last its more or less finished- until the correct frorks and front brake turns up that is.
This is a late 86 (built for 87 model year) SM600 and it has been rebuilt to match the one I bought BITD as an apprentice engineer. The original bike did thousands of miles before being stolen from my garage in 1995.

It has been the most difficult build I have done. These early parts are hard to come by- especially some of the low rent parts like foam grips and plastic pedals. The front mech was particularly hard to find in the right size. I ended up getting a smaller clamp size and milling it out to fit.

It is about 70-80% correct- as I have mentioned it has the wrong forks, the original ones I found turned out to be bent and cracked at the crown.

Brake levers are not correct as they should have plastic lever blades, these were too badly damaged to go on so a pair of Dia compe 4 finger jobbies donated its blades which were machined down and drilled to fit the Suntour bodies.

The SM600 had Suntour XC Sport mechs originally but I went for period correct Shimano M700 Deer head mechs as I did on my old bike BITD- shift quality was far better even with Suntour shfters still in place.

Other jobs to do include making some new Chromo spindles to fit the MKS Grafight pedals that i have- these were originally specced but I have given up trying to find any MTB ones so have a pair of NOS BMX ones to fit.

I'll post a full spec later but heres a few pics for now. I hope you like it, a lot of pain and long hours on eBay went in to this...

sm600-1.jpg


sm600-2.jpg


sm600-5.jpg


sm600-3.jpg
 
Very cool, such attention to detail. A real labour of love no less! Its nice to see a bike that is built to reflect something that you had BITD - I think everyone should have one! ;)
 
Love it. Looks great. Are the bar and stem BMX-derived 22mm? If so, what bars did you use?

Reason I ask is I've got hold of a fine nitto golf-club stem for an 1985 build and I'm in two minds whether or no to go with 22mm motorbike bars or get it machined to 25.4.
 
doctor-bond":2zeyki3c said:
Love it. Looks great. Are the bar and stem BMX-derived 22mm? If so, what bars did you use?

Reason I ask is I've got hold of a fine nitto golf-club stem for an 1985 build and I'm in two minds whether or no to go with 22mm motorbike bars or get it machined to 25.4.

Hi,
Yes this was another problem. i could not find any risers in the right size to fit the stem (an original spec SR 130) so I machined the stem out to 25.4 and fitted some Cannondale Coda Risers which I had powder coated to match the frame.
SM600s in this year were specced with a flat bar but the one I bought in 1987 had risers on it straight from the shop!

Thanks for all you kind comments guys. I'm looking forward to a gentle pootle around the park this week on it. Its not going to get any serious off road action as its been too hard a build to stack- it probably rides horrible compared to my other stuff anyway :LOL:

Cheers

Si
 
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