1994 Kona Fire Mountain restoration project.

[Relliott6879]

She's back! After a hiccup with the courier's van breaking down :shock:, the frame arrived back with me this morning. In a happy coincidence, today is my birthday, so this has ended up a sort of present from me to me.

I don't know how many people on here have used Argos, but for those that haven't, I really can't recommend them enough. The genuine care and interest at the point of drop off was outstanding, going through every little detail in a structured, methodical manner to ensure everything was 'just so' and nothing missed. The frame and all the sundries arrived well packaged enough to survive a nuclear blast, everything bubble wrapped to death and insulated from eachother to be sure of no paint chips or scratches through things knocking together in transit. The quality of the work is something else, Argos have captured the deep red lustre of the original paint perfectly, if anything it's even deeper and sparklier (is that a word? it is now!) than factory.

As can be seen from the pictures, I've had a couple of extra bits done, namely Crud Catcher bosses and hydraulic hose guides for the Maguras. The next stage of the build will come when I get the wheels, a friend of mine is building them and I'm due to meet up with him on the weekend of Nov 5/6, then it will be off to Bikepost in Troon to have Mark Fidler fit the headset and bleed/fit the Maguras.

 

[ajm]

Re:

Superb! Out of interest, what sort of money are we talking about for that kind of job? My own is probably a bit too far gone to be worth doing, even with the sentimental aspect, but I have considered it...

 

[Relliott6879]

My total bill for the frame, forks, stem and sundries being painted, plus decals (supplied by me having bought them from Gil), being fitted, clear lacquer, extra braze ons, VAT and insured delivery, was £362.00. You can knock £130.82 off that though for the stem/sundries painting and braze ons, so you'd be looking at £231.18 or thereabouts for a frame and fork painted, stickered (if you're supplying), lacquered and delivered back to you.

 

[Paul R]

wow that is lovely congrats

 

[Ghosty]

Ooh that's looking good. The 'bronze' colour definitely exists as I've seen it on P2s on quite a few '94 Lava Domes. I think they'd switched to grey by 95/96 though.

I used to have a '92 Fire Mountain with XT M737. Was a good hack and handled okay but it was just too heavy for me to get on with- the '92 FM is non-butted cromoly so it wasn't far off being a gas pipe bike, it didn't quite have the precision of my Cinder Cone (butted) or Tufftrax (Tange MTB double butted). Also for some reason the geometry made it impossible to use, the pain it put on my lower back was awful.

I imagine this one will be a shade better than my FM, both aesthetically and handling-wise!

 

[Relliott6879]

This one has a single butted Tange frame and a triple butted Project 2 (says Spinner on the dropouts, so I don't know if they manufactured the P2 for Kona?). I weighed the bare frame and forks yesterday and they came up at 5.40lb/2.45 kg for the frame and 1.76lb/0.80 kg for the fork.

 

[Ghosty]

I was going to go and weigh my FM frame, but it seems someone's binned it. :|

 

[ajm]

...you'd be looking at £231.18 or thereabouts for a frame and fork painted, stickered (if you're supplying), lacquered and delivered back to you.

Thanks for that, I have occasionally wondered what this cost but never quite got round to asking for a quote. Quite reasonable for that quality of job, I'd say... bit too much to spend on my battered old frame though!

 

[Relliott6879]

bit too much to spend on my battered old frame though!

It wouldn't be a battered old frame by that point though, it'd come back looking brand new.

 

[ajm]

Re:

Well quite What I really meant was that it has issues deeper than paint, including some rust which is getting a bit out of hand now and a slightly mangled cable stop or two - all fixable, just not justifiable. It's been a great bike and I've had way more than my money's worth out of it over the years - by the sounds of it yours will be significantly better than new soon!