1990 Cannondale SM700 rebuild

[duncanthomas]

I picked up this 1990 Cannondale SM700 a couple of years ago. It was pretty rough and well-used. Not much of the original groupset remained, and the previous owner had upgraded it over the years. Some serious Cannondale quick-release paint on this one! Also cool that it was optioned with the Pepperoni fork.






I serviced it with fresh cables, pads, tyres, etc., and smashed around on it for a while on some local trails and with the dog. Very ugly, but loads of fun.






With the paint bubbling away, I decided to start to strip it back before it started to eat into the aluminium.

 

[duncanthomas]

I stripped the frame with paint stripper then gave it a light sand blast to help the paint key into it, gave it a coat of etch primer, and then a couple of coats of gloss black. Not a pro job, but I'm pretty happy with how it turned out.

 

[duncanthomas]

Last weekend, I built up my courage and had a go at redoing the splatter paint. Turned out to be loads of fun, and I'm pretty happy with how it came out. I had a friend’s frame as a bit of a reference. Probably went a bit heavy on the fork, but I like it.

In the end I found a kitchen fork and a palette knife with the right consistency of paint worked the best for the splatters.









This is where I'm up to currently. The next step will be installing the new decal set I got from Retro Decals, then giving it a couple of coats of clear.

 

[Y282]

Love this. My favourite generation of Cannondales.

 

[duncanthomas]

I installed the new decal set from Retro Decals this morning. Now I need to build up the courage to clear coat it all!

 

[CTK]

Fair play great job!

 

[paddlingpool]

Looks great

 

[trailwright]

What a brilliant restoration you've done. I sighed when I saw the stripped back frame little knowing you had all the gear to make it look better than the original.

And what a bargain price too with all those XT bits. Are you going down the original spec route or at least more period parts where they were absent?

 

[duncanthomas]

Thanks for all the positive feedback!
Parts wise I’ve been slowly collecting and cleaning up M730/735 XT parts. Still a few bits to locate but nearly there.

 

[trailwright]

Good to see the progress. However, please for the love of the baby jesus, remove the dork disk, go to your nearest body of water, and skim it across to a watery grave.