1991 Cannondale SM800 Beast of the East

aguycalled80

Retro Guru
This is a bike I don't have anymore, and ultimately a sad story, but I liked this bike as much as any I've ever built, so it's worth a post I think.

A very well used '91 Cannondale SM800.





I think it was mostly original. It had the Shimano DX group, but an XT rear derailleur, the push-push shifters - front one was broken of course - no tires, hopeless chain, dirty as heck. But for $40, not bad. And the original Pepperoni fork and roller stem with the Gecko decal on it was pretty cool.

I wanted to build it as a serious trail bike, as it was designed, but with a little modernity. First iteration was with black DX cantis, a Chromag riser, and a 9spd Microshift thumbshifter.





I shaved off the shift pods, went with a Sugino crank with a Rock Ring instead of a big ring, so it had very low gearing. I wasn't happy with the mismatched thumbshifter for the front, so instead I went with a set of NOS gripshifts. 8spd instead of 9 unfortunately. I swapped out the freehub body on the DX hubs, so I could run an 8 or 9spd cassette on the original wheelset.

In the end, the front end was just way too high, so instead a nice wide no-name flatbar. Then some fat Kenda Nevagal tires, Shimano DX clipless pedals, which I don't have cleats for but they look cool.





And there it is. Just a touch of modern, but mostly the way it was in 1991. I bought the wrong colour cable housing as you might notice. I'm a little colourblind though so I had put a bunch on before I realized.

I didn't get to ride it much as we had to move right after I finished it. Hard choices had to made; this went, as did my '91 Blizzard.

I sold it to a nice kid that just needed to get around, and he messaged me a week after to say it had been stolen. It really feels like a lot of very good work was wasted, but life goes on right?
 

Attachments

  • 31958160_10155212066302364_5783479794016452608_o.jpg
    31958160_10155212066302364_5783479794016452608_o.jpg
    234.4 KB · Views: 417
  • 31957374_10155212066367364_3988286603633098752_o.jpg
    31957374_10155212066367364_3988286603633098752_o.jpg
    252.9 KB · Views: 409
  • 33923071_10155252010017364_2446022319324266496_o.jpg
    33923071_10155252010017364_2446022319324266496_o.jpg
    153.5 KB · Views: 406
  • 38754420_10155402291312364_7295438832034381824_o.jpg
    38754420_10155402291312364_7295438832034381824_o.jpg
    115.9 KB · Views: 406
  • 47818824491_41c9e20094_o-001.jpg
    47818824491_41c9e20094_o-001.jpg
    269.7 KB · Views: 416
  • 47029234444_b7e3487384_o.jpg
    47029234444_b7e3487384_o.jpg
    455.6 KB · Views: 420
Re:

I built one of these a few years ago and loved it. But for some reason sold it and have regretted it greatly. Trying hard to find another one to build up.

Nice looking build.
 
Back
Top