1991 Marin Pine Mountain Build

[Cetim]

This is going to be a long one!

I've always liked the Zolatone Marins and picked up this '91 Pine Mountain frame from a bike recycling place local to me. It needs repainting as the seatpost appears to have been removed using heat which ruined the paint.

I have a DX groupset waiting for it and have checked with Gil for decal availability.


Couple of pics. Have now worked out how to embed.

Pine Mountain Build

Pine Mountain Build


I'm going to strip the zolatone off and try it with stone chip paint first which someone on another forum showed me the pics of. If that doesn't work, I'll investigate powdercoating.

I have the right stem and bars which I'll paint fluro orange and I'll find forks and paint to match.

I'm not going for OEM just period correct. So mainly DX with some XT with thumbies instead of rapid fire and maybe some other upgrades. Will see how I get on.

To be continued.............

 

[WandsworthRouleur]

Re: 1990 Marin Pine Mountain Build

You can't beat Zolatone. Still looks great and modern today. I had a Zolatone Eldridge Grade BITD (XT Rapidfire+ with the rest DX). First proper MTB. Loved that bike...

 

[brocklanders023]

Re:

Marin projects are always good and the 90 PM is second only to the 90 Team in my favorite Marins.

Have a search around the forum for Zolatone solutions as there were a few threads trying to recreate the finish a couple of years ago.

 

[Cetim]

Re: 1990 Marin Pine Mountain Build

To break the monotony of sanding the old paint off, I started thinking about the saddle.

I have a nice Flite which I was going to use but I don't find them particularly comfy.

I have this old Velo which is like an armchair to sit on. It had red panels at the back though which won't match the grey/flouro orange of the PM.

Untitled

I bought some bright orange leather shoe dye and applied. It said to apply two coats but I've ended up using most of the bottle.

Came out well and the colour should tie in nicely to the forks/stem.

Untitled

Back to sanding......

 

[Silvergoat]

Re:

Ah, this takes me back. My first mtb was a charcoal zolatoned Palisades Trail (or the one with neon yellow stem, bars & fork). Have very fond memories of it. After saving up for a bit, I managed to buy some early Rockshox for it off a mate. Unfortunately some little toe rag stole it one day. I'm looking forward to watching your build and seeing how you recreate the zolatoned look.

 

[Cetim]

Re: 1990 Marin Pine Mountain Build

Thanks, looking forward to getting stuck into it.

I bought grey stonechip paint, etch primer and flouro orange paint at the weekend in readiness.

One thing I have realised after checking the serial no. is that it is actually a 91 Pine Mountain so a slightly darker Zolatone.

 

[Minifreak]

Good work dying the saddle corners, great attention to detail

 

[Silvergoat]

Re:

plus one for the saddle! Think the 1990 models used a [paler] grey zolatone and the 1991 models were specced with "charcoal zolatone".

 

[Rotorhead]

Re:

Just seen this project and I love it. How are you getting on? I'm hopefully attaching a pic of my 1991 Pine Mountain which I finished early in July. Mine was in pretty good nic when I got it so nothing like what you've taken on. It rides beautifully so it's worth keeping going. One tip: Gil dis me some great decals but some of them were larger proportions than the originals so worth specifying exact sizes if you're going that route.

 

[Cetim]

Re:

Funny that you should ask this, I was actually just about to do an update.

The project kind of took a sideways step as they have a habit of doing, I'm still doing the Pine Mountain, I just got distracted by another.

As the PM was just a bare frame, I was on the lookout for fork, stem, bars etc. I decided to buy a 91 Eldridge Grade frameset as it would came with all those things plus a seatpost, headset and BB. The forks had faded from red to orange as well.

However when it arrived, I realised it was a 92, although still in Zolatone and the stem and bars are different and the tube sizes were different so the seatpost didn't fit. It was also in far too nice a condition to split up. I just couldn't do it.

Untitled by Mac74, on Flickr

Looking at my stash of parts, I decided I could just about build them both, so as the EG was more or less ready, I started with it first.

The paint was basically good but there were a couple of areas where it had rubbed and I touched these up with the grey stonechip and textured paint combo that matches the darker Zolatone finish quite well.

The forks and stem had faded but were basically good. The colour would have been bright fluro red originally but looks orange in certain lights, you can see that from the photos. I'm going with orange as that is what it appears as the most.

Untitled by Mac74, on Flickr

I fitted the saddle from the PM and polished up the Marin Lite seatpost.

I'd got hold of a set of Marin bar ends but they were quite scuffed and I don't really like ski bend ones, so out with the hacksaw then a good polish with wet and dry and I had these nice stubby ones.

Untitled by Mac74, on Flickr

IMG_0133 by Mac74, on Flickr

I got hold of a blue Marin bottle cage from a bike recycling shop and stripped it back. It was a bit bent, so straightened it as best I could. It then got a couple of coats of etch primer.

Untitled by Mac74, on Flickr

IMG_0131 by Mac74, on Flickr

While I was doing that, I polished up the Deore cantis, I had.

Painted the cage in bright orange. I'll probably fit this to the PM eventually as I think it will match the colour better.

IMG_0138 by Mac74, on Flickr

Stripped and polished a set of M62(?) brake levers, which match the cantis well. Bit earlier than the 92 frame but still would have been used back then. I'm going with thumbshifters, so need the separate brake levers.

IMG_0111 by Mac74, on Flickr

After a lot of cleaning and polishing and getting some retroesque Ritchey foam grips in orange, I was ready to go. The groupset is not OEM and is a bit of a mix. There's a lot of Deore stuff, the chainset is Deore LX and the pedals were going to be M737 spds but I found a set of Ritchey ones which I've used.

BPQC0106 by Mac74, on Flickr

Assemble was reasonably straightforward, I was in no rush and most stuff bolted on OK. I always struggle to get the Shimano link wire brake set up right, and it took a while. The brakes have standard Deore pads, which while basically unused are pretty ineffectual at actually stopping. I have some koolstops which I may put on.

Halfway there.

IMG_0139 by Mac74, on Flickr

And the finished item. Haven't had a chance to ride it yet as too busy today and the weather was so bad, I felt guilty about taking it out like that for the first time. I will be using it and getting it muddy but there has been a lot of polishing that I want to keep it clean for a little bit longer yet!

IMG_0158 by Mac74, on Flickr


Pleased with how it turned out. Lets me get on with the Pine Mountain now, will update on it soon.