This is my first fixed gear bicycle. A fixed gear bicycle is a single speed bike which cog (the rear sprocket) is fixed with the hub. Therefore you can not coast, that is pedals are always spinning as you ride. Your legs are part of the machine, and you can easily sprint up or slow down. Building and customising a "fixie" is a terrible hobby for lots of people: fixedgeargallery.com is "an incredible collection of fixed gear bicycles from around the world", where each week about 50 new bikes are submitted. Just a fashion? I don't know, I just know that I have been dreaming of a fixed gear for years.
But I never had the fortune to bump into a free frame, neither enough money to buy the basic parts. Since you have to invest a reasonable amount of money on it. Until one night, walking my dog Ares in the neighbourhood, I found an abandoned touring Peugeot from the late 70 / 80's (?), without wheels. I removed everything unneeded (front and rear derailleur, front brake and lever, gear levers) and kept the crankset, fork, headset, stem and handlebars.
I decided to spend more than 350 euros for Surly front and rear New Hub's, 18t cog and lockring, a pair of Mavic A319 rims, spokes, a good Shimano chain, Salsa cross brake levers and of course tyres, tubes, tape etc. I could have ordered a complete fixed gear bicycle for about the same amount of money I spent for the single parts, but I didn't want to miss the thrill of building my fixie myself.
I started building the wheels, following this article on Wheelbuilding by the deceased bicycle (sub)culture guru Sheldon Brown. In addition to this guide, I would suggest to start by fixing the first three leading spokes and the following trailing spoke, in order to have a starting point for the inclination of the spokes with respect to the hub, which is not always intuitive for a beginner! Of course I put my first key-spoke wrong on the front wheel. I then passed to truing the wheels, using a good truing stand that I got for for 60 euros. Only at this point I realised that I couldn't mount tyres wider than 28", and that the A319 rims where useless and I could have bought cooler and thinner rims.
I
went for the 3/32" spacing for cog and chain, in order to keep the old
crank and chainwheel. I approached the moment where the assembly of the
basic machine was to be completed. I choose the small (42t) chainring
and crossed my fingers, hoping that the chain had a good line and
tension. I had to put some spacers on the rear axle and to remove the screws used to trim the wheel alignment from
the rear dropout, the chain
being otherwise either too long or too short. I started riding brakeless,
finding it quite easy to stop from the low paces I go here. The feeling
is simply great. I finally made my submission to fixedgeargallery.
Of
course I felt in love with my new bike and I wanted it to be as cool
and efficient as possible. I tried to remove one of the chainwheels,
but in doing so I broke 2 of the 3 bolts, since I screw them in too
tight (it is not a bad idea to find a torque wrench). It took me one
week to find spare bolts with spacers of the correct size, but finally
I removed the large (52t) chainring and mounted the smaller (42t) on
the outside of the crank.
I put black&orange
tape on the handlebars and, for a safe commuting, I mounted an old Modolo
front brake and a discreet Salsa cross lever. After some time riding at 42/18, I switched to the 52t chainwheel, and mounted mountain-bike clipless pedals.
I made an update on fixedgeargallery.
I plan to change the bottom bracket and crank with a Miche Primato Corsa. Eventually I'll buy a track frame and pass everything onto it!