Dumpster + Stumpjumper = Dumpjumper

1988 Specialized Stumpjumper in size 21.5 inches, as found in a dumpster.

Please note that the following post will likely only appeal to and/or be comprehensible by the most bike nerdish among visitors here. You are hereby warned and/or welcomed.

I've fished many a bike out of dumpsters over the years. I don't generally go looking for them, but they often have a way of finding me. Some have been complete basket cases and others have only needed air in the tires. Yet, what never fails to amaze me is finding a decent quality bike tossed in the trash. Old bikes aren't like old computers, in that they never become completely obsolete or unusable. Old bikes aren't like old cars, in that they don't degenerate into egregious polluting money pits, but instead are cheap and easy to recondition. Old bikes aren't like old furniture or mattresses, in that they don't absorb unappealing substances from previous owners.

I can understand rationalizing the discarding of a less than functional department store bike that was never engineered to work well in the first place. That which is nearly useless readily becomes useless. However, bikes that were at least initially high in quality of materials and construction, unless mangled, are almost always repairable into good running condition. This goes doubly so for steel mountain bikes from the off road boom era of the 1980s; with sturdy tubing, user serviceable components, and lack of suspension, they're almost indestructible.

Don't get me wrong. I don't pine for the old days and I'm no longer the Luddite I once was concerning the evolution of bike design. I appreciate lugs and fancy steel, but I also know that great advances have been made in materials and technology, and that, venerable as they are, these sturdy old steel bikes are no match off road for something more modern, like my Salsa Horsethief for example.

On the other hand, I'm certain that with proper care the long-term viability of an old steel monolith will far outpace many modern bikes in the utility department, most likely to the tune of decades. There are far fewer things to go wrong with these old bikes as compared to newer bikes, and equivalent parts are still readily available. With components in good order, a set of lights, a pair of fenders, and some method to carry cargo, an old steel mountain bike can't be outmatched for usefulness.

Deore index/friction thumbshifters and Deore 4-finger brake levers.

Now for a little velo-pathology to explore how this bike may have traversed the past quarter century. This particular Stumpjumper seems to have spent much of its life dormant, stored somewhat haphazardly, and perhaps used intermittently. It has plenty of telltale signs of neglect, in the form of nicks and scratches in random places, probably from being leaned against things or falling against other items in a shed or garage, and a veneer of dried on grease and oil from infrequent maintenance. The underside of the downtube is mostly free of rock strikes and the drive-side chainstay shows little sign of chain slap, so I'd wager that the bike traveled most of its miles on smooth surfaces in town as opposed to rough trails.

Non drivetrain side. Notice the pronounced bend in the rear rack's shelf and support struts.

The remains of a decal that once proclaimed the bike's chromo tubing and Taiwanese manufacture.

That's a solid forged aluminum stem. They don't make 'em like that any more. The stem alone probably weighs more than a modern carbon frame.

Though this bike likely hasn't seen a lot of miles, it had no easy life. It spent enough time outside for the graphics to fade, and there is a bit of surface rust where the steel has been exposed due to paint chips. The components that are still present are without exception original and stock, even down to the grips.

The drivetrain and brakes are Shimano Deore, from back in the days when Deore was on the penultimate tier of Shimano's off road lineup. The cranks are in good shape, and the teeth of the very '80s Biopace chainrings look healthy. Bearings haven't fared as well, as the bottom bracket is indexed, and the headset is in poor adjustment. However, the open seat tube is not rusted, and the chain is oily and moves freely. The derailleurs look fine and move well, but the cables and housing are sluggish and gummy. The shifters are intact, though the mount for the left shifter is bent. The good thing is that all the components on this bike are rebuildable, and the bearings are easily replaceable if needed.

There are a few additions to the bike that have occurred over the years. Though now badly bent, a period concurrent, white Blackburn Mountain Rack was a common addition to many bikes of the era. There is evidence of bar ends once installed but now gone, a sign of an update in the early to mid '90s when bar ends enjoyed popularity. A cycle computer mount at the rear wheel, indicates this bike was probably used on a stationary trainer at some point. Bright red paint under the upper and lower Zefal plastic pump mounts along the back of the seat tube signal that they were probably installed at or near the time of purchase.

Drive side top tube.

Drive side down tube.

Non drive side top tube.

Non drive side down tube.

As its year of manufacture is the same as that when I finished high school, bikes much like this one dotted the college campus of my undergraduate career. Distinctive two-tone paint schemes, unique to 1988 and 1989 Specialized bikes, seemed omnipresent for many years.

This Stumpjumper is readily identifiable as being an '88, due to its under the chainstay u-brake, a feature adopted by most manufacturers for a brief period spanning from about 1986 to 1988. Builders and riders went crazy for u-brakes because of the clean looking cable lines and the u-brake's powerful stopping ability. The popularity abruptly ended once the same builders and riders realized that under the chainstay was a less than convenient location for brake maintenance and made for a tremendous mud and debris catchment area. I've owned a few such u-brake equipped bikes, and though the reason the design was quickly dropped remains potentially problematic, the brakes are dependable and powerful if properly adjusted.

I've yet to get my hands dirty with this Stumpjumper, but that I will rebuild it is not in doubt. I'm happy to have saved the bike from an ignominious end, and I know it has at least a couple more decades of service within its capacity. Whether it will be with me or with someone else is yet to be determined.

Bikes like this Stumpjumper are the antecedent to a growing renaissance of steel, multipurpose, high utility bikes, such as the Surly Long Haul Trucker and the Surly Troll, among others. While at present it seems absurd that a desirable Surly frame will ever make its way to a dumpster, 25 years ago it seemed equally improbable to one day discover a Stumpjumper in the trash. I can only hope that in another quarter century, I'll be the lucky one to find a crusty old Troll next to yesterday's coffee grounds.

I threw on a pair of wheels to get a visual. My parts bin came up short in the quest for a 26.6 mm seatpost. 

Mountain towns, bikes, and rain

The Mountain Fair in Carbondale had lots of bikes around, and perhaps the biggest concentration of Xtracycles per capita of any place I've been.

We managed to squeeze in a little travel before school starts again, by making a (rare for us) trip into the mountains. It takes so much coordination for all of us to go anywhere that we don't often lug ourselves someplace where we're not obliged to go. It was refreshing to get away, even for a little while, though the traffic both ways didn't do much to dissuade my frustration of crowded driving in the mountains. We ended up visiting Aspen, Carbondale, and Glenwood Springs.

Mountain towns offer some great bike spotting opportunities for an aging bike nerd such as me. The bikes to be seen did not disappoint. Foremost in my notice are the many vintage mountain bikes, some of which exhibit evidence of years of heavy action, while others appear nearly unused.  I saw far more neat old bikes than I had the chance to photograph,  but here are a few that I captured.

This circa early 1950s cantilever framed Schwinn has a bent seatpost and a newer saddle, but otherwise looked to be in fine riding condition with an admirable patina.

A matched pair of retina-jarring early '90s Klein Rascals shod in old time-y Specialized Ground Control skinwall tires, now pressed into kid transport service.

Lousy photo aside, this 1988 Fisher Hoo-Koo-E-Koo was mostly original, sporting a pair of Fisher Fattrax tires. Fisher Fattrax were my favorite treads from the old days, but were discontinued nearly 25 years ago.

Aspen's bike sharing system, known as We-Cycle, appeared to be well utilized and contributed to the town's bike-friendly vibe.

Of course the girls found lots of things to experience. The townspeople were friendly and happy to accommodate, especially at the Aspen Volunteer Fire Department.

A balloon unicorn and balloon Elmo came along for the ride. 

Back at home, we've had a lot of rain since Monday. Although this is Colorado's monsoon season, it seems as though the rain has been more intense the past couple of years. I suppose that's good for keeping wildfires at bay, though I'm certainly not accustomed to overcast, wet days. I don't know how people in wet climes survive.

The view from my office window is of pouring rain.

I took advantage of a break in the weather to take a Denver B-cycle ride, and ended up riding the elusive white B-cycle.

An enterprising fellow poses with his super chopper near the South Platte river.

A little tough to see in this shot, but that's a guy on a penny farthing commuting home from Denver to Golden. He's been an icon in the area for decades. I've talked to him on several occasions, but can't remember his name at the moment. 

Cherry Creek had been flowing over this bridge along the bike path moments before, as a result of an intense thunderstorm.

To complete a trifecta of oversized bikes spotted, I waited for the train with a doused hipster and his double decker bike. 

New bike instructive stickers in a light rail vehicle.

A fairly recently installed bike box near the Webb Building in central downtown Denver seems to be well utilized. 

My intrepid aspiring photographer enjoyed shooting some art at the Denver Art Museum.

1984 Miyata Ridge Runner revamp

The Ridge Runner in its revamped form.

There has been a dearth of posts around here, which is usually accompanied by a surfeit of goings-on, as has been the case recently. Fortunately, my readership likely numbers in the single digits, so few, if any, have probably noticed. In any case, this latest installment outlines the recent rebuild of my 1984 Miyata Ridge Runner.

For years, I pined for my first Miyata; my original mountain bike that I had stupidly sold long ago. When I found a Ridge Runner as a replacement earlier this year, it was mostly stock, and had been seemingly unused for much of its life. As it turns out, lack of use is both a good and bad situation when it comes to the longevity condition of a bike. It took me some time to take the Ridge Runner apart, inspect it, and put it back together. Along the way, I rebuilt everything that could be rebuilt, and even so, had to substitute several items for those that were no longer up to par.

Join me now, on a whimsical adventure as I strip the frame and reassemble it, as only an old bike nut can.

First sign of trouble. The bottom bracket exhibited considerably less than free rotational action. At about this point, I began to wonder if only old timers like myself still possess semi-obsolete bottom bracket tools such as this. 

That is 29 years worth of old, waxy grease that no longer has any lubricating value. Difficult to spot in this photo are the tiny fragments of metal embedded throughout. You got it, a shattered bearing.

On the positive, inside the frame was clean and without any sign of rust.

My suspicions were borne out after cleaning the spindle, when the drive side race was clearly pitted. One of the ball bearings had mostly disintegrated at some point in the distant past, and its fragments subsequently chiseled away at the race.

Next up was the rear derailleur. The upper pulley of the SunTour MounTech derailleur had a thick wad of waxy grease and an impressive quantity of embedded hair wrapped around it. I don't know why, but hair often ends up in pulley wheels. 

Having things apart allowed me to confirm, as suspected, the frame features SunTour dropouts.

I cleaned the derailleur thoroughly. I have some experience with this era of SunTour derailleurs, which have an extra spring-loaded pivot housed in the center of the upper pulley which is incredibly difficult to service. The pivot is more than likely to explode if an attempt is made to open it. 

I cleaned the derailleur, but could not get the upper pulley to spin freely without an obvious feeling of gritty, impeded movement.  In the end, rather than destroy the MounTech derailleur in an attempt to make it serviceable, I decided to use a different derailleur. In the old days, most of the SunTour Mountech derailleurs from 1983 and 1984 were replaced under warranty anyway, so a replacement is in keeping with the practice of of this era. Apparently, the MounTech design worked well under perfect conditions, but was finicky and fragile. If you're interested in learning more, there's a good article about it here, and frankly if you've read this far, why not?

I have few spare SunTour derailleurs, so the first I considered was the Cyclone M-II.

The first SunTour rear derailleur that I considered for using on the Ridge Runner was a Cyclone M-II; a design that was produced between about 1982 and 1985. The one I have is in pristine shape, and has a sculptural smoothness and feeling of quality that no longer exists in mass-produced mechanical devices. It really is a beautiful piece of machinery, almost jewelry-like in its detail and sophistication. The Cyclone M-II is more finely engineered and crafted than most high-zoot watches I've ever seen.

However, the Cyclone M-II not quite right for my Ridge Runner. I don't intend for this bike to be a museum item, and it would be a shame to beat up the Cyclone off road. Moreover, it doesn't have quite the chain capacity that I need, so I dug a little more in my parts bin. I located a set of circa 1985 SunTour XC Sport 7000 derailleurs. The rear would likely have been of the sort used for warranty replacement of a faulty MounTech derailleur. Perfect. Incidentally, it was somewhere around this time that SunTour transitioned to being spelled Suntour, with the lower case T.

SunTour (Suntour?) XC Sport derailleurs.

Presto! The same derailleur, suddenly clean, through the magic of the internet.

While cleaning the frame and parts, I found some cryptic indicators denoting era of manufacture, further underscoring 1984 as the year of production of the majority of the parts on the bike. I couldn't help but think of the dates I found in relation to the events of my life at the time. Ninth grade. Not an entirely happy time for me. I suppose any year in which Ghostbusters and Star Trek III came out wasn't all bad, though.

The super clean Dia-Compe brake levers are inscribed "0184", likely month and year of manufacture

The end of the Nitto bullmoose bar is stamped "Cr-Mo" and "R-R", possibly meaning the bar design was specific to the Ridge Runner. Who knows? 

The "M" in the serial number signifies 1984, but I have no idea how to interpret the rest of the number. Yep, no chain marring here, baby.

Clean and temporarily devoid of parts.

Once I'd finished cleaning and inspecting the frame, fork and parts, and deciding what to reuse or replace, I began the task of putting it all back together. I like to assemble bikes, and took my time doing it just the way I wanted. That said, my goal was to keep with the spirit of the bike, if not always the precise year of parts for those items that couldn't tenably be used for anything amounting to actual off-road riding. Of course, I filed away all the original parts in my shop, just in case.

I've been wrapping the drive-side chainstays of my bikes with tube strips since 1988, and I'm sure others were doing it well before me. It's how I generally begin a build.

That's a Park Third Hand tool, a Park Fourth Hand tool, and a 10 mm wrench simultaneously used to adjust the front brake. As much as I like old bike stuff, I'll take the much simpler adjustment of Avid BB7 disc brakes over this any day.

The original bottom bracket was pitted and unusable. However, as it was an astounding 135 mm wide, I didn't have any replacements wide enough to enable the original Sugino AT cranks to clear  the chainstays. Therefore, I sourced the logic-al successor to the Sugino AT, a 1990 Ritchey Logic crankset made by Sugino. A Shimano UN-71 cartridge bottom bracket spins it all nicely.

Standing in for gear-changing duty, the Suntour XC Sport rear derailleur looks quite squared-away on the bike.  Minimal use or not, after 29 years, a new chain was in order. The chainstays are so long and the largest cogs so big that I didn't need to remove any links to achieve a proper fit. 

The Ridge Runner was originally spec'd with some sort of ergonomic grips, which are long gone. Ergon GP-1 grips are my current favorites, and blend in well. SunTour Power ratchet shifters are a joy to service and rebuild. Modern shifters don't come anywhere close. New cables and housing all around, of course.

Another stand-in are the wheels; Mavic M6CD rims on Deore XT M730 hubs that I had built in 1989. These wheels have been used very little in the past 24 years and the rims are nicely wide. The original Araya rims on SunTour hubs have bone-dry bearings and await me to repack them when I get a little more time. In the mean time, you gotta love the '80s Mavic graphics.

For rubber, I went with a pair of new, fat WTB Weirwolf 2.55 LT tires. I know, I know. For historical accuracy I should've used something with a skinwall. However, good skinwalls are hard to come by, and I want to actually ride this bike. The Weirwolf has a nice rounded profile with shortish knobs, similar to early mountain bike tires, and is about the fattest tire that will fit this bike. I've always used the fattest tires I've been able to find, and I'm sure the same would've been the case in 1984.

The present iteration of the Ridge Runner is finished, and I'm eager to get it out in the dirt. In the couple of short rides I've taken so far, the refurbishment has felt great. The bike feels like it is new, and I can tell it's got a lot of adventure left in it.