Bob, My QB came with moustache bars and i loved them, felt very responsive in traffic and could climb like crazy, figured i would go back to them after putting on some alba bars, but dang if those alba didn't win me over, can get similiar jack-rabbit acceleration with the albas and can lean back and cruise when i don't want that. a little less manuevarable in traffic, but need to ride more relaxed anyway!
i predict this could be a permanent change. On Sunday, January 27, 2013 2:26:40 AM UTC-5, Statrixbob wrote: > > My lovely silver 66cm Quickbeam had been sitting pretty much unused since > last October when I took delivery of my new 62cm Hunqapillar. There was > nothing wrong with it, but somehow it gets hard to get off a new bike. > > But it wasn't right. I still loved the QB. I just needed a good excuse. > > It finally came to me. The QB had ended up being set up with a Platrack up > front which often sported a big Wald. It was great for shopping and hauling > stuff around, but I was getting the feeling that my QB might want to run a > wee bit lighter. After all a Hunq can carry pretty much anything you can > throw at it so why have to two bikes set up more or less the same wa? > > I'm a January birthday boy and after purchasing the Hunq I had a decent > amount of rebate due so I decided a cockpit change was in order for the QB. > I'd fallen in love with Albatross bars so I decided I'd move from Moustache > bars to Albas on the QB as well. I'm not giving up on the Moustache bars, > they'll be going to Hilo to replace the drops on the RB-1 I keep there. I'm > not a big drop fan so it'll mean I'll probably ride more when I'm in Hilo. > > This was also a good time to replace the cables and housing on my QB. I > ordered new Albas, a new Tallux 13cm stem (big guy, 66cm QB, big stem - > it's perfect), new Shimano brake levers, and cabling to boot. I also > ordered a set of Portuguese cork grips. That meant I had to mix up a batch > of shellac. I use so little of the stuff that buying a pint isn't really a > deal as most of goes to waste after a couple of years. I find mixing up a > couple of ounces at a time from flakes a better deal - besides it's fun. > > The rebuild itself was almost very smooth. I always forget my bikes are > big enough I need extra long cables to reach the rear of the bike - I had > to run out and get a tandem cable once I realized this. I also needed to > replace my front barrel adjuster - but luckily I figured this all out in > time such that I only had to make one trip to the LBS. > > Everything went pretty well after that. I had no trouble and in a couple > of hours (lots of breaks) I had a brand new bike - sort of. :-) I did have > to wait for the shellac to mix so I rode for one day with some cheap rubber > grips I had laying around. Worked fine, ugly though. > > Then disaster struck. When putting on one of the cork grips I managed to > break the darn thing. Luckily it was pretty clean break and I didn't lose > any material. I was bemoaning the fact that I'd have to order another set > when I realized that once they were on my bike both ends of the break would > push together and be pretty much unnoticeable. Beausage of different sort I > guess. Ultimately it turns out you can tell if you look at it up close but > I can't feel any difference and a little imperfection never really bothers > me so until they wear out completely I'm good. > > I did a few good coats of shellac, let it dry and voila...time to ride. > > Yesterday I went out for 20 mile jaunt after work and stopped to take some > not so great photos with my camera phone. I'll have to get out with a > decent camera at some point, but some aren't too bad at smaller sizes. > There are also a couple of shots of the bike with the ugly rubber grips, > though at larger sizes you can they blur a bit. > > All in all I'm thrilled. Now I have a Hunq that can carry anything and a > relatively lighter Quickbeam. > > Good stuff. > > Here's a few shots of the whole deal... > > http://www.flickr.com/photos/mgps-bob/sets/72157632587418243/ > > Aloha, > > Bob > > -- > Robert Harrison > Honolulu, HI > rfhar...@gmail.com <javascript:> > statrix.com > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To post to this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch@googlegroups.com. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch?hl=en. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.
