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Re: Post the picture of your diy paint sprayjob
Here's a couple more paint jobs I've done! First one is not a road bike, but still a custom paint job.  I painted this helmet for my girlfriend. Painted with alcohol inks on a white base. Finished with regular 1k clear and wet sanded and buffed. The bike is my old Velobuild 177. I can't quite remember, but I don't think I used any primer on this one...just scuffed up the original finish (probably 600 grit) and went to town on it. The frame is painted with Spray.Bike Frame Builder's Copper. For the matte finish I applied a couple thin coats of matte 2k clear coat, lightly sanded to smooth everything out, then applied a final thin matte 2k coat. The fork is painted with Montana Anthracite, finished with 2k clear and wet sanded/buffed. The bars are The One Pro, repainted in black, finished with 2k clear and wet sanded/buffed. My cousin now rides this bike built up with Rival XPLR. We're currently working on repainting it, updates coming soon.
November 20, 2024, 04:25:23 AM |
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Re: Can we migrate this forum to a modern forum? I'm tired of the broken pages.
Sitar_Ned is the forum's administrator. You can reach out to them via PM or email. Honestly, not much capacity at all. It's just me and I am in no way a web developer or webmaster. Just a simpleton Arkansas mountain biker that somehow figured out how to get this forum up 10 years ago. I know the broken pages are annoying... and I am sorry about that... I do try to fix them immediately when they pop up so please do let me know.. I really appreciate it. I do have plans to upgrade to the latest SMF version to fix little issues like that but I'm sorry to disappoint anyone but there are no plans to "modernize" the forum in any way. No desire to have some modern mobile-friendly, super slick, dark mode interface. Chinertown will remain old-school looking with zero ads and zero optimizations for Google search. My main goal going forward is to keep AI out of the forum as much as possible. That's just my jam but I do understand if it isn't for everyone. That said, I am certainly open and interested to hear everyone's input/advice/ideas and really appreciate it. June 06, 2025, 06:52:42 AM |
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Forum Slowdown - Spam Bots
Just wanted to keep you all updated... I am aware of the site slowdowns happening over the last few days and am working on implementing a fix. We upgraded the forum software, got the new super fast server... then bam.. hammered by relentless spam bots and the site slows to a crawl. Frustrating. Hopefully it will be taken care of by end of day tomorrow, just wanted to keep you all in the loop. Really trying to avoid having to use those annoying "choose which squares contain a motorcycle" things but we may have to go that route.. not sure yet. I'll try everything I can to avoid doing that so if you see those start popping up... I had no choice. Sorry for the inconvenience, -SN July 22, 2025, 07:51:41 AM |
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Re: TAN TAN X67
I had 3 problems : - Rear brake mount was not flat, had to face it AND file the connection between the two screw holes (because the facing tool only face on 10mm diameter). - Seatpost doesn't hold, Tantan says 8-10 Nm but even with 12 Nm, Carbon Paste and alloy foil from can, it slips. I need to find a solution. -The front derailleur mount is also too much to the exterior, wich leads the derailleur to touch cranks arms. I tried with 105 di2 and ltwoo erX. As well as with ultegra cranks. I had to put a 2mm spacer on the crank axle Otherwise i only did a 50km ride on the flat, nothing special, i'll see in the mountains. Edit : the frame with derailleur hanger front and back, rear axle and screws was 853g in size 49, clear coat and black paint July 26, 2025, 02:25:08 AM |
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Re: Seraph Bikes Superlight 836g X68 - Alternative to SL8 Fakes?
So, I've been lurking here for some time and sometime in early May I placed an order for a X68 with complete Ultegra di2 groupset and a set of 50/65 Falcon pro turbo from Light bicycle. The wheels are 34mm wide and I run Conti GP5k 30C that expand to 33mm. It is absolutely not a weight weenie build, focus has been on a mix of aero and comfort for endurance riding without explicitly trying to weigh the bike down. Don't have a good scale to weigh the bike but the bathroom scale says it's around 7,7kg. This is without wrapping the handlebars though. The pros with Tantan is the comparatively low costs for both frame and groupset 2100$ inc. shipping to .se. Also the possibility for custom paint. I think the cons would be pretty much everything else though. I ordered the frame painted matte red and matte black with a long gradient along the top tube and down tube. Gradient is good and is actually better in reality than what it looks like on the pictures. However it was not matte but painted in gloss.  Paint was ok on the frame, the fork has a few marks, some small like specks of dust in the color and one larger where it looks like something has touched the fork before the paint dried. Thankfully it's at least on the back of the fork. Brake mounts have some over spray and front brake was hard to install. Had to do a lot of filing to be able to install it in the first place and in the end I got help to do a professional facing for the front brakes.Tantan also sent the wrong handlebars. I'm a small guy, frameset is size 49 and Tantan sent me 400x90 handlebars instead of the 380 I've specified. On my old bike I run 360 so this was already a compromise. And they're absolute a$$holes to deal with when it comes to something like this. If it is mentioned that they've made an error - the emails won't be answered. If I ask for at least some kind of discount for ordering a new handlebar - the emails won't be answered. I've been reluctant to install the wrong size handlebars for a while but now I've just installed them so I can at least ride the bike. Also I didn't calculate seat post length and min insertion so now I've got about 85mm insertion. X68 should have 100mm insertion but SL is at 75mm. Since I'm a small light guy I'm not stressing over it and anyway Tantan doesn't want to talk to me about selling me a longer seat post or narrower bars. Has anyone tried to fit Yoho seat post to the X68? Or can someone recommend any other SL8 style seat post that will fit? It is unlikely that Tantan will receive more money from me so I've ordered the new HBR17 in 360x100 from LightCarbon. More expensive but it looks promising IMHO. I like that it is available in narrower size and I also like that it has some flare - if nothing else it will at least contribute to a sporty look. It is also available with spacers/adapter for SL8 if you ask nicely. So far I have only made 4 rides and less than 200km on the bike and it sure is different from my old bike. The old is a repaired Focus Cayo (2013-2014 or something) with 35mm alu rims and mechanical 10s. Even if the new bike only is "current" the leap from the old bike is large enough to make it feel like I'm in the future now. The bike wants more speed and tighter corners so I think we'll have some good times together. Paint job didn't turn out exactly like I wanted it but I think the way it actually turned out isn't bad either. Together with the wheelset I like the visual appearance and I think the new handlebars will also contribute to a sporty/racy look. Overall I'm happy with the bike and don't regret buying it although some of the experience with Tantan has been frustrating. Only drawback is now I can't blame the bike - now it is clear that the motor is the limiting factor. I think that if LightCarbon LCR018-D had been released before I bought the X68 I might have bought that one instead and made a build leaning more on comfort (and "aero looks") than actual aero. Would be interesting to build an endurance bike with deep section rims for 38-40c slicks but that's an entirely different project. August 16, 2025, 02:38:21 AM |
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Re: TT-Bike Budget Build
Sorry guys, I dropped the ball on this thread… Just to sum up quickly: everything went well with my build. I had no major issues. All the parts fit well (I got lucky). The quality of the frame is good. The paint job isn’t perfect and has some minor inclusions and imperfections. I’ve already done around 1,200 km outdoors on the bike and completed my first triathlon / full Ironman last Sunday. Super happy with the build! I still haven’t taken any proper pictures of my bike… I guess I enjoy riding it more. The pictures I do have are from the end of May / June when I finished the build. I’ll take some new ones and upload them over the weekend. Feel free to ask me anything about the build. August 27, 2025, 05:48:20 AM |
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Re: XM Carbon Speed Race Frame - The wish list
Since I had some boys in the team drooling over my GT frameset yesterday... We would get our US trademark approved soon, hopefully mid-Oct. Then we would arrange UCI approved stuff on our wheels and frameset. September 20, 2025, 12:51:25 AM |
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Re: Argon18 TT vs VB TT
I'm pretty sure the Argon 18 predates the VB (at least the prior version, I think the current Argon 18 got a slight facelift last year). The VB is basically a copy of the Trek Speed Concept.
October 06, 2025, 02:39:24 AM |
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Re: Twitter C6 budget build
Okay, so I've received the frame and my initial impressions are pretty good. It's light enough, and I'm honestly surprised because I expected it to be a little chunkier. However, some of the hardware is heavy, and with no alternative to lighten it up (like the very heavy, specially shaped seat post). I'm not sure about some of the finishing details of the fork, though. It looks a little rough by where the brake hose enters the fork. Also, my fork was missing a crown race for the headset and neither was one included in the baggie of hardware. I ordered something on Amazon to hopefully get the bike together for this upcoming weekend, so I hope I spec'd it out correctly. I'm also relieved to report that it clears 32c tires just fine. Pics included. There's oodles of room on the fork, and a decent amount of room on the rear triangle. My frame size is a "S" (45cm). Weights (Size Small - 45cm) Bare Frame (no hardware, no headset, no seatpost): 1533g Fork (uncut, no hardware, no axles): 444g Thru Axles + Dropouts: 103g 300mm Seatpost + Seatpost Hardware: 278g Headset + Hardware (bearings, fork plug, headset cover + cap, 2 spacers): 187g Integrated Bar + Stem: 654g (!!!!) Included 68mm Bottom Bracket: 91g Total Frame Weight (total of all above): 3.29kg (7.25lbs) I'll also be adding the following: Front Wheelset + Tire + Disc: 1220g Rear Wheelset + Tire + Disc + Cassette: 1557g Magene P515 + chainring: 805g (not my own measurement, I stole this from someone else's post) Ltwoo RX Groupset: approx. 1150g (not my own measurement, stolen from elsewhere) KMC 12sp chain: 234g (from KMC website) Extra Spacers + Hardware: approx. 50g Ryet Carbon Saddle: 110g Xpedo Pedals: 235g Total Added Part Weight = 5.36kg (estimated) ESTIMATED FINISHED BIKE WEIGHT: 8.65 kg (19.07lbs) That doesn't seem so bad considering this should be all-in with pedals and tires and sealant and all. Maybe a few extra grams for a bike computer and bottle cages are the only things I didn't consider. October 22, 2025, 02:26:38 PM |
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Re: TanTan/Seraph TT-X69 - the 2026 edition
I've been purposely quiet in here about speaking on the X68. And TanTan as a whole. Trying not to be cryptic or passive aggressive. I'm not exactly happy with everything surrounding my dealings for the company. It's a story for another time. But I will at least say that the extreme variation in rider experience among several customers highlights that perhaps the build quality from TanTan on this particular frame offering is very inconsistent frame to frame. The simplest explanation is that they did not / do not make the GR201. Tideace/Haideli also sells that frame, which suggests it's likely from the Haideli/Long Teng factory. The LTK GV201 is also nearly identical. There are no clear documented links other than product listings for Tan Tan and LTK. This is in stark contrast to business registrations, which tie Haideli to Tideace (they are very public about this) and Haideli to Permeants (found via searching registrations and legal filings in China). We know from photos of product in the backgrounds as well as photos on their websites that LTK and those three Haideli companies are tied together. When looking for a manufacturer for my handlebar project, LTK was incredibly cost-effective, and with the quality of the LTK266-D-SL, it was very tempting to go with them. In the end, I did not. One factor was not wanting to touch the TanTan/Seraph supply chain due to a lack of trust. While it seems unfair to place the bad reputation created by a brand's bad behavior on a *suspected* supplier, for a project like this, where I am still learning, I wanted a partner I could trust without worrying. This, despite not finding a clear link. It is still possible that I trusted the wrong company, the design will get stolen, and the patents I have filed will amount to nothing. I still don't know if I trusted the right people, but there was enough of a worry bead there to go elsewhere for now. Edit: to be clear, i dont think my ideas are inherently worth stealing, but i still felt like I needed to prepare for that just in case. October 29, 2025, 02:47:52 PM |
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