Day 943: More Recycling

Recycled bicycle

A nice follow up to yesterday’s visit to Recology was to have a bicycle returned to me that’s been on long term loan for the past eighteen months. It's been recycled too. The frame has undergone several makeovers during the course of its lifetime that I’d guess started sometime in the mid 1990’s. It’s a very solid bicycle frame that’s made out of one of the most notoriously reliable frame materials, Reynolds 853 steel. The bicycle frame's first rendition was a build up that was done by an old friend of mine. It had some medium level parts on it, and it was perfect for anyone that was dipping their toes into the road cycling scene. My friend later gave the frame to me, sans parts, after I’d had an accident that literally crippled my road bike in 2002. I think that he was trying to get me back on my bike, and I sure did appreciate the gesture.

Unfortunately, the frame sat for a long time. I looked at it regularly hanging up in my bike closet. I kept dreaming about rebuilding it in one style or another, with this or that set of parts, but that never happened. Instead it just sat there for years.

Colnago C-40 (Notice the headtube)

Seven years later another buddy of mine was riding my beloved Colnago C-40 when a car pulled out in front of him. Luckily for him he wasn’t killed, or even severely injured. The C-40 was another story. It had been mortally wounded in the incident. When the bike was returned to me I had a bit of an "aha" moment. As I looked at all of the high end parts that adorned the bike, I thought to myself, those parts will eventually make their way onto the old Reynolds 853 frame. But when will that happen? I had another road bike so I was in no hurry to hop onto another “project,” so the parts and the frame remained sitting in my bike closet for another year, or so.

I finally found the impetus to build up the old frame when I'd heard that a young man, who I’ve mentored in cycling over the years, had decided that he wanted to try out road biking. I was happy to help out, but his mother was very reluctant to have her son riding out in traffic rather than up on the mountain where it’s safe.  He’d just had a great season of mountain bike racing so he was eventually granted his wish to ride on the road. That being the case I had the frame and the parts to make it happen for him, and it was essentially accomplished for free. He was, and I quote, "stoked!"

Soon after he was cleared to ride on the road we met on a weekend afternoon to build the bike. A lot of bikes have been built on my porch. We started the build of the old frame by pulling all of the parts off of my C-40. It was a bit sad to deconstruct that bike, but the parts would live for another day on the old frame. We then sequentially installed all of the parts onto the old road frame. After several hours of work the old frame had been transformed back into a bicycle again. For the next eighteen months the new-old bicycle was ridden all over Marin County, CA. The young man loved it. He loved riding on the road so much that he ended up buying a Specialized Tarmac that’s at least five pounds lighter that the old bike. I guess that the old frame served its purpose…

The new-old bike is now going to be loaned to another friend so that he too can test out riding bikes on the road instead of the dirt. We'll see just how many friends end up riding the bike and being converted to road bike enthusiasts.