You may remember a while back I posted that I bought a vintage mixte to restore. I haven't posted anything about it since because, well, it's been sitting in my garage. I promised myself that I'd take care of a few more pressing matters in my life (like finishing two years of back taxes) before starting on this project. Well today I took the first step in getting it started. We took the bike (which I've named Rose) over to Bikerowave to see what kind of shape she's really in. My plan is to get the bike in working order while spending as little money as possible. I'd like to ride it for a while and evaluate it before spending a bunch of money on replacing components. The one thing I plan on splurging on, though, is a Brooks saddle. My reasoning here is that I can always use the saddle on another bike, and it'll last me a lifetime.
Over the next few weeks I'll post some pictures of the "before" state of the bike. Here's a teaser:
The diagnosis from a very helpful volunteer at Bikerowave (Ryan) is that the bike is in pretty decent shape over all. It will need new tires, new cables and housing, new brake pads, and possibly a new chain. I also plan on doing quite a bit of cosmetic cleaning. They carry pretty much everything I need at Bikerowave, so the whole thing should be pretty painless and not too expensive. I can't wait to get started!
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It took me about a year get my wife's mixte on the road. I collected the parts piece by piece in an effort to keep the cost down. If you're going to splurge on an item, it's hard to go wrong with a Brooks saddle.
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