26” MTB Commuter Bike Build - Nishiki Alien

hey everyone today we're doing up really cool Nishiki alien this is a 1989 one really nice T Prestige tubing kindy cool straight blade Fork on it which tapers down to nice skinny area so it should be quite a nice feeling fork with a little bit of flex to it nice little in embossed here into the CBE log came with deal XT components on it this bike was sent up from Nelson my friend Michelle sent it up to me so really cool thanks he Michelle for sending the bike up so we just check the chain wear before taking the chain off just to make sure we've got all the parts that we need for the bike we are just going to use a sspeed setup so it does have this really weird um front deria pull mechanism so I've seen this on an old Tri that I had as well where the cable alter um sort of is like the flex Point instead of like a cable stop on the frame pretty strange but not the first time I've seen it so I have one of one of these Nishiki aliens I never thought I would see one in my size um I've said that a few times about bikes before but honestly never thought that a like a really big one would show up I've seen probably two in New Zealand of like very small aliens and yeah I just never thought i' I'd find one in the size so I've got a really cool handlebar for it which is the magic components moth handlebar so it's quite a wide back swe handlebar similar to the nto albatross but wider I don't think I don't actually have the N elros anymore so I don't know if it comes back as far as the The Moth but um yeah I don't think this headset is stock it's a Shimano 6001 but really cool piece nonetheless seems to be in okay condition so that's going to stay the bike overall is pretty tidy does have like a few scuff marks and there's something on the top tube which I don't know quite what it is but um the bike pulls apart pretty easily so no issues there with like stuck SE posts and things like that the steam was a little bit tricky to get out um but there was just that little Notch that I filed down there in the stere tube no real boogie so that's the inner cable clamp so it's just bolted to the frame I think it was a trek 8,000 I can't remember what it was an old alloy Trek that I remember having that same situation so it does have a set of bottle bosses on the down tube as well you can see there okay pretty cool XT Parts on it so just a little bit dirty and stuff you can sort of see some of the the grime and stuff that sort of builds up in the regular spots always make sure the wa always make sure the washer comes up too um otherwise the crank tool can just strip the threads if you push it on try and remove the the WD40 in there got tool in then you it has this really cool bottom recet shell cut out it almost looks like the carago one um but these really help with proration and sort of water ESS so bikes that I've had with this bottom Breer cut out they very rarely have rust in the bottom bracket shell really helps with um yeah keeping the moisture out and stuff you in 52 so because of that big hole in the bottom bracket there's like all like bits of gravel and tiny little stones and stuff the bottom Breer shell does look pretty tidy though so it's leading water out which is the good thing but um debris and stuff is just sort of sticking around most of the bikes that I've seen without that hole in the bottom shell have been bit rustier compared to the ones with the hole also ones with the uh the cable guide underneath the bottom Breer shell and they've got the hole there but the hole is plugged up with the cable guide um that sort of impedes the the flow of the moisture out of the bike um which builds up rust and stuff so I think we clean the shell out the threads look fine so not much Point chasing them out and then put a little bit of penetrol in inside the bike and we'll try and get a little bit inside the bottom bracket shell as well and then we're going to go to the outside of the frame polish that up Polish Polish that up give a bit of a clean stuff and then go on to the headset so I did a little test spot here because you can see so as you could see this I don't know what has caused this it's like rubbing it looks like it's worn through the clear coat but the clear coat is really thin I guess that's the only thing I can sort of think of um it looked like that the whole way across but then I polished the section and you can it's really hard to show it but you can sort of see like there um it's a lot bit it doesn't look as disgusting as that so I don't know whether it was actually the clear code that's worn or if it's just something that's got on here and it's just like stuck a bunch of grime to it I don't really know either way polishing cleans it up quite nicely so we're going to go through and clean the rest of the bike before we go over and polish it otherwise you just end up polishing in like the debris and stuff which just creates a bunch of little scratches I normally just use some soapy water to get off like all the dirt and stuff but in some of the tougher places you might need like a mild Degreaser or um some dishwashing liquids work really well but otherwise just like some WD40 or something to help loosen it a bit or if it's was just dirty just dirty I think so I think that was just dirt I don't know whether I should keep this decal or not a lot of it is sort of faded off it's not a factory one but it's suitably old and the idea of a alien Viking or a viking alien is pretty cool to me so that's the only reason why it stayed so far um I found a couple little dents very tiny there's one sort of there it's kind of hard to get that's where the dent is just sort of there little Dent there then there's another one over here somewhere I don't think I'm going to fill this in I think it's just going to stay white so I was thinking of filling in that in at the seat tube join but I decided against it um if I I think I do actually have a purple that would suit it pretty well but um I just decided against it so moving on to polishing up the frame now um you could just use some kind of car polish normally like something kind of mild to start off with um just a cram polish this is a a scratch and S remover as well so we'll get rid of like some of the small scratches and stuff but it's mostly just to remove the scaff marks and stuff like imperfections off the bik so this is what I use to treat the inside of frames you can use frame saver or you know like a llin spray or something like that there's quite a few things that you can try this is just the one that I use CU it's available locally and it works really well for me so basically you just spray it inside all the frame tubes obviously be a bit careful around threads and stuff because if it's one that's going to set you don't want it to set in threads because it's a steel handlebar I should really put some Rust treat on the inside here to show all the shaking and stuff with the handlebar than it is with the frame shake shake shake so you really want it to get on each side of the inside so you sort of got to shake it and spin it around and stuff get one cut oh my gosh this is so big what the heck we are going to have to I think we are going to have to polish that stem up a little bit more try a little bit of Auto s and see how it goes in too much time cuz I don't think it's going to match too well but we'll hit it with a bit see how it comes up so I was tossing up between using the thumb shifter mounted on the wrong side but the inside so you use the left lever on the right hand inside or a steam shifter just a nice old Sun tour friction shifter or a baring shifter I couldn't really decide so I just decided to put the thumb shifter on for the time being and then I could change it out if I didn't like it so in some of the shots at the end of the video you'll see that I changed the shifters up and I definitely prefer it with the steem shifters just for whatever reason so I'm I'm pretty big fan of steem shifters especially on bikes with back sweep handlebars don't ask me why it just feels nice and cruisy and then you have the stem shifters and you just cruising around it's just a fun feeling I don't know um so I changed it off from the shifter but this does really well if you want to experiment with that as well moving on to the brakes brakes moving on to the brake calipers M 7 32s HPP it and stuff out and then we'll just clean the body up give it a bit of a Polish with some Auto so so these have like these sort of Dome um pivot things because there's this side which has this adjustment so this is like the toe and adjustment so you turn this and then the pad goes in and out in relation to the rim pretty simple they work pretty good only thing I don't really like is only thing I don't really like with most of these old Shimano brakes is they only have a spring adjustment on one side so it sort of just pulls and then you can't like add tension to this opposite side so if one side is so one side is weak um you sort of just bend the spring a little bit and that can add a bit of tension some SM it around so these are the wheels that came with the bike they're not a matching Rim anymore so I really like the ARA rm20 that is on the front wheel but the rear has been swapped out at some point for this mavic I think I will relace an rm20 into the back when I get a chance but for the time being these will do okay quite like these Continental mountain Kings but one of them is worn and I've got another set of tires that are sort of more commute friendly anyway but I could use these on something else so we're going to strip the wheel down and grease the bearings up and everything okay got to take the cassette off cuz going to be replacing this as well so we are going for for a slightly wider range SSP speed setup we'll go through that in a bit though what the yeah a nipple just broke nipple just broke hell why was it so tight I don't like alloy nipples if you're going to build a weir don't use alloy nipples one that broke and it's not seized on there so that's good at least but if that one just broke and I don't even I wasn't even really leaning on the bike but if that one broke and I wasn't even like I wasn't riding it I was barely even leaning on the rim um I don't know if the other ones are going to VI a couple of them have been replaced spokes definitely need tension sometimes I think why did I record all of that I could have just used this small little clip it doesn't look right that looks like too many B noises great that worked out well the stupid bloody spoke with the broken nipple snug it up doesn't need to be super tight not as Loose as that stupid like that H so now so now now we're going to take this tire off replace that nipple throw the new tire on it's not a new tire specialized Rhythm light I think it's called Uh 26x 2.3 we're also going to be using sort of a wide range seven-speed cassette on this we've got a couple of eight-speed cassettes kicking around at a pretty wide ratio um so we're going to be sort of taking the cogs off that then using some of the spaces from in between a sspeed cassette we're going to be using that and just use seven of the gears um and see how that goes do quite like these tires um I would I would keep these tires on it um if both of them were in pretty good condition CU I quite like the look of them it' be nice oh they're folding too lightweight um be nice to have like a aggressive looking Tire if I had some ENT race tires I would use that on it but instead the but instead the specialized Rhythm light should work pretty good I'm going to have to get it down on the ground get my weight over it I mean sure enough both both beads broke off at the same time gone we don't have any 14s but going to use the just use an old spoke to pop it through there sure the spoke is in the right spot 12 is better than nothing actually this 12 is probably going to be stronger than the rest of the nipples so didn't even get to tighten this one and it's already all cracked so whether that was from like a previous true or not I guess that could have been the situation with the other one that broke as well surprised that this one hasn't given up yet so this is the cassette that we'll be using on the bike this is a box for 8-speed but you can disassemble these on the back side there's uh three screws that you p out and then the cassette just all falls apart so we can just use seven of these gears and then probably a 12 to the bottom so that's the screws there quite a lot of cassettes have these makes it really handy for making like custom situps and stuff so now it's 12 14 18 22 28 34 42 for I I've got the front axle out and stuff and as I was pulling out and as I was undoing the cones from the front hub I noticed that there was like a little bit of binding um which would which sort of normally indicates that there's some kind of issue with the front axle right so I checked it out I rolled it across the table and it had a wobble to it so it's straight some ways so you can see straight there not straight there so we've got another front axle of a different wheel just going to replace that throw that in uh so these are the specialized Rhythm light tires I haven't been able to find any of these new so I got pretty lucky finding these in a used state but still pretty usable um I really like them I've tried them a couple times on different bikes and yeah they like a really great commuter Tire I think they're ideally suited for pump track and that sort of stuff use but the nice sort of curved and fast rolling tread on them is really really good for commuting I think haven't had too many punches on them I think one or two but I haven't done too many KS on them so yeah really like this really cool the front fork has a decent amount of tie clearance I could fit fenders on the Spike as well we're not going to be though just sort of my preference I just don't want fenders on this bike even though commuting in New Zealand you pretty well need fenders year round cleaning up the front room just going to use some soapy water and stuff before installing the cranks just making sure there's a decent amount of grease in the bottom bracket threads and then on the bottom bracket it's sou as well just using the same un 52 that for that so the crank caps I used on these Race Face cranks are just the factory Dior or I think they come on mt60 and the m730 series and you just file down that little bit that I was pointing at before checking out the chain line now that we've got the cranks on looks pretty good probably could do with moving over to the left or in board a little bit but we're going to be on the bottom part of the cassette most of the time anyway so once we got the chain on we're just going to check and the Der is going to hit that some the largest Cog so we'll try a longer B limit screw and that might give us just enough clearance so that's the factory length one and you can see it's still going to hit so we could modify the deria and that might give us like a little bit clearance if we sort of trim it down to this black line that I drew here but test shifting and it doesn't make too much of a Ruckus I think I have a 4 to on another bik but I don't want to really want to change that around I I think I don't really use that 40 or 42 to anyway um it's just sort of nice to have if I feel feeling super tight or something or if I've got the trailer on the back and then it just gives me like a little bit extra gearing to get up some steep Short Hills um so it will run so it will technically run in that gear but it's not like longterm it's going to wear out that jockey wheel um just being in that Gear Running on it could run one of these which just drops the drer down a little bit just giving that a little bit extra clearance but I don't really run that 4 to or 42 to Cog that often so I don't really mind just wearing out the Dy wheel a little bit so the second gear is a 34 Toth and that should give me plenty of low range um but it will be nice to have that 42 to just in the odd occasion where I will need it for for for for that moving on to mounting the front rack now a lot of people ask me about the little rack adapters that I use mostly over on Instagram I think I think I explain it in the YouTube videos but I'll leave a link in the description below but there's a product called the gamma R adapter uh g m o that you can use but otherwise I just sort of DIY create my own little ones we're going to use this vertical one and see how that goes just cuz it's a bit simpler but normally I mount one to like the rear eyelet and then through the front axle sort of for it's about time to throw the brake pads on we're going to be using cool stop Eagle pads I prefer to use the salmon compound which is the orange compound of cool stop pads but these are the ones that I have kicking around so we're going to be using them think the salmon ones just work a bit better in the wet and stuff but if it's not too wet around you then these black compound will last longer so the salmon and black one like the mixed jeel compound is probably the best for me I feel but they're work in mud and everything so definitely get some cool stop pads if you don't have some that for for my favorite grips are the ESI chunky grips these are a really nice feeling and they're not too I wouldn't say they're hard wearing cuz they're pretty sensitive to abrasions and stuff but the color lasts a really long time and they stay clean and everything they don't go sticky so I put those on with ioop alcohol really nice feeling grip and this it's just a cork bar end last finish finishing touches on the bike are some stickers these are ones from Craig or Second Life Bikes then Neco cycles and Gary's ones I've got a whole little stash of some stickers to throw on the bike just going to go through my assortment and Chuck some on for a little bit of color and a bit of Personality I'm got to show some love to the homies shout out to Crum works these Hanah bars I just amazing I've ridden them now for a few months and just insanely stucked with them I'm so tall but finding like a back sweeped handlebar is pretty difficult I really like the nto albatross but it's not just not wide enough for me because of my height but this is just such a cool feel to me so really happy with how the bike turned out so these are some of the stickers we chucked on Gary down the bottom there 26 in lifestyle save old bikes is crazy Second Life Bikes there's a blue log and necro cycles and there all last no gas is the solar Community bike club just going to go for a bit of a ride now and I'll see you at the end of the video n it here fre in right there [Music] it's for [Music] don't Once Upon a Time from there s do [Applause] [Laughter] so that worked really well I think the short RAR end and the really wide handlebars really help me out there I'm so happy with the how the bike turned out really love those handlebars and just the way the bike looks and turned out overall I just really love it like from the race Bas cranks to the front basket and everything as you can see we did change to a stem shifter by the end of the video um just really prefer the setup compared to the thumb shifter I think it just suits the feel of the bike for some reason so happy with it like it just looks so cool it rides really nicely it's not as stiff as the Alpine Stars which does sort of better off-road doesn't put the power down as much as that but um it just sits my writing and the commute and everything and it can do still do some single track which is really great thanks everyone for checking out the video thanks to chworks Magic components for making this really cool handlebar it's so cool it's so cool if you're taller and you like back handlebars it's definitely worth checking out I don't know if it suit shorter people as much but there you go so yeah thanks for checking the video out and I'll see you again soon bye what the [Laughter]

Channel: Toasty Rides

Views: 13,592

Keywords:

Id: wISOi-wcGnc

Length: 52min 3sec (3123 seconds)

Published: Sat May 25 2024