Crust canti lightning bolt sizing, build

[Hans Erickson]

I bought one of the sample lightning bolts that was on the crust website a few weeks ago -- the ones with the Sklar fork crowns -- and built it up with parts from the 1986 Trek Elance 400 650b conversion I've been riding for the last year. 

The Trek was able to accommodate the 42mm Baby Shoe Pass tires with no room to spare, and because the Trek has nearly horizontal dropouts any misalignment in the rear axle would put the tire against the chainstay. 

The Trek also required long-reach brakes for the 650b rims. I had been using the Tektro R559 and they were just awful. I tried fitting the center mounted Paul centerpull brakes but they only just barely reached and put the pads so close to the tire that I didn't feel comfortable, especially since I was already feeling sick at the cost of them.

I tried to get a frame builder to dimple the chainstays for more clearance, add posts for direct mounted Rene Herse centerpulls, and add brazeons for a third bottle cage under the downtube, and put the same hourglass-shaped rack mounting points on the fork blades that the crust forks have. The frame builder and I only realized when he started marking up the fork that the RH brakes require posts that are different from canti posts. Not just different placement on the frame, but different posts entirely. I should have noticed this when buying the brakes but didn't. At the time, RH was out of the posts. They graciously accepted a late return on the brakes. I abandoned the frame modifications and put the bike back together. The LB already has all the things I was trying to change on the Trek so I decided to wait for them to come back in stock. 

(Continued in message to follow)

[Hans Erickson]

(Continued) At the time I bought it, only the medium was available, which saved me the trouble deciding between medium (55) and large (58). The geometry is extremely similar between the Trek and the LB. The LB has slightly less reach. I'm 5'10" and have a PBH of 85cm. The stand over listed on the crust geo chart for the size large is 844, which seemed pretty tight. Stated stand over for the medium is 815. With the 42mm BSP tires, I measure the stand over as about 803mm, so about a half inch shorter than the chart. My actual stand over on the medium of 3.15 inches. 

Knowing that I would probably have more stand over than the chart suggests makes me think the large would have been the better size. I felt fine on the almost identically sized Trek for over a year, but now I'm second-guessing. I've even thought about pre-ordering a large now and selling this one but I'm not sure that's worth the trouble and shipping expense.

A couple of other things I noticed during the build:

There is so little clearance between the seat post and collar bolt that even the surly cable hanger, which is only 2mm thick, doesn't fit. It scores the seat post when I change saddle height. I could file a little off, but I have to wonder what hanger is supposed to fit in there if not that. I think the original LB had a cable hanger integrated into the seat stay bridge. I've also seen pictures of older versions with the old dia-compe 1260 hanger, but that doesn't work well with the threaded seat collar bolt on this model.

I just gave up on the canti brakes entirely because I couldn't get the slack out of the system with the ill-fitting rear cable hanger and the tight bend. I temporarily put some mini-Vs from one of my kids' bikes on there. They're 95mm Tektros and I'm waiting on a set of TRP CX8.4 which I'm hoping will give a little more rim clearance. The 95s rub when I'm out of the saddle. I can't believe how much more effective they are than the R559s. 

I didn't realize when I bought the bike that it was the new deep purple color with sparkles. I prefer it to the brown.

Hope that helps anyone choosing between sizes. Pictures to follow of the new bike, measurement of the stand over, and the old Trek.

-Hans

[Hans Erickson]

[Hans Erickson]

On Tuesday, March 8, 2022 at 10:11:21 PM UTC-7 Hans Erickson wrote:

[Cary Weitzman]

Hans Erickson wrote on 3/9/22 12:10 AM:

> There is so little clearance between the seat post and collar bolt
> that even the surly cable hanger, which is only 2mm thick, doesn't fit.

Not a new issue, the original version has the same problem. I let Crust
know about it when I received mine, and yet I've seen dozens of builds
with the Surly hanger, so I just assume most people don't care that much.

Don't file the hanger, find a screwdriver as close to the inside
diameter of the hanger you can stick it inside and then peen the wire
the hanger is made with down with a hammer to flatten it out just a tiny
bit from the outside. It doesn't take much.

Cary
PTBO.ON.CA

[Rashid Khan]

Definitely not a new issue. Another option is to put the binder screw in a drill (or lathe) and file off the threads where the hanger hits the screw. That’ll create more than enough clearance. 

Rashid in CO