Some Like It Hot

Habanero Hot!

To say I hate my Surly Cross Check wouldn't be fair. When I got that bike I loved it.  It was the first drop bar, go anywhere bike I had.  I rode it exclusively for the first year and put about 6000 miles on it since I got it.  I raced it.  I went on adventures with it. I rode it to work. Then I got a "real" cross bike and realized that the Surly was sporting about 10 extra pounds.  Since then it has been demoted to a fender clad rain bike.  It weighs in at about 31lbs at the moment.  The brakes have always been a little finicky to adjust and it has always shifted like crap.  That could probably have been fixed with a new set of brakes and an actual road derailleur instead of the MTB one that is on there right now.  But that wouldn't justify a new bike now would it?  I also kind of dread riding this bike now and nobody should dread a ride, right?

I'd looked at titanium bikes a few times over the last few years as a possible replacement but always talked myself down since I only ride the Cross Check in the rain.  As I was swapping over the winter tires and adjusting the shifting and brakes for the umpteenth time I decided to take another look.

Exciting Boxes And Existing Wheels

I'd heard good things about Habanero bikes and hey, they are named after a hot pepper after all, how bad could they be?  So I made the decision to contact them and investigate the next step.  I don't think it would be a spoiler to say how that ended up.  I had decided to go with a non-disk bike since I have lots of relatively new road bike wheels laying around.  Mark Hickey, the owner of Habanero Cycles was extremely helpful.  They can supply anything from a raw frame to a complete bike.  Being as cheap as I am, I decided I would build the bike myself.  Actually I just wanted to do a bike build since I had never done it from scratch. The fully built bike from Habanero was probably only $100-200 more and I put in WAY more effort in labor than that.  But, hey, I'm in this for the adventure.

Smaller Exciting Boxes

Actually the prices on parts through Habanero were so competitive that I ended up ordering a lot of the bits and pieces along with the frame.  I ended up getting most of the groupset from Chain Reaction Cycles and filled in the rest from Tree Fort Bikes & Jenson USA.  Some of my favorite online bike parts dealers.  Not to mention Bike Nashbar, Bike Tires Direct, Backcountry, Competitive Cyclist, Amazon (of course) etcetera, and so on...The first step is admitting you have a problem.

We Don't Need The Box (Inside Joke)

Time to start building! So, I grabbed the bottom bracket, threaded it into the frame and grabbed the highly specialized 16 notch, Park BBT-9 bottom bracket tool to tighten it down.  Well, it turns out that there is another highly specialized 16 notch, Park BBT-59.2 tool that looks nearly identical but is just slightly smaller.  Luckily I realized that the "hand tool" in the box with the BB was also an adapter.  Moving on.

All Done Lacking Finishing Up

The overall shape of the bike too place quickly.  I got everything loosely clamped in place so I could try the size.  With a lot of encouragement, measuring and calculations Mark convinced me that the 57CM frame would be the right size for me even though I usually ride a 58CM or 60CM.  With the knowledge that the bike might be on the small side I am waiting until I ride it to cut the steerer tube.  Therein lies the problem.  I didn't buy that many headset spacers and I need A LOT.  If anybody has ever bought a headset spacer they know that this may very well be the most marked up item not only in bike parts but in the entire free market world.  I already had to go to the big city of Portland and have some credit at one of the bike shops, so I splurged.  Oh My God! Their website showed a bunch of options at reasonable prices but when I got there I found that those were online only.   I bought five 5mm slices of a tube for $20.  It almost killed me.  These are not high-tech in any way.  They are pieces of plastic, err, "carbon fiber".  When I got home and started installing them I realized that I really needed more.  OK, I'll have to wait.  I bought about 4x the stack height on Amazon for $8.95. 

Seriously, which bunch of spacers cost $20!

This is not encouraging me to visit my LBS.  Actually, my   LBS probably would have given them to me even though I hardly ever shop there due to a conflict of business hours.  In fact he has given me one, custom made even! I've talked about headset spacers way too long.



At this point the bike is nearly built except for shifters and brakes.  The shifters weren't that bad to install once I learned where all the secret hidden compartments were for the clamp bolt and all the cables.  The brake cable is hidden under a cover with the smallest screw in the universe.  I was paranoid about loosing it.  Probably justified since I had set down much larger parts and lost them many times during the build.

As it turns out, I just hate adjusting brakes.  Or anything to do with brakes.  Problems included bolts that bottomed out in the studs that needed to be cut.  No way to adjust cable tension and no quick release on the Techto Mini-V brakes.  At least not without an inline cable adjuster which I didn't realize I needed to buy. And brake pads that didn't really reach the rims very well at maximum adjustment.   Screw it, I'll get them close enough because I really want a test ride.

Really Really Almost Done

The bike is finished except wrapping the bars and cutting the steerer tube.  Those are waiting for the last 2 parts and a few test rides to dial in the sizing. 

Test Ride Time!

Some Skating Recon Along With The Ride

After a few quick adjustments I went for a quick lap around the block.  Around here around the block is about 10 miles.  Other than feeling a hair small the bike rode like a dream.  I'm used to riding bigger bike but I think this one actually fits me.  I chose to keep the decals to a minimum to keep it a secret weapon.

New Bike Clean

I Like the Simple Pepper Logo

Nice Clean Lines

Who Needs Bar Tape?

I'm going to call it a total success.  As it stands the build weight is 21lbs.  Not feather light but I think the tires might have self sealing tubes in them.  I'm a little worried about fitting fenders on it since the brakes and I seem to disagree.  I might have to buy some nice upscale fenders to match the rest of the bike. I kinda hate to get it dirty.

For Sale: Surly Cross Check, Size 60CM, Lightly Loved.

I'm still not over the headset spacers.