The NJS Plan Changes

I'm still waiting for the fork to come back from the painters; turns out the powder coater does not have a pearl white, so they will paint it a standard white and send it to a "wet" painter to for a coat of pearl clear. Then there is the topic of the crank. As I explained in an earlier post, I bought a beautiful NOS Suntour Superbe Pro. Unfortunately it was only the right side and in 165mm. 165mm is certainly the perfect size for a track crank, but it's also close to track specific. Now the Suntour cranks is also NJS, which means it connects to an ISO bottom Bracket Spindle. For those of you that don't know, the Industry standard for most square taper spindles in the US is JIS (the use of the JIS standard for spindles was driven by Shimano, which is confusing since they used the ISO standard for everything else). ISO is used by Campagnolo and some older European component makers; it is also the standard used for most track gruppos. The two standards are not in-compatible; ISO is a little smaller than JIS, meaning if you slide a JIS crank arm on a ISO spindle, the crank arm will stop about 4-5 mm farther then where an ISO crank arm would stop. If you have a worn crank, then you may run out of spindle. This is where the 165mm length comes into play. I figured I just pick-up a left Campy crank arm until I could find another Superbe. The problem is (as I said) 165mm is usually made for track, so the only left crank arms out there are 170's. I ended up with a Shimano 165mm crank arm. It was a beautiful Dura Ace, but it is JIS. The crank arm was new, so difference on the spindle was an acceptable 3-4 mm. I rode it this way for a few rides, but the fact that my bike had mis-matched standards weighed heavily on my mind.

Most of the parts I have accumulated for this project has been from Internet stores. One I pointed out earlier, was Rider Paradise. Unfortunately this site has dwindled to offering no parts at all. To take it's place I have been checking out njs-keirin.blogspot and njsframes.blogspot. Finally I found a Dura Ace crank on njs-keirin. $207 (+$25 shipping) for the crank, pedals and NJS straps. This was a great deal. The Dura Ace track cranks are NJS and really, really nice; certainly as nice as the Suntour cranks and I have both arms! The pedals are MKS Custom Nuevo(s).

Unfortunately I made a small mistake. I noticed the spindle of the right pedal was hanging up a little. Most likely it's a slight manufacturing defect. I took the pedal apart and took a Dremal bit to the exterior plastic seal; I could see a small polished portion on the spindle where the two were rubbing. The Dremal seemed to do the trick. I then noticed the same problem on the left side. This time I had a problem with the bolt that attached the spindle to the pedal. The pedals have two cartridge bearings pressed into the body and the spindle slides into the bearings. The spindle is held in place with a allen screw. With the right pedal, I needed to put the allen wrench in a vise and turn the spindle with a pedal wrench to loosen it. With the left pedal it seemed to be taking more torque than the left; then SNAP! Oh no. It turns out the screw was left hand threaded. The following day was a waste of about 8 hours trying to locate a replacement screw. I ended up with three options. 1) Throw the pedals away and buy some Soma Hellyer (RX-1 copies) for $70 (my original plan before I bought the used Custom Nuevo(s). 2) njs-keirin.blogspot has a set of beat up RX-1(s) for $35 (plus $25 shipping). The administrator of njs-keirin.blogspot has offered to sell me the pedals at a discount. 3) I found a Web store that will sell me a new set of axles (w/ right and left hand threaded allen screws) for $45. While the third is not the cheapest alternative, it should solve the original problem of the bent axles, plus replace the broken left handed screw.

The choice was determined by njs-keirin.blogspot as they offred to sell me the pedals for $5 plus the $25 shipping. . At this point I must admit that these pedals are not for the Keirin bike. As mentioned earlier, I have already bought a new pair of MKS Custom Royal Nuevo pedals for the NJS bike. The Royal Nuevo(s) are different as they have loose ball bearings; very cool. The used pedal will be for the green machine (my first fixed gear bike). The only real issue will be if the axles are compatible. Custom Nuevo(s) and RX-1 both have cartridge bearings and I'm guessing the spindles (bolts) and bearings are the same. The RX-1(s) have a more abbreviated cage than either the Custom Nuevo(s) and the pedals have different thread pattern for the cages. Best case scenario is the spindles will not only be compatible but in better shape. Regardless all I really expect is a left handed bolt that will work. I'll advise.

Well it worked. I got the pedals in short order and the left pedal had the left handed threaded screw I needed. The Custom Nuevo(s) are now functioning and I have installed them on the green machine. The RX-1 left pedal is a different story. It looks like it was in an accident and then used as a fishing weight for a while; and were talking ocean fishing here. The right pedal on the other hand was in good shape. The two obviously have different histories. While were on the subject of pedals, I bought a set of Christopher toeclips and straps (white) and I plan on using these on the track bike. The NJS bike has has become more of a concept bike. At first the idea of building a bike that could certified and ridden on a Keirin track sounded cool. However, as I have putting the bike together, I realized it would lose all personality and end up being one of the hundreds that are lined up in the basement of a Keirin track waiting to be ridden. I think I can understand why the Keirin racers treat their bikes with so much disdain. So here is the current line-up.

Frame: Soma Rush 55cm
Fork: Threaded Tange steel
Headset: Tange Levin engraved
Bottom bracket: Shimano Dura Ace (NJS) cups/bearings; Campagnolo spindle
Crank: Shimano Track (NJS)
Pedals: MKS (NJS)
Toeclips/straps: Lapize
Handlebars: Nitto (NJS)
Stem: Nitto (NJS)
Rims: Tubular Araya (NJS)
Spokes/Nipples: DT 15g
Hubs: Suzue Pro Max (NJS)
Tires: Vittoria CX
Wheels: 3 cross front/ 4 cross rear
Cogs:18T (Soma), 16T (Shimano)(NJS)
Seat post: Soma
Seat: Soma
Brake caliper: Tektro
Brake lever: Soma

Still waiting for the fork, then ...

NJS bike; What's going right; crankset (kinda)

When I was looking for a NJS crankset, I decided I did not want a Sugino; way too common. I was perusing ebay and found a Suntour Superbe Track Crank; but only the right side. It was NOS and absolutely beautiful, so I bought it. Why do I do these things. Had I waited I would have come up with a set, now I need to search (probably in vain) looking for the left arm. But in the mean time, I found a Dura Ace left arm, in 165mm (the same as the Suntour) That should work in the mean time. There was a problem with this plan however. The Dura Ace was JIS and the Suntour ISO. Now I knew this when I bought the Dura Ace, but it was only $25 and NOS.

When dealing with cranks and bottom brackets, usually there are problems. Since I was dealing with square taper, there are two standards, JIS and ISO. They are not incompatible, but they are different. JIS is the Shimano standard, except for track cranks. ISO is Italian and Track. These are generalities, but for the sake for this discussion it will work. The difference between the two tapers are the ISO is slightly smaller and shorter. Generally an JIS crank will mount about 4 mm farther on an ISO spindle (see http://www.sheldonbrown.com/bbtaper.html for more info).

I wanted to mount the crank on my fixed gear bike to see how it looked. I scrounged around and found a used bottom bracket with Shimnao NJS cups and bearings, and a Campagnolo ISO spindle. Track Spindles tend to be narrower than standard spindles, usually in the 107-108.5 range. This is meant to achieve a chainline of 42mm; this is compared to 46 mm of the standard road double. The Campagnolo spindle was stamped "68-SS-120". I am told this means the spindle is for a bike with a 68mm bottom bracket housing, a double chainring, with 120mm rear hub spacing.

The Spindle itself measured about 112mm. This would seem too long but it is asymmetrical. When installed in the proper fashion it would give you a 46 mm chainline, turn it around and the chain line was 42mm; nice! I put the whole thing together and it looked like this.

Since the Dura Ace arm was new, the difference on how far it mounted was only about 2mm. I also Dremel ('d) out the corners of the inside of the square taper so the crank could mount farther down the spline. Add that to the fact that the spindle was a little longer on the non-drive side and you have a perfect fit. If I someday do find a mate the Suntour right side I may go with an NJS spindle, but for now I'm quite happy with the result.

I've gotten the rear wheel back and it looks just as nice as before, but now it's 4 cross. I am also expecting the new Vittoria CX tires in the next 2 days' and Lickbike still hasn't credited my VISA (I think I'm done doing business with them). Next is the frame. I had toyed with the idea of getting a Keirin frame but all I would be doing is hanging my pretty new parts on a used banged up frame. Okay they are very nice, all lugged and custom made, but it wasn't made for me. It would just be one more Keirin track bike where I would have to compromise somewhere in the size and/or color. So I looked around and settled on a Soma; a 55cm in pearl white. I called American Cyclery (the Soma distributor in San Francisco) and they'll have one for me in 2 days. I told the wife and she wants a road trip to China Town (she's so good). The only custom part will be having the fork steerer cut and threaded; they come 1 inch threadless. I have a very nice Tange chromed steel headset I bought for just the occasion.

Brad

The NJS Bike Part 2 and Headsets

Well pretty much every part but the frame has been purchased. I'm still waiting on riderParadise.com who is 3 weeks late with the Dura Ace chainring, cog and NJS chain. I was a bit concerned as they have a track record of losing orders from time to time and they recently have had practically no NJS parts left on their site. But, they immediately returned my email and said the parts will be re-shipped; I think that means, "Oops we didn't ship your order", but the price is good so I have hope.

Under the heading of new parts on an old bike, I have mounted some of the NJS parts on my the old green machine. So you don't have to look back it looks like this;

I call it my sanity bike and sent this photo to fixgeargallery.com; they have yet to post it but it's only been a couple of weeks. With the new parts I call it, what else? My insanity bike (the Green machines evil twin).

As you can see the brakes and the lights are gone. I also added a beautiful Chris King headset; in green of course.

The old headset was a Stronglight A9 that worked great, and would have probably outlived the frame. But because it is made of fairly soft aluminum and had come loose several times, it had become pretty nicked up. It also had this strange habit of not wanting to tighen up. I would have to over-tighten the adjusting ring, tighten the lockring and then loosen the adjusting ring into the lockring. After about 3 years of this, I finally figured out the lockring was galling against the aluminum washer between the two rings. Once I coated the washer with grease the problem went away. Unfortunately some damage had been done to the lower race (with a Stronglight the steel races are separate from the cups and come as two discs that sandwich around the roller bearings). The damage was minor and similar to the notchiness I've seen with cage ball bearing, but I did not feel any of the associated "indexing". Due to the fact that I have the same headset on my Peugeot, I bought two bearing sets in case I ever needed them. This is something I always do and generally find I end up replacing the part before or at the time I would need to re-build it. Anyway I sold the rebuilding kits on ebay a few days before I pulled off the headset; I actually made money on them too! The previous headset was a chromed Campagnolo that was started to suffer from what I previously called indexing and is also called "notchiness", this is why I went to the Stronglight.

From Wikipedia;

On bicycles ridden only in dry conditions and/or with fenders, the normal failure mode is a progressive notchiness in the steering, caused by pitting of the races. This is normally called "brinelling", although this stems from a misunderstanding of the cause; true brinelling is caused merely by pressing the ball axially into the race, and it is almost impossible to replicate this damage even by striking the fork crown repeatedly with a hammer. The pits are by far deepest at the front and back of the head tube, and are actually caused by flexing of the fork blades, which is transmitted to the steerer tube. This misaligns the bearings and causes "fretting", a small amplitude, large stress movement which tears metal from the races at the points where the balls rest.
The solution is to have a 45 degree interface in the headset where this flexing movement can be accommodated, preserving the relative alignment of the races and allowing the ball bearings to take pure axial and rotational loads. Shimano cartridge bearing headsets do this by allowing the cartridges to move relative to the pressed-in cups, while Stronglight roller bearing headsets, and most threadless headsets, now have loose upper and lower races which can move relative to the cups. Modern headsets, therefore, rarely suffer from "brinelling".

And from Sheldon Brown:

Roller Bearing
A bearing that uses cylindrical or conical rollers instead of balls. The major bicycle application of roller bearings is in some headsets. Roller bearing headsets are very long lasting, due to the greater contact surface area as opposed to ball bearings. Current units, however do not turn as freely as ball bearing headsets. This is due to the use of cylindrical rollers, rather than conical rollers. Cylindrical rollers do not naturally roll in a circle, but in a straight line.

For those of you that don't know about the Chris King Headset, they are way overbuilt and will probably outlast several frames. While there may be more innovative headsets, Chris King has certainly set the standard. From NYC Bike Snob;

Another financial investment. Regardless of whether they're worth the price, nothing inside our outside of cycling holds its value like these things. This is not an endorsement, it's just a fact. You can’t even get a used one cheap on eBay. I’ve tracked the retail price of these things over the years against the price of gold and the indices of all the world's stock markets and believe me when I say they offer a better return than any of them. As long as Mr. King successfully continues his anti-integrated headset scare tactics I’m putting all my money in his headsets.

Previously Ritchey made a their threaded WCS headset with needle bearings. This head set is no longer in production, but I believe it is the Ritchey WCS headset still sold by Rivendell. The only other headset I know of is the Woodman Saturn. The headset has a upper cartridge bearing on the top and a roller bearing on the bottom. I know nothing about this headset and it's only available as a threadless headset, but it looks interesting.

Brad

The NJS bike..it starts

Yes, I decided to go for it. More than the Hipster draw, which is very strong by the way, it's the Retro-grouch part me that wants one. Most, if not all the bike will come from the internet/ebay. First we start @ Rider Paradise an ebay case store in Japan; I will be getting most the parts from here.

NEW NITTO PEARL Stem 25.4mm clamp 100mm NJS TRACK
NITTO TRACK BAR B125 Steel 25.4 clamp 400mm NJS B-125

The choices here were based on use; I'm actually going to ride this thing, probably do a Century on it. Very few folks can maintain the classic kerin drop for very long. The Nitto 123 bar drops 180mm and the 58deg stem gonna take it down another 2 inches. The Nitto 125 bar combined with the Pearl 71 deg stem is going to raise the bar 5 inches!! Oh yah.

Now, how about some wheels. First I got one of the best wheel men in the business. Combine that with Japan's traditional cheap spokes and nipples; this is one place I'm not going all NJS
World Class Cycles

Suzue deluxe pro max high flange 36 loose ball bearings no lockring 36 NJS

Traditional high flange loose ball hubs. I've got a set of the Campy loose ball hubs on my fixie and they are tits; but they require some attention. I'm going to be using a lot of Shimano Dura Ace track parts so I decided to go with the Suzues. The company closed it's doors in 2006 but they had a lot of stock. That stock is just now starting to dry up with these 36h Pro Max and the price is up to $275 a pair most places (one place has then @ $199).

NEW ARAYA Tubular rim 16B Gold NJS 36H 335g Keirin

Again from Rider Paradise. Here I had to make the jump to tubulars. I consdiered some Araya clicnchers I found on ebay; they were the old 20A hard anodized variety, but the history of bike racing was made on tubulars, and this was to be a retro-bike, so I decided to go for it. However this is where the NJS stamp stopped. DT Swiss spokes and nipples. These are them; very shiny indeed.

Viittoria Corsa tires, the best made.

Pedals, we are going to need pedals and clips; back to Rider Paradise

NEW MKS ROYAL NUEVO NJS TRACK pedals
NEW MKS Alpha Sport toe straps NJS keirin track Black

MKS toe clips are as good as I have ever seen (of course I had to buy them somewhere else but that's beside the point), but $45 for straps! Damn. Okay, they run about the same as Campy, but the Campy's aren't made any more. The Ale's are only $14 for christ sakes.

Now how about a crank. Checked ebay and found a NOS Suntour Suberbe 165mm Track NJS Crank; but just the right crank. It was so beautiful that I bought it. Now I need a left crank arm. This may be a year long quest, but most 165mm left cranks should work. There is the issue of ISO vs JIS. Most track components are ISO and most Japanese/American parts are JIS. The difference in the square taper is minimal, especially if it's new. I find NOS Dura Ace 165mm left arm for $24. When it arrived it I found it sat about 2 mm deeper on an ISO square taper axle than the Suntour crank; it should work fine.

Now how am I going to pay for all this stuff. Well, the Suzue hubs went on the credit card, but most the other parts are Paypal. I have dug through a lot of my parts bin and have been auctioning them off on ebay. So far the other stuff net cost has been about $100.

Just sold a bunch of stuff so it's time to go Rider Paradise again.

Currently I am riding with a 48:18 gear ratio. I expect that once I play around on the track I am going to want to increase the ratio but I still want to ride on the street. The Dura Ace Track cogs are pretty cheap @ $15@, but they only go up to 16T. I decided to start with a 46 tooth CR and 16T cog; I can drop down to 13T or anywhere in between later.


NEW SHIMANO Dura Ace TRACK CHAIN RING FC-7710 46T 1/8"
NEW SHIMANO DURA ACE TRACK COG SS-7600 16T 1/8" NJS

FTF (further to Follow)