A Salsa with Wilderness Trail Bike drop handlebars and earlier WTB shifter mounts for Suntour friction thumb shifters. (This is not one of my bikes.)
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A Salsa with WTB dirt drops and later WTB shifter mounts, made for post-1986 Shimano indexed thumb shifters. Note the early iteration of a removable face plate stem. (This is not one of my bikes.)
A 1980s magazine "cool stuff" page. Post 1986; note the indexed Shimano thumbshifters. The stem, by Steve Potts, has a removable face plate. Potts's LD stems tend to have less of an arc of the circle than, say, the Ibis LD stems..
Blue Trek 930, ca. 1993 (1 1/8 inch threaded steerer); US made, lugged True Temper steel. Bought in 2004 or 2005; sold ca. 2017. I dislike anatomic bars; these must been installed in a scraping-the-barrel's-bottom build.
Titanium drop bar MTB in road ride mode. Leather brake hoods feel better than rubber. Despite the decal, it's not a Schwinn. Bought new in early 1991. Note the Salsa upjutter, designed (like the Ibis LD) specifically to put drops on MTBs.
Early 1990s Diamond Back Apex, modified, at a Chaco outlier house ruin, circa 2012, NW New Mexico.
Hilso Trail, McKinley County, New Mexico, close to Fort Wingate in the Cibola National Forest, circa May 2013. DBR Sandvik titanium MTB; owned from 2012 to the present.
Diamond Back DBR Titanium at a Chaco Canyon outlier house, off the paved path, NW NM, summer 2013.
Not a bike in sight! Eastern Navajo reservation; NW New Mexico.
Bianchi Grizzly, new circa 1988 and made in Japan of steel tubes joined by lugs; shown here in about 2013 in Los Angeles.
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A late 1980s Grant Petersen era Japan made Bridgestone MB-3 converted to a utility bicycle. Nitto rear; Pass and Stow front racks; sold in the summer of 2015.
A Taiwan made early 1990s soccer dad hybrid turned into a proto gravel bike in around 2012; sold in 2026. Lugged frame; unicrown fork; big bang for the low bucks.
A highly specialized bicycle, but used for purposes other than what it was designed for. Sold in 2015 in Los Angeles after maybe 18 years in my grubby hands.
Early 1990s ? Bridgestone RB-1, sold in 2015 in Los Angeles. Clearance for maybe 28mm maximum; very good handling and faster on smooth surfaces than a drop bar 26er but less flexible.
Black Mountain Monstercross, Fall 2016; as of the summer of 2026 my only new frameset for the past 30 years. Mike Varley's designs are very nice. Sub 6 pounds for frame, fork, headset in 62cm! No bar tape yet; still at the fitting stage.
1993 or so GT Avalanche Team: Japan made Tange Prestige; 1 1/8 threaded fork; sold after maybe 15 or 16 years to a Thai buyer in the summer of 2026.
Another iteration of the soccer dad hybrid turned gravel bike Miyata Triple Cross, as built in 2017.
Circa 1988 KHS mountain bike utility build with Nitto moustache bars and stem shifters. The frame later went to a friend in Albuquerque but was stolen at the University of New Mexico campus.
DBR (Diamond Back Racing) US made Ti MTB; custom steel fork; customized Bruce Gordon front rack; Zuni Mountains, circa 2018.
DBR (Diamond Back Racing) US made Ti MTB; custom steel fork; customized Bruce Gordon front rack; Zuni Mountains, circa 2018.
Trek 970, early 1990s vintage, here in 2020 or 2021 in utility mode with front and rear racks. Too much red matchy-matchy!
A rare Skarke frame, made by a Hewlett Packard engineer in Colorado who in the 1970s and/or 1980s built frames inspired by French constructeurs. October 2020; COVID era. A cottonwood tree in its fall glory provides the backdrop.
The Skarke features reversed Mafac cantilever brakes and rear brake cable routing through the seatpost and seat tube, features also found on some French constructeur bicycles. Note the generator mount.
DBR (Diamond Back Racing) titanium frame by Sandvik; custom steel fork, late COVID era in ABQ NM
Pre-Trek Bontrager Race Lite frame with a disk conversion and a Clockwork Cycles fork.
Moots YBB on the eastern Navajo Nation in New Mexico, Spring 2024, before its drop bar conversion and de-suspension-ization.
Bridgestone MB-4 single speed that was my beater for a year or so, ca. 2024; sold in ABQ NM that year. Straight bars are tolerable for short rides with bar ends that mimic the brake hood position.
A ca. 1988 KHS Montana Pro MTB, my beater for a few years, early on. Aged Rene Herse tires; Roberts 6700 Carpet Cement as sidewall treatment keeps worn tires usable for longer.
Early 1990s Diamond Back Apex, my first foray into frame modification. An uncommon true 23 inch frameset, bought at a swap meet in Los Angeles's South Bay.
Davidson (Seattle, WA) titanium light touring frame w/ a Brent Steelman fork; from a Pacific NW bike co op. From the brief era of 1" threadless steerers. By modern standards, a flawed design, as tire clearance is limited to "only" 38mm tires.
Albuquerque ditch bank late winter sunset, February 2025.
1988 or so KHS Montana Pro beater in its mature build, using "in stock" parts; good enough to enjoy; not so nice as to provoke worry when you park it. The Rene Herse tires finally got too iffy even for a beater.
KHS Solo One SE, built in 2012 from a South Bay Los Angeles swap meet NOS frame and a QBP Karate Monkey fork that cost three times what the frame did. It needs a 94-58 bcd crank; the rings are too large.
Eastern Navajo Nation, March 2026. Diamond Back Apex circa 1990, modified and powder coated John Deere green.
KHS Solo One SE on the eastern Navajo Nation in the spring of 2026. The cow skull is not a purchased adornment; it's from a cow that died on the range you see behind the bike and barbed wire "gate."
KHS Solo One SE on the eastern Navajo Nation in the spring of 2026
An early 1990s US made lugged steel modified Trek 970. A garage queen purchased in 2019 from a bike co op in Los Angeles. In its 2026 guise.
1990 Diamond Back Apex, modified; eastern Navajo Nation, Spring 2026
Abandoned or trashed mirror, ABQ NM; Black Mountain rim brake cross; experimenting with a new-to-it front basket.
Miyata 1000, circa 1990, with late 1980s decal styles; late June 2026, ABQ NM
Miyata 1000, circa 1990, Soma Shikoro tires, WCW carbon center hubs, Pass and Stow rack, Nitto bar and stem.
Miyata 1000, ca 1990; late June 2026, ABQ NM. Some day I'll finish wrapping the bars. Nitto Nitto Nitto!
This modified Diamond Back Apex gives me huge bang for the few bucks I've spent on it, mostly in powder coating after the brazing. The paint was beat up when I bought it for a really low price.
A Shimano FC-6207 triple on the DB Apex makes a good wide range double, 40-28 plus pants guard; a Campagnolo Nuovo Record pre-CPSC front derailleur shifts this combination really well.
The joy of ditch bank loops: Black Mountain cross, rim brake, late June 2026; Soma Cazadero 50mm tires.
June 2026, my latest sub-beater, a garage sale Costco Skyomish, labeled Tange tubing MTB, ca. mid 1990s; its weight is an argument against inexpensive oversized tubing; only the headset, seatpost, brake calipers & frame & fork are original.
The open space in Albuquerque makes up for some of the other very real shortcomings of the city. Here, the golden hour at June's end; community garden plots.
![Can a thirty year old dual suspension bike fit into my riding ethos? This new build, mid August 2026, will help me answer the question. It's a 1996 Schwinn S[9Six] integrated rear triangle dual suspension with very limited travel.](schwinn_dual_suspension1.jpeg)
Can a thirty year old dual suspension bike fit into my riding ethos? This new build, mid August 2026, will help me answer the question. It's a 1996 Schwinn S[9Six] integrated rear triangle dual suspension with very limited travel.
This slide show is, I hope, minimally thought provoking, while also somewhat self-indulgent. It's very first world to be able to obsess over minutae as I do.
Regardless of the self indulgence, I'll try to update this periodically, as I try new bikes, assuaging my curiousity.