Recently picked up this bike as my first fixie and I loved the frame (I will be adding a front brake before I take it for a ride) but I have concerns with this rear tire clearance.
It looks like 1mm or less of lateral clearance and the wheel is about as far back in the dropout as possible. Is this normal for this kind of racing bike frame? And if not, is my only option to buy smaller diameter wheels?
Thanks in advance!
by spilt_yakult
20 Comments
Yeah, that’s really narrow. A lot of older bikes have less clearance. Looks like you need narrower tires.
Fairly normal for fixed track frames to have tight clearances but that seems too tight for having the wheel all the way back.
Are those wheels 700c?
The frame might be for 650 wheels
What size are those tires? Are they flush with the rim? I’d be curious if this frame was actually designed to run much smaller tires and that’s why the clearance is tight. I can’t imagine it was designed to run the wheel that far back.
Less tire, not less wheel. Possibly narrower rim, but usually tire solves this. 700×23 was probably stock.
tyres, not wheels
This is a legitimate Track Racing frame and would be pretty terrible to use as a street bike. Good luck.
Are they 27 inch wheels? They’re just a bit bigger than 700c.
Cunefare makes [track frames for 650c wheels](https://www.ebay.com/itm/167611603780). Yours might be one of them. How’s the clearance at the fork crown snd brake?
You might be better off with 650 wheels
Something weird is going on here. You say the tyres are 23 but they look wider than my 28s. Is the rim really wide making the tyres look really fat?
I agree with the others saying something odd here, but I have very limited experience with track frames. Especially looking at how far back the axel sits in dropouts and limited space ahead of tire someone might have tried to “covert” a 650 to 700. Might see if frame manufacturer can confirm OEM from frame number? Also very possible I just don’t know enough about track frames.
Edit: you can see where wheel used to fit 1 and 2 links farther in. I can’t imagine losing that much frame clearance with the wheel.
You’ll need smaller tires and the wheels are fine
Aiming those are 700c wheels. You can tell by a couple aspects that you should have 650b. Changing the tires and staying at 700 will probably not do the trick.
Send it.
Ps. Don’t.
You need narrower tires. The rubber part of the wheel.
My balls hurt just looking at that bike…
If you slide the rear wheel forwards in the dropouts won’t the tire hit the frame? There’s no way this frame was designed that way, and you really shouldn’t be all the way at the back of your dropouts so something is wrong here. I’m agreeing with other here that this bike was made for 650b wheels but someone has tried (and failed) to squeeze 700c’s in there.
Probably a 650c frame at that size.
Side note, that must be the largest difference between TT and ST length I’ve ever seen.
Definitely put a negative rise stem on it.
Holy reach batman what’s th reach on that thing.
run a mullet with a smaller rear wheel