Back in 2013 I bought a carbon Merckx equipped with 2×10 Ultegra that was just small enough to be irritating. I was young and dumb, and so rode it anyway for a few years before my life changed and I stopped riding for a decade. Now that I'm a little older, the fit was less forgiving and I thought about a new bike. But then, vintage grouch I've always been, I saw an '84 Miyata frameset for sale (the '84 catalog calls the paint scheme "Olympic Silver") for a song from my LBS. I've always fit an old 62cm Nishiki International well, and felt that if I could get a higher end version of that, I'd be set. So I seized the chance and planned to move all the Ultegra onto the 912.
Everything moved over pretty easily. I decided not to cold set the rear triangle (for now). The biggest compatibility issue was the aero shifter boss, but I found a method on BikeForums to make a cable stop using a Suntour Symmetric shifter set and some Shimano downtube cable stops with the flat back. The stem and bars came together, and the typewritten ratio guide is there to stay (partly because I'm also a typewriter nerd).
I anticipated a loss of responsiveness when I moved to steel, but I was surprised to find that it's very responsive without the vibration of carbon. I've had a lot of fun on it and it's one of the best fits I've ever had. Now what to do with a perfectly good 2012 EMX-3 frameset hanging on my wall…
by mud_chicken