I bought this bike last fall for under $100 to serve as a good winter bike that I could beat up and not really worry about. I had never heard of the Lotus brand before and after a little research I found that they were a mid-range racing bicycle maker back in the ’80s. The bike originally came with downtube shifters, a 6 speed freewheel, and steel wheels which had terrible braking capacity in wet weather, so I decided to upgrade with parts I had from a broken bike. Honestly I can’t believe all the parts work together since they’re from 4 different decades, but so far the ride has been great and I’m looking forward to winter riding.
**Full parts list:**
1983 Lotus Prestige Ishiwata Mangy X DB tubing frame/fork
STARS Panther 9/10/11sp Campagnolo wheelset (cheapest Chinese alloy wheel I could find that was also 9sp Campy compatible)
Suntour Superbe brakes
Giant P-SL1 23mm tires
Shimano UN55 square taper bottom bracket
Aero Cold Forged 170mm cranks, 52/42t chainrings
Miche Primato 9sp 12-23t cogset
KMC X9.93 chain
Suntour aRX friction front derailler
Campagnolo Mirage 8 speed rear derailler
Campagnolo Veloce 9 speed Ergo levers
Origin8 1″ threaded to 1 1/8″ threadless headset adapter
FSA Vision 100mm -8 deg 26mm clamp diameter stem
Ergal 7075 46cm handlebars
Unbranded fluted alloy 1 bolt seatpost with Giant saddle
Shimano R540 pedals
Wiremaster on
Damn. Your parts bin is better than my parts bin. Enjoy the ride.
[deleted] on
I ride a lotus, cheers!
[deleted] on
very creative build list, not bad : ]
BoogerDavis on
I thought you meant you were going to strip it for parts, and was going to offer you $25 for the frame 🙂
6 Comments
I bought this bike last fall for under $100 to serve as a good winter bike that I could beat up and not really worry about. I had never heard of the Lotus brand before and after a little research I found that they were a mid-range racing bicycle maker back in the ’80s. The bike originally came with downtube shifters, a 6 speed freewheel, and steel wheels which had terrible braking capacity in wet weather, so I decided to upgrade with parts I had from a broken bike. Honestly I can’t believe all the parts work together since they’re from 4 different decades, but so far the ride has been great and I’m looking forward to winter riding.
**Full parts list:**
1983 Lotus Prestige Ishiwata Mangy X DB tubing frame/fork
STARS Panther 9/10/11sp Campagnolo wheelset (cheapest Chinese alloy wheel I could find that was also 9sp Campy compatible)
Suntour Superbe brakes
Giant P-SL1 23mm tires
Shimano UN55 square taper bottom bracket
Aero Cold Forged 170mm cranks, 52/42t chainrings
Miche Primato 9sp 12-23t cogset
KMC X9.93 chain
Suntour aRX friction front derailler
Campagnolo Mirage 8 speed rear derailler
Campagnolo Veloce 9 speed Ergo levers
Origin8 1″ threaded to 1 1/8″ threadless headset adapter
FSA Vision 100mm -8 deg 26mm clamp diameter stem
Ergal 7075 46cm handlebars
Unbranded fluted alloy 1 bolt seatpost with Giant saddle
Shimano R540 pedals
Damn. Your parts bin is better than my parts bin. Enjoy the ride.
I ride a lotus, cheers!
very creative build list, not bad : ]
I thought you meant you were going to strip it for parts, and was going to offer you $25 for the frame 🙂
How’d you get the bike to stand upright?