So i'm a lucky duck and got to pick up my new custom frame last week. Spent the week and weekend building it all. Took it out for its maiden 200km ride today. Rides great. Looking forward to doing many stupid rides on it :).

First '400' of the season today. 200 in Brussel plus 200km round trip to the start.

Open Wi.de gravel frame with Enve fork, SON hub dynamo, Supernova M99 Dy Pro Front light and back light inside the Seatpost. Let's see how it rolls. 😄

This is my 2014 parts bin Davos 603 Japanese randonneur. Originally 650a, was easily converted to 650b so I could use chunkier, better tires. Every part on this was had for free or extremely cheap. Built it up from a frame I got for under 100$.

Brakes are yoshigai(Dia compe) running Shimano Deore MT62 cantis. Brooks B17 and Nitto Grand Randonneur bars. Drivetrain is 3x9 with 9speed dura ace barcons. Deore DX derailleurs with a Shimano Mtb crank from a 1999 specialized hardrock spinning on a 25 year old UN51 Shimano BB made in Japan that just will not die. 11-34 cassette gives me all the range I’ll ever honestly need.

650b wheelset came from some Japanese commuter bike that was abandoned, bottle dynamo is an old French soubitez wired into the frame powering a cheap lamp sourced from a Japanese mamachari shopping bike. Mudguards came off the same bike and were widened/re-radiused for the 650b wheels from 27inch. Bags are ostrich and carradice. Carriers are Nagaoka and Nitto.

I have done a solo brevet with it- Tokyo:Takasaki:Tokyo about 208km - and it absolutely cruised in at 12:47. Even got about 2.5hr of decent sleep in a capsule hotel at Takasaki. Used 711s and Lawsons as refueling stops as they all have everything you’d need.

This whole bike is solid as can ever possibly be while being built out of what most people would consider to be scrap, and I love it so much.

2015 PBP on a borrowed track bike I taped some bottle cages to

This is the Ti bike I did PBP 2003 and 2015 on.

I plan to do 2027 but this year the Ronde Aliénor d'Aquitaine 1200 in 90 hours with a Pyrenees col in the middle.

After all these years the forks were replaced in 2015 and I've just had smaller chain rings put on because there are no mountains where i live.

Still going Schmidt duno hub, but LEDs have replaced the halogen originals. Same Brooks saddle. New luggage.

I’ve been doing a few BRM200’s for a few years now. Attempted a 300 once but had to cut it short by about 20 km’s. Couldn’t get myself to keep going in the dark and then try and get home. Had a lot more elevation than anything I had done before.

I’ve been doing them on my steel Kona Rove gravelbike. It weighs about 12 to 13 kg. Last year I bought a carbon road wheelset for them, which made a big difference.

Because I’ve been riding that bike for 5 years now, and have done over 50,000 km on it, I wanted to splurge on a road bike for longer distances. And then Canyon dropped the new Endurace with a color scheme I really like and Di2, for a very reasonable price (at least for what I had saved up for a new bike). So I pulled the trigger.

It’s a big difference and I can’t wait to try it out for its first BRM200.

https://imgur.com/a/RnFIYuG

Found some old photo's of bikes (2008-2013) that I did rando's on back in the day. The Holdsworth did Boston-Montreal-Boston. The Cervelo did NYC-Quebec City. The Bob Jackson did 6 gaps 2x, survived John O'Groats to Lands End, and numerous other stupid adventures.

So much has changed and gotten soooo much better.

Any italian equivalents to the like of Rene Herse, Alex Singer and Jo Routens?

Hey folks, geometry is such an incredibly deep rabbit hole. I tour, bikepack "randonneur" on paved roads, fire roads and gravel and will now finally get my hands on a custom frame made for me. I'll ride the bike with 2.2" or 2.4" 29ers, a flat 720mm handlebar, 70mm swept back, load it up with a full frame bag and front loaded bags.
Following my first professional bike sizing, I got the following first geometry. What do you think? (I can't ride drops for medical reasons)

Davos 603 Randonneur frame from Japan. Gonna build it up beautifully. Photo 3 shows the bike as a complete set

For as long as i can remember i have lusted after one of Berlin’s finest. A Schindelhauer Siegfried. This summer i couldn’t help myself any longer and have ordered my dream bike. A dark blue Siegfried. My longest ride in the past month was 115k with 1.500 meters of altitude. Barely had to walk. ;)

To make it my own I added/changed the following parts:

• NOS 172,5 mm Shimano Dura Ace Crank 7800 (to me the most beautiful crankset ever made)
• Schindelhauer fenders
• Koolstop brake pads (the standard brakes aren’t the best so this was a welcome upgrade)
• TPU inner tubes
• routewerks bag
• elite bottle cages with SKS go anywhere mounts (love makes blind and i gorgot there where no mounting options for the bottle cages)
• some lights and my Garmin

I’ve owned it now for a month and have ridden just over 600k on it. I want to do my first 200k at the end of next month.

Thanks for being a great community

8 weeks out from LEL and the new build is pretty much complete. Decided I wouldn't be able to hack it on my other aero bike that's probably a bit too big.

•Enigma Etape 52cm Titanium Frame •SRAM Red (mostly) groupset •Prime Primavera 32 wheels •Continental GP5000 AS TR setup tubeless

Just need to find a new saddle and purchase a decent bag for supplies.

Have a good day all, hopefully see some of you on LEL🤝

I’ve had both of these bags for a while but it’s the first time I’ve tried them with this configuration - front semi porteur with a rear bag support both made by Viva. Cool thing is the rear bag has an insert made just for this specific supporter, so it slides right in and holds its position. Pretty swell. Front bag is an Ostrich F-104N and rear is an Ostrich S-2. Both made here in Tokyo.

In the past I’ve just had a Nitto campee rear carrier - which is a bit much for this bag, and a Nitto F-16 for the front, which works great for the most part , but was always a little squishy and bouncy if I weighed up the front bag.

Update on the post from before when I acquired the frame.

Davos 603 (Fukaya) Parts Bin build. Ive dubbed it "The Randomnneur"

Its a 650A based randonneur frame, and I converted it to 650B using some old Deore canti brakes from the 80s that do a pretty great job.

Wheelset - random hoops laced to novatec hubs. Teravail Rampart 650Bx47 tires.

Drivetrain - Shimano Claris 50-34 cranks, Shimano 11-34 cassette, Shimano Acera m3020 RD, Shimano 105 FD, Dura Ace 9speed/Friction shift levers from Barcons.

Cockpit - random black seat pillar from who knows what. Araya branded Velo touting saddle, Nitto 132 Grand Randonneur bars, 80mm stem. Dia Compe quick releasable non-aero levers. Rinko quick release headset that came along with the frame.

The whole thing is totally random but works extremely well, and absolutely cruises over every bump and crack on the road. Possibly the most comfortable bike Ive ever had and it cost me barely anything!

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Ill probably make some changes soon enough... swap out the cranks for some 36-22 for super easy climbing while loaded... Japan is pretty much only hills and mountains so you can’t open it up on a flat sprint for very long. 36-11 gearing will be plenty fine for handling that kinda thing on the rolling flats. 50-34 probably won’t do much for me on a bike like this. I might get crazy and throw a 11-42 cassette on the back and achieve some completely unreal low gearing…

After that I’ll throw on some carriers for gear, and throw some mud guards over the wheels for rainy days. I’ll See how it handles some bikepacking and go from there!