New Project No. 27 - Building a Fixed Gear Bike

I'm a firm believer that you can never have too many projects on the go at once. So to the list I've now added "building a fixed-gear bike". If you don't know what this is, it's a bike with one gear that doesn't let you coast; so you have to pedal the whole time you're riding it, yes even down hills, around corners, and when coming up to a red light.

If you want to know more about fixies, read the late Sheldon Brown's web site, or search YouTube for "fixie" (the slang name for such machines).

My obstacles are:

• I've never ridden a fixie (or a track bike, which is much the same thing), so I don't know exactly what components will suit me best (e.g. what size gearing to choose for the only gear, which is a pretty important call).
  
• I'm part Scottish, so I dinnae wanna spend a lot of money, laddie.
• Although I've assembled my own road bike, it was with more modern components, and I'm by no means a bike mechanic when it comes to skills or even tools.

My strategy is to cannibalise two of my existing bikes that I don't ride any more (one is worn out, one is too small) for as many useful parts as possible, and buy the rest as cheaply as possible. I want the bike to look decent, but it doesn't need to have top name bits or be particularly light.

More details and pictures to come in part II; it's getting late.