My ugly bike
One of my prettiest bikes, the Randy Herse. This is how she looked before giving her to Eliisa— it’s now fully fendered and basketed all the time, and has her beloved Salsa Cowchippers (polished, natch) and a Crust x Nitto UI stem
In general I think I have a pretty good eye for building a beautiful bike. When I first got my Stooge Rambler I was hellbent on putting as many silver parts on it as possible, attempting a René Herse meets classic Stooge build that ultimately went by the wayside when I realized that A) there wasn’t any silver dropper posts at the time, and B) that bike actually needs some black accents. My Randy Herse, now my wife’s, was my ultimate chef-d'œuvre, the perfect classic Bicycle Quarterly style randonneuse with all silver everywhere. And when I couldn’t find a silver part, like the very specific front brake cable hanger I needed, I deanodized it myself with Easy Off oven cleaner. It’s the same can of oven cleaner I used for deanodizing my former Canfield Nimble 9 headset which now resides on my REEB Donkadonk, and the same one I used for turning E’s Suzi-Q seat post clamp silver instead of black.
note the deanodized silver seat post collar
Enter my 2007 Specialized HRXC. This bike originally came into my life because my mother-in-law is an estate sale queen, and bought it to have me fix up for her. It came with the original base level spec, complete with v-brakes, freewheel, and extremely crappy suspension fork. The whole thing was a proper jalopy, and being a bad [but correct] son-in-law, I kind of just sat on it for a year or more knowing that she wouldn’t miss it.
note the deanodized headset
Meanwhile, I was taken by the idea that my Stooge Rambler might be really fun with a fork with more offset. The Rambler has a 69º head tube angle (which, as an aside, why don’t more “gravel bikes” have <70º head tube angles with big fork offsets? it’s absolutely magical), so in order to get a low or even just low-neutral trail figure you need a fork with a lot of offset. The only non-custom fork I could think of was the Rawland ULV with its 80mm offset and 27.5 plus tire clearance. So I dropped them an email in 2023 asking to buy a fork. They replied pretty quickly saying I could get one, but then communication went silent. Then randomly in July of this year I decided to drop them a line again. They replied quickly and sent me the fork for a crazy good price, complete with a needle bearing headset and some other bits and bobs. Off to the races!
“final form”
I took it out of the box and to my horror noticed that it looked a good deal longer than a 400mm axle to crown. I measured it and lo and behold it was 430mm axle to crown. I started doing some research on Bike Insights, and hit up Dr. Welby to get his thoughts. We started looking up a bunch of weird hybrid frames with crappy suspension forks, but cooler heads prevailed and I didn’t buy anything impulsively (again). He mentioned that most mid-school 26” hardtails with 80mm suspension forks would probably have the axle to crown I needed. If only I had one of those… oh my gosh that jalopy I’ve been storing and more or less forgot about might be just the thing! I grabbed my tape measure and was #blessed to see that the HRXC my mother-in-law dropped off a year or more ago was just the thing!
I racked my brain on parts to put on it, not wanting to spend any more money if possible. Around that time I decided to just set and forget my Rambler at 27.5” wheels, having just built up a really nice set of DT Swiss hoops on closeout for it. This left my 26+ wheelset that was formerly on the Rambler laying around. The front dynamo hub mercifully was 100x12mm, which I used fork dropout reducers for on the Rambler, meaning it would slot right into the HRXC. The rear was 142mm thru axle, but since it’s my beloved min-max Koozer hub I easily switched it from XD thru axle to HG QR very cheaply. The rear can fit a 2.5” tire, and I went for a 2.8” up front, although I swear I can run a 3.5” in that fork. I bought some short pull BB7 calipers on eBay to go with my Velo Orange levers, put on an extremely reliable 1x10 Shimano mountain drivetrain, and used a 27.2mm -> 30.9mm shim in my parts bin to run this prototype Path Less Pedaled designed dropper post. The standover, and subsequently stack, on this bike is extremely low. So I went for a couple spacers + Ganopper stem to get my bars where I wanted. I also was so Jones H-bar curious, so I sprang for some barely used $40 ones from Facebook Marketplace.
That wingspan though! I’m convinced that the more backsweep you have the more your bars feel wide— these 710mm with 45º backsweep are proper huge and I’m pretty much always choking up on them.
I put it all together and went for a shakedown ride with no front load. I took it to Belle Isle and rode mostly pavement, but of course took it on the bumpy dirt. The ride quality was really breaking my brain— the Randy Herse is patently low trail in the very traditional Bicycle Quarterly sort of way, and this thing certainly felt low trail, but the pneumatic trail from the 2.8” tire balanced the ride out quite a bit. The Jones bars are perfect on it— I cruise through the headwinds up in the aero loop position, and bimble around on the extremely comfortable 45º backsweep section. I think they’re absolutely more practical than drop bars, but I have no plans to replace all the bikes in my collection with them… yet.
Ultimately I put a front rack and basket on there, and the handling is perfectly dialed now. With the 70º head tube angle it gives a trail figure of 44mm (41mm mechanical), which is actually the same as E’s Nor’easter (which feels very good and neutral to me, especially with the big tires).
The thing is, I really don’t need this bike at all. It fulfills a similar roll to my Stooge Rambler (ATB shredder that isn’t a pig on the pavement) or my Specialized Hard Rock Clydesdale (basket city bike jammer that I can lock up with minimal fear of theft). But something about it is just so fun, and so right. Also, I can’t lie, it is kind of nice to have a super light weight aluminum frame. The paint is chipped really bad and it looks pretty ugly. It has mismatched bar tape, and rusty crank bolts. But it delights me, and it’s a great loaner for friends that are off-road curious. Also, it might end up being my travel bike (without the basket) since it’s so light, and if I gotta lock it up in a city I won’t be as stressed as if it was my Rambler. But, like a lot of my bikes, it naturally has irreplaceable parts; namely the fork. That being said I think it would be a lot of fun with a Jones SWB fork, but that’s another dither for another day. But all told, this ugly sumbitch rides incredibly and I’m grateful to have it.
Stick your friend on it… they don’t know what “trail” means nor do they care.
Without further ado, the parts:
Specialized HRXC 2007 17” frame with a Rawland ULV fork
Stan’s Barons 26” with a Shutter Precision dynamo front hub + Koozer rear hub
Vittoria Booze Light 2.3” rear tire (blows up to about 2.5” on the 35mm internal rims) / WTB Ranger 2.8” Light/Fast, both setup tubeless
160mm Sinz square taper cranks with a 40t Amazon special narrow wide chainring and Canfield Crampon pedals
Shimano Deore 10 speed 11-42 cassette
Shimano Zee 10 speed shifter
Shimano CUES 9 speed derailer ($10 from Rivendell!)
Jones H-Bars 710mm
Ganopper stem
Velo Orange brake levers with Avid BB7 road calipers and 180mm SRAM rotors
Hyacinth Crystal Ship rack and plate + Wald 1392 basket + Busch & Muller IQ-X light
