Crust Lightning Bolt Canti - It's Alive!

If you have been following the Crust Canti Lightning Bolt build bouncing ball, you will no doubt have been on tenterhooks waiting for the latest installment. Well, here it is. 

2022 Crust Lightning Bolt Cantilever - complete

The build took a bit longer than I planned, which of course I knew it would. But it's finally done and roadworthy. 

As can be seen in the photos, I tended toward a modern build with a mulletish drivetrain, employing the Avid Shorty Ultimate cantilever brakes and re-using a pair of Bontrager carbon fiber bottle cages. The front derailleur and headset are both by Campagnolo, the rear derailleur and shift levers are by MicroShift, the cassette is a Shimano Deore 11-42, and the crank is VeloOrange's 46t/30t. That's right, it has a low gear of 30/42. That's not a bicycle drivetrain - that's a stevedore's winch! I used an existing Selle Italia "Man" saddle and a set of Origin8 Classique brake levers I bought some years ago in anticipation of the end of sensible componentry.

Here's a list of the components for reference:

Weights and Measures

The weights above are pretty close. Without water bottles, but WITH a saddle bag containing everything I need for roadside repairs plus a small cable lock, it comes in right at 10.9 kg or exactly 24 lbs in old money. It's got to be the lightest production steel frame in existence, combined with some pretty darned light components. No doubt it could be shaved down some more, but to what end? Even in my hard bike case, the package should come in just under 50 pounds, so I should be good to go for Europe when the time comes! 

The Lightning Bolt, ready to ride, weighs just over 24 lbs!

Brakes

Okay, I don't know shit about cantilever brakes. Makes you wonder why I would buy a bike made specifically for this type of brake. Save the rim brake, I guess. I'm hoping to live my entire bike life without evolving to disk brakes, hydraulic components, or an electronically controlled drivetrain. Not so much retro grouch as technophobe. I was sorely tempted to try Rene Herse cantis, but man, the price. After much time scouring the web for reviews, I settled, as noted earlier, on the Avid Shorty Ultimates. They seem to be kind of the most "modern" interpretation of the cantilever, are super lightweight, look appropriate with the black frame and derailleurs, and judging from about 360 miles of riding with them, work great. 

 

Avid Shorty Ultimate cantilever brakes

Cockpit

Handlebars

I kind of backed myself into a corner by deciding I needed to try one of Nitto's B132 Grand Randonneur handlebars, reputed to be one of the most comfortable long distance bars ever made. The GR has long 120mm reach compared to more "modern" bars, so I decided I needed a shorter stem. On my current bike I have a 70mm Nitto stem and the Olympiade B114 handlebar which has 100mm reach. That 170mm combination feels about right. So, I decided I needed a 50/60mm Technomic stem which, with the 120mm handlebar reach and the Lightning Bolt's slightly shorter reach, would give me a position similar to what I'm used to. Simple, right? 60mm normal stem and a Nitto B132 handlebar. How hard could it be? Well... 

Nitto Grand "Raund one ur" B132 handlebar

I only just noticed they misspelled Randonneur! Not on the Nitto web page, not on the package, but on the engraving on the handlebar itself. The misspelling is literally etched in aluminum! Glad I'm not the only one who can't spell French words. Nevertheless, it's this one:

Nitto B132 handlebar specification

I went narrow, because according to GCN I'll shave valuable aero watts! https://youtu.be/muMYrFJkmWM

Stem
I didn't want the 225mm "tall" stem (I haven't entered my Rivendell "tallux" years quite yet). The handlebar's clamp area is 25.4mm and I didn't want to have to use shims on a stem with a 26mm clamp diameter. No kludges. I want exactly what I want and don't want to compromise, dammit! So it took a while to get the necessary parts together. I ordered the "standard" Nitto Technomic from Rene Herse. Took a while, but it was worth the wait!

So there it is in a nutshell. There were a lot of little decisions and details along the way, some of which I may write about later, but this lays out all the essential parts. So far I am super happy with it. It feels both "faster" and more stable than my Velo Routier, which I'm sorry to report I haven't touched since I got the Crust finished. I'll provide my impressions of the differences and ride quality after I've had a chance to spend more time on the bike. 

Acorns in Autumn

So you’re going out for a ride Saturday morning with some friends. You reckon you’ll be out for around three hours or so. When you start temperatures are going to be in the low fifties and when you finish they’ll be in the mid seventies. So where you gonna put your stuff? You know, your arm warmers, your leg warmers, your knee warmers, your wrist warmers, your neck gaiter, your thermal beanie, your long-fingered gloves, your energy bars, your gels, your electrolyte capsules, your hydration tablets, your cell phone, your keys, your lip balm – you know, your stuff.

Well, the roadies will of course stuff it all into those three pockets on the back of their Italian made jerseys and make like a domestique with a shirt full of bottles for the team. Their stuff isn’t very voluminous anyway, since they’re all on strict calory-free diets and all their clothing is purpose built with only the latest fly weight hi-tech fabrics by Italian artisans in a small factory just outside of Milan. Either that or they just stuff a newspaper down the front of their jerseys and toss it when they get too hot. And of course their team cars will be along any minute now to collect their surplus stuff anyway.

The urban, fixie hipsters can keep their stuff in one of those huge, formless messenger bags with the seatbelt for a shoulder strap. The bong and stash shouldn't be taking up that much space in there, so there should be plenty of room.  

The tourers will no doubt pack it all into one of the voluminous panniers adorning their rig. Or on their bike trailer, somewhere between the tent, the sleeping bags, cook stove and toilet paper.

The jaunty CycloChics have the delightful, flower festooned baskets on their retro mixtes, brimming with bottles of wine, loaves of French bread and hunks of cheese in which to store their goodies. Not to mention the handbag strewn over their shoulder and the pockets of their trendy cycling jackets. 

The mountain bikers have all those pockets and bungee cords on their gigantic hydration backpacks.

The Acorn Boxy Rando mounted on the '86 Fuji Allegro

But I have recently gone in a different direction. I have recently come under the spell of the old, the vintage, le retro.  I’ve started seeing the randonneurs out of the corner of my eye, and have a strong attraction to their aesthetic. It’s got a kind of Steam Punk / Victorian thing going on that speaks of whacky British explorers and faraway lands. And there’s something these randonneurs all seem to love – French Handlbar bags. After seeing a few of them around town, I simply had to have one. 

Now the classic French bags are Gilles Berthoud bags, but I have a bit of a buy American (if at all practicable) thing, so I searched around a bit to see if I couldn’t find something made by folks a little closer to home. And sure enough, there are several makers out there producing this style of bag. Most seem closer to bespoke mom-n-pop shops, and that suits me just fine. 

The one I ultimately chose is by Acorn Bags, a small two-person, husband and wife shop in Southern California. They make so few products, you have to get on a waiting list to be notified when the small batches go on sale. So you get an e-mail on Sunday night that says, “Tomorrow a batch of bags in [one of three colors offered] will go on sale starting at 9:00 AM, Pacific Time.” Then, when you go to the site, you have about 20 seconds from the time it becomes available to put the item in your cart or they will be sold out. I got lucky on my first try and scored a Boxy Rando in Saddle Tan. 

There is no denying the attraction. These boxy bags, made from waxed cotton with leather and brass, nestle neatly between the handlebar drops. Contrary to what the name might imply, they don’t actually hang from the handlebars, but are propped on a small rack above the front wheel right where you can reach it while you’re riding. And because it doesn’t hang from the bars, the bag doesn’t impede the placement of your hands near the stem. Brilliant, intuitive design, obviously honed over years of practical experience, these bags have pockets on the rider’s side, and a top flap that opens toward the rider with a map case built in. Good design is simply eternal. 

I’m currently riding it without a decaleur, the metal stabilizer typically mounted to the stem or head set with these types of bags. It seems pretty stable, but the bag only just fits between my extremely narrow handlebars (the bike, an ’86 Fuji came with 40cm Nitto bars, typical of the era) and stabilized only by the cords attached to the d-rings on the sides, the bag kind of crowds my thumbs when I round corners.  I’m still fiddling with it and will write a follow-up report as I either figure it out or get exasperated by it. 

Related reading:

http://lovelybike.blogspot.com/2010/09/allure-of-handlebar-bag.html 

http://www.ccs.neu.edu/home/fell/PBP1975.html