Fuji's Transformation, Part I

The Fuji Touring Series I is quite unlike its more renowned predecessors, the anachronistically named Touring Series III and IV. Those are both Japanese-made, lugged, with elegant paint jobs, and generally classic in appearance. The Touring Series I is TIG-welded, has a mountain-bike-ish look, and—somewhat bizzarely for a bike called a "Fuji"—was made in the USA from True Temper AVR tubing.

It is hard to imagine ever having had only one bike—but Fuji was the bike that relieved me of that condition. I bought him on eBay. He was cleverly listed with "Bridgestone" in the title. I bought him for the cantilever mounts, the clearances, and the downtube shift bosses. Unfortunately I didn't know much about sizing at this time. I was riding a 59cm Marinoni race bike, which is a reasonable size for a race bike. I bought the Fuji—listed as a 58.5—thinking he'd fit me just fine. I now ride 62-64s; Fuji is more like a 56, since he has about a 2cm "seat tube extension."

So he's been a bit small for me, but I've always ridden him a lot. At first I set him up as a tourer, and did my first 200+km single-day ride on him. I even removed his fenders and rode the Hell n' Back on him. More recently I had him briefly set up as an around-town bike, and then as a "temporary randonneur"—a placeholder for my never-to-materialize Velo Orange Randonneur. For this I bought a Nitto M-12 front rack and an 11cm Technomic stem (that's him on the side, on his way to his first brevet with Randonneurs Ontario.)

Since I was expecting my VO by March, I disassembled Fuji over the winter, leaving him as just a frame. Then I started putting together a build for Marta. For quite some time I've been planning an "ease in to cycling" bike for her: something with wide tires, high handlebars, really good brakes, fenders, a sensible gear range, indexed shifting, etc. Fuji is perfect: while he doesn't leave her much standover height, and while his top tube is a bit long for her, he has incredible clearances and makes it possible to get the bars up nice and high.

Over the past couple of weeks I've begun building the bike up in earnest. Below are some shots of the early progress. When I finish him up in the next couple of days, I'll post more photos...

The clearances on the Touring Series I are incredible. That wheel has Grand Bois 30s installed. It almost looks like too much clearance, doesn't it? And the rack looks way too high! Well, stay tuned...

I'd been using a tab to attach the fender at the fork crown. But since I had a spare "daruma," I figured I'd use it! This meant enlarging one of the holes and covering up the other...

I did this with duct tape; with a little spot to go directly under the hole, so it wouldn't attract a bunch of dirt.

Installed...


...and barely noticeable! (Especially since it's under the fork crown! Well—I take pleasure in details!)

What looked like way too much clearance in fact turns out to be just right. Those are 700x35 Paselas installed, with absolutely perfect clearance between fender and tire. The stainless steel spacer connecting the rack to the fender is from a Dia Compe centrepull — it really does pay to have lots of spare parts laying around!

I built up the wheels from some NOS Shimano Sante hubs I've had in my closet, Sun CR18 rims, and DT double-butted spokes. I re-spaced the rear wheel to 132.5 to reduce dish. I was planning on transplanting a hyperglide freehub body, but then Ryan W. of the iBOB list had a 13-28 Uniglide cassette for me, which is absolutely perfect. No "delayed" shifting on this bike!

The brakes are some decidedly "cheap" imitation Dia Compe wide-profile cantilevers. They're "Chang Star," and I didn't pay a cent for them. The hardware is actually quite excellent, though, allowing for easy toe-in adjustments. The geometry is flawless, of course, and the finish is actually even nicer than the Dia-Compes. With Kool-Stop pads from MEC, they stop incredibly well. Another advantage is that they allow to M12 to sit properly. With the previously-installed Tekro Oryxes, I need lots of spacers at the fork crown to allow the rack to sit level. With the Chang Stars, it sits level without spacers.

I had an old SR 8cm stem installed, but Marta felt a bit too stretched out. So Olivier gave me a 6cm technomic. Here it is just peeking into the steerer, and looking ridiculously tall. (It's now sticking in almost all the way to the bottom of the steerer!)