KTM Lucky Country touring bike restoration - 01 - The 20€ touring bike

Yes, I'm not joking. My KTM Touring Bike costed me 20€. What? you still don't believe me?

Here's the proof. I made a screenshot of the advertisement from Willhaben (an austrian portal for buying/selling stuff). 

Well, let's see what I got for 20€! 

Not bad right? 😜. Alright, let's be honest. It's a pretty old bike, but let's see the pros and the cons of this 20€ buy.

PROS

• it costed 20€!!
• a magnificent and relatively light steel frame
• 26" wheel size
• V-Brakes, simple and indestructible
• rear rack included (let's see how I manage to fit the panniers there, and if the rack can hold them)
• fix steel fork
• 3x crankset
• very light and stable aluminum fenders included
• it's in perfect conditions for having, what, 20 years? (I couldn't find any info on when it was build)
• it fit's me perfectly

CONS

• yes, of course, some components need replacement.

Anything else to mention? Yes, let's check what components I got:

1. KTM "designed and produced" steel frame (not sure if it's cro-moly, it doesn't said anywhere)
2. 3x6 Shimano SIS/Tourney transmission with a Shimano MF-HG20 14-24t freewheel (will be replaced as the gear ratio is not enough for riding up steep roads).
3. Selle Bassano Saddle, made in Italy
4. Vuelta by Rodi wheels, made in Portugal
5. very stable aluminum stander, swiss made
6. a 6V external drop dynamo

But does it run? Absolutely, and it's a nice bike to ride, even if it's been more than 20 years that I'm riding bikes with front suspension and the Lucky Country has a fix fork.

It's also nice to ride again a 26" (my normal bike is a 2017 27.5" BTWIN Rockrider 900 XC MTB with a Manitou air fork, which by the way I love to ride).

So before jumping into the build project, I wanted to be sure that the frame was solid. I also wanted to understand if it was the right frame size to start the project. So I did some small updates with some components I had at home just to bring the bike back to life and take it for some test rides.

I started by replacing those old tires with some younger Continental Touride that I had at home. They are not new, but they are in much better shape than the others. 

This was 0€ investment because I had them at home, but if you need to buy them new they Conti cost around 11€. These will just do the job until I get the Schwalbe that I plan for the build.

Then I bought from AliExpress a 17€ front adjustable stem to be able to allocate a 31.8mm handlebar that I had at home from an old 2008 Conor WRC mtb.

adjustable stem

Also from AliExpress I got some cheap (9,57€) 3x8 Shimano SL-M310 shifters, probably fake and some even cheaper  aluminum brake levers (Toopree 5,37€) because the original Shimano components, although they were working, they needed replacement. The original Shimano shifters are friction shifters, but they seemed wear-out and the front-derailleur shifter was not holding the gears. The original Shimano brake levers were just fine, but they hold themselves to the handlebar by pressing a bolt against it, instead of clamping it. This bolt already scratched the original steel handlebar, so for installing the 31.8mm aluminum handlebar from the Conor I wanted a newer clamping system.

Shimano 3x8 SL-M310 shifters

Topree brake levers 

The reason why I bought this cheap components is that I wasn't sure if the frame was ok, and even more, what was going to be the final configuration of the build. Both things seems to do the work just fine.

Well, that's all for the moment. In the next entry I'll start describing the all-rounder touring bike build build project. 

I leave you a picture of the bike in one of the test rides, where I confirmed the need to replace the freewheel/cassette as the 18 gears with a 14-24t freewheel are just valid for a city use.