This Tandem Is In Danger Of Getting Out Of Hand

So last September I bought a tandem from Ebay. £50 for about a late ’70s Pashley beauty. It needed some tender loving care, so I . . .

  • Dismantled it to the bare frame
  • Stripped the paint by hand, and rubbed the frame down to the bare, shiny metal.
  • Had a word with a friend who owns a factory making parts for JCB, and he nicely ran the frame down his powder coating line, so it came out JCB yellow with a paint job good enough to survive riding through salt water if need be.
  • Re-assembled the tandem with . . .
  • A Brooks B66 Saddle (£65)
  • A new set of front handlebars (£10)
  • Leather handlebar grips front and back (£15 each)
  • New mudguards (£25)
  • New cables throughout (£10)
  • New tyres (£19 for the pair)
  • Replaced the derailleur mech for a Shimano 105 unit from 1992 that I just happened to have in a drawer (Free!)

Which means that so far, my £50 tandem has cost £209.

And now I need a new wheel on the back after the disaster a couple of weeks ago. It’s an old size (26″ x 1 3/8″), and I have two choices - either a simple alloy-rimmed replacement, which is about £22, plus two pairs of brake blocks for the double rear callipers - say, another £12.

OR . . .

. . . a nice man at a local bike shop will build me a new wheel, with a Sturmey Archer XRD5 hub. Five speeds, and an internal hub brake that’s got a big block of aluminium around it to dissipate all the heat generated from stopping a tandem. He’d include the thumb shifter, all the cabling, big chunky stainless spokes and a nice rim too. And all for about £150.

So there are my choices - take the price of the tandem to £241, or all the way up to £358.

Is it just my imagination, or is this getting slightly silly?

Filed under: Stuff, Where I Shop, tandem

8 Responses to “ This Tandem Is In Danger Of Getting Out Of Hand ”

  1. Von SmallHaussen on March 17, 2009 at 10:43 pm

    Completely out of hand. Why do I feel partially responsible for this?

  2. Treadly and Me on March 18, 2009 at 2:30 am

    I fail to see any problem so far… :-)

  3. John the Monkey on March 18, 2009 at 8:31 am

    A friend of mine recently bought a 2nd hand tandem - it cost him about £800, so as long as you stay under that, you’re doing fine, I’d say.

  4. miketually on March 18, 2009 at 9:14 am

    Or, you’ve got a tandem for just over £400. Sounds fine to me.

    That SA wheel sounds like what I’ll be looking for for my Yuba Mundo in a year or two. Thanks.

  5. Andy in Germany on March 18, 2009 at 1:09 pm

    How much would a similar refit cost on a car? Well over 400 quid.

  6. 2whls3spds on March 20, 2009 at 12:40 am

    Well we purchased our used Raleigh tandem for about £320 ($450usd) and that doesn’t include any upgrades…so it sounds like you are still in the range. :-D

    Aaron

  7. algernond on March 20, 2009 at 8:23 am

    Maybe shoud make it fixed gear..

  8. Brad Hefta-Gaub on March 23, 2009 at 3:40 am

    The way I see it, it’s all about utility… do you love it? Do you use it? Then it’s worth it… plus it sounds like you’re well within the budget of most classic bike rebuilds!