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Planet X Zebdi Lockdown Build Project


Private Repress

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Thought I’d share some progress on my lockdown project. 
 

Started off with with a bit of a desire for a midskool 26 that I could do a bit of everything on. Had some modern parts spare and a few classic, not quite enough for a full build. Oh and I needed a frame.

 

Managed to get the Zebdi on this forum, lovely condition and fitted the bill perfectly:

9AC181ED-73AC-42E5-B01F-65D322CDAE88.thumb.jpeg.6d6eb866efc6c0d47141d6aa301f51fa.jpeg

I’d picked up a second hand hope XC on an onza rim as part of a bundle of bits I’d bought, along with some tensile cranks.

made sense to bang them on with the other bits I had so ended up with this:

 

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the front wheel wasn’t a permanent choice, just borrowed from my Giant, the intention was to have discs front and back for noiseless trials.

Never the less I liked the red hubs so spent what felt like a year trying to find a red front hope XC. Ended up getting one on eBay, took 3 weeks to come as it was from France!

I decided I wanted to run a 22t up front as opposed to the 18 I had on the tensiles. Not a straightforward task! Could not believe how hard it was to source a spider and bash ring. 
 

took a chance on this threaded spider on eBay and found a black spire granny god NOS, happy days!
 

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sadly on arrival I realised the offset on the spider meant it wouldn’t fix to the tensile crank arm. Argh!

so bit the bullet and got some second hand middleburns with a spider:

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next up I realised the rear wheel had a small crack where the rim is pinned. So figured I’d get two rims, build the front up front scratch and replace the rim on the rear. Didn’t want anything drilled so settled on DMR DeeVees. Placed the order, in May and they still hadn’t been dispatched this time yesterday, so cancelled that, spoke to Tarty bikes and settled on some spank spoons. They arrived today!

so laced up the wheel whilst I was on a work conference call following @Ali C wheel building tutorial to the letter (great vid if you haven’t seen it!).

Then banged the wheel in the jig this afternoon to straighten it up:

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Here is the bike as it stands now:

BF7ABEFF-9583-40DA-A1E8-B9120829C7FC.thumb.jpeg.3acf561d7e319af17473c4da70bb7137.jpeg

I’ll get the back wheel stripped down over the weekend and rebuilt on the spank. 
 

Had a quick mess about on the drive and it’s a lot of fun, may opt for a short stem in the future and possibly stick these tyres on my Ashton in lieu of some slicker skate park/street friendly alternatives. 
 

I absolutely love it though. Street sesh this Sunday for sure. 

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40 minutes ago, biketrialler said:

I had 2 Zebdis back in the day and I dont remember the rear disc mounts being up to it, more of an afterthought. Beware!

Looks great though and a lot of fun.

Yeah to be fair not many many frames of this period had durable disc mounts. I’m not doing anything major on it and like to think of myself as a smoothish rider so hopefully will hold out. 

Edited by Private Repress
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On ‎19‎/‎06‎/‎2020 at 5:29 PM, Private Repress said:

Here is the bike as it stands now:

BF7ABEFF-9583-40DA-A1E8-B9120829C7FC.thumb.jpeg.3acf561d7e319af17473c4da70bb7137.jpeg

I’ll get the back wheel stripped down over the weekend and rebuilt on the spank. 
 

Had a quick mess about on the drive and it’s a lot of fun, may opt for a short stem in the future and possibly stick these tyres on my Ashton in lieu of some slicker skate park/street friendly alternatives. 
 

I absolutely love it though. Street sesh this Sunday for sure. 

Cant wait to see it with the rear spank on it. The rear braking surface is killing me! Its making the front tyre look bigger than the rear. Cant be having that haha.

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@Ross McArthur you request has been duly noted sir:

CB4BE7BA-554E-42F4-BEEF-018C13193847.thumb.jpeg.4605ff68a3f801386eec5246033510a4.jpeg

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I didn’t have time to get the back wheel built before going for a ride on Saturday. So much fun though, hit a new concrete skatepark, which became over ran with scooters so went for a street sesh. Managed to snake bite the rear going front to back on a wall. Didn’t mind though as I stripped the wheel down when I got home and built the hub up on the spank. 
 

 

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3 hours ago, LEON said:

Very nice, sold one very similar a couple.of yeats ago, same colour. What's the bb height and chainstay length? I remember those being about 393mm.

Thanks @LEON Yes chainstay length is bang on 393mm, looks to be about +5mm bb rise with the short forks I’m running (only just accommodates the tyre/rim choice!)

image.thumb.jpg.91453e615b0620b910abf8a6691f6c26.jpg

 

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@Ross McArthur thanks mate, I’m delighted with how it’s worked out, and it’s been worth the wait. 
 

Gearing wise it wasn’t so much it was lacking in any particular place, I’ve just always seemed to ride a harder gear than most, but I tend to a lot of rolling manoeuvres ie. pedal hop up a wall as opposed to static stuff. Haven’t had much chance to settle on it yet, but hitting street tomorrow after work, so might switch back yet!

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6 hours ago, Private Repress said:

Thanks @LEON Yes chainstay length is bang on 393mm, looks to be about +5mm bb rise with the short forks I’m running (only just accommodates the tyre/rim choice!)

image.thumb.jpg.91453e615b0620b910abf8a6691f6c26.jpg

 

Nice! My best Zebdi ever had short forks like that. Most people who are building up old retro frames are treating the front end like a Hex, it's not a Hex, it'll never ride like one, bikes like this need the short forks they were built for, usually low/short stems but that can depend on height etc. My most recent one rode like crap with Inspired forks on.

Edited by LEON
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@LEON Very nice mate! Lovely builds. 
 

I totally agree about the short forks and lower front end. I’ve only gone for the higher rise bars as I’m 6ft 2 and have problems with my lower back.
 

it’s quite a comfortable geo for me with my weight fairly central, makes for a well balanced bike.

I seemed to let the Zebdi slip under the radar when they were released, I had a giant trials team which I was besotted with and never really paid Planet X much attention. shame really because it’s such a sorted frame.
 

 

Edited by Private Repress
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9 hours ago, LEON said:

Nice! My best Zebdi ever had short forks like that. Most people who are building up old retro frames are treating the front end like a Hex, it's not a Hex, it'll never ride like one, bikes like this need the short forks they were built for, usually low/short stems but that can depend on height etc. My most recent one rode like crap with Inspired forks on.

Couldn't agree with that more. I had a set of echo forks on my Ashton and it rode like shit on the front wheel. Swapped them out for some tatty old Ashton forks - but they ride better! I had the echo fork paired with a 90x25 stem....That was also far too high and short haha. Like you say, its not a Hex. I've just got something about stems following the same angle as the top tube, in the same way people like to run the angle of their bars at the same angle as the head tube.

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59 minutes ago, Ross McArthur said:

Couldn't agree with that more. I had a set of echo forks on my Ashton and it rode like shit on the front wheel. Swapped them out for some tatty old Ashton forks - but they ride better! I had the echo fork paired with a 90x25 stem....That was also far too high and short haha. Like you say, its not a Hex. I've just got something about stems following the same angle as the top tube, in the same way people like to run the angle of their bars at the same angle as the head tube.

I've seen a Pashley 26MHZ with essentially an Arcade front end, I can't imagine how badly that rides. A Hex bb is virtually 30mm higher, the standard back then was Fattys, 90 x 10 stem and 2" double walls, that's basically what gets the best out of a 20 year old frame, give or take a small amount. 

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1 hour ago, Ross McArthur said:

Couldn't agree with that more. I had a set of echo forks on my Ashton and it rode like shit on the front wheel. Swapped them out for some tatty old Ashton forks - but they ride better! I had the echo fork paired with a 90x25 stem....That was also far too high and short haha. Like you say, its not a Hex. I've just got something about stems following the same angle as the top tube, in the same way people like to run the angle of their bars at the same angle as the head tube.

Stem and seat angle the same as the top tube angle always looks good in my opinion :)

Edited by Private Repress
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3 minutes ago, LEON said:

I've seen a Pashley 26MHZ with essentially an Arcade front end, I can't imagine how badly that rides. A Hex bb is virtually 30mm higher, the standard back then was Fattys, 90 x 10 stem and 2" double walls, that's basically what gets the best out of a 20 year old frame, give or take a small amount. 

Think I may have seen the same one, it must make the bike feel like a micro scooter. I suppose that’s okay if all you want to do is manual with the front wheel two inches off the ground. 

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Yeah I did see that ta, I had a really nice build a couple of years ago but bikes have moved on so much I just couldn't get into it. The long stays were the main thing. They're one of the best frames from back in the day though.

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On 22/06/2020 at 3:57 PM, Ross McArthur said:

Oooosh, very nice!

On the gearing point. Where did you think you were lacking in gearing? Just for getting around? Or we were you kicking thin air on the 17?

I had a 16 on the Ashton and went back to 17 as I feel its the sweet spot!

@Ross McArthur went back up to 17t haha.

also went up to 16t on the ET from 15t!

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 6/23/2020 at 11:45 PM, Private Repress said:

A couple of clips whilst getting used to it tonight (not sure if this will work!)

https://www.instagram.com/p/CBye9qIFvhyiJYchVJMnp4Z1gV9IETktMI08Bw0/?igshid=qs2pqcfbfuko

Ah, unfortunately the clips don't work since your account is private! Great build post dude :-)

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