This trip was particularly good. I was able to net a vintage mountain bike - a 1986 Schwinn High Sierra in bronze and chocolate. When I hauled it up out of the hopper, I saw that it was missing the non-drive side crank arm and pedal, and needed two spokes on the rear wheel. Everything else - and I mean everything else was stock original parts, right down to the cables and housings, in the original brown. I gave the nice people at the dump $5 and scampered off home, laughing all the way.
The above is what mine looks like, sans front rack. It even still has the original roller cam brakes on it - I knew these existed, but had only seen a few of them on bikes of this time period. (pic from mtbr.forums.com)
The above picture isn't the best, but you can see the basic shape and braking mechanism in the pic. Got the pic from velospace.org. I did some digging and found out some information about tuning the brakes and basically maintaining them here . The nice thing about them is that they are very powerful and stop very quickly, as good as any cantilevers I've ridden, if not better than a few of them.
The specs for this bike can be found here . Mine stayed pretty true to what was published here, but that isn't always the case.
I took it in to be re-cabled and rehoused, had the brakes adjusted, put new tires on, ( the 28 year old tires were dry rotted - they were original too!!) added fenders, washed it up a bit, (took 3 hours to clean off all the gross disgustings) and Voila!!! I had a ride-able bike. It rides well and is comfortable, and it also has the mid-blade front fork mounts that I find useful for front racks and other goodies. I will, at some point, put on newer/different handlebars, but for now I will run it in this mostly-original fashion. I plan to use this for touring, along with my Surly Troll. I have friends who like the touring thought, but don't have a proper ride - I can loan them this one and they will be just fine.
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