My absolute favorite thing to do is modify vintage steel frames. Taking some of the best bikes ever made, and giving them new life. What are the best bikes ever made, you say? High quality readily available small batch mass produced vintage road bikes! Reynolds 531 tubes, Columbus SL, lugged, quill stems, high end forged drop outs. All the best stuff, so why aren’t they popular anymore? Because modern fads and trends change everything. Also inflation and the need to use cheaper materials to keep costs down.

People finally caught up to fatter tires and more versatility in their bikes instead of just trying to have the fastest race bikes. No one rides old high end race bikes anymore because they either bought into the idea of needing aluminum or carbon frames or whatever cult like fad. And no one wants to ride bikes with limited gearing and that can only fit 700x23mm tires.

So I modify them to be rando machines, city bikes, fun sports touring rigs, or whatever else you want your old bike to do!

My favorite full sweet is to take a nice vintage road bike and respace the rear triangle to 130mm for modern road hubs. Add cantilever brake bosses for 650b, probably dimple the chain stays to fit up to 38-42mm tires. Add a pump peg on the seat stay, whatever braze ons its missing, including dynamo hub wiring guides and front rack mounts for handlebar bag or Porter racks. It’s actually a ton of work, but way less work and way less expensive than building a whole new handmade show bike from scratch. Scruffy inexpensive stuff is fun! And it can still get a new powder coat and parts and be an awesome head Turing bike.

Here are some picks from a recent Raliegh Competiton mod I’m doing a YouTube series on.

This 1973 race bike got the rear end respaced to 130mm. Cantilever brake bosses added for 650b wheels, dimples added to the chain stays so it can fit 38mm tires. Down tube shift cable bosses, rear derailleur cable stop, two small dents filled, and a seat lug hole reinforcement.

I’ve done more of these types of mods on cool vintage steel frames than I can remember or count and look forward to doing lots more. Let’s save that nice old Trek or Miyata 620!

I’ve done so many of these that I’ve had special decals made. So many of these bikes end up getting fresh paint or powder coating jobs and fresh builds with mint or new parts. These bikes get a full set of my StarMichael Bowman decals with one exception. Instead of the decals that say Handmade by StarMichael Bowman, they say Modified by StarMichael Bowman. I’ve also just ordered cool 80’s style holographic decals with this logo for any bike that I get to modify!

Lana’s Miyata.

Here’s one I did for my friend Lana back in May of 2017. It’s an old 80’s Miyata 615 touring bike that was in great shape. I removed the cantilever brake bosses that were on there, probably for 27 inch wheels. Then added a set of cantilever brake bosses for 650b! I also add the new bosses in the much wider modern 81mm standard for all modern brakes. Old bosses are often spaced at 64mm, way to narrow even for vintage brakes and narrow rims!

I also respaced the rear triangle to 130 mm for modern road hubs, added a pump peg on the chain stay, added extra water bottle mounts and the amazing Compass Taillight and internal wiring guides. Probably added some dynamo wiring guides on the fork too. Lana then got it powder coated, and we ran over the whole bike with all the reamers, facers, and chasers and built it up with a brand-new Shimano 105 11 speed group. Wheels were hand built by Stoic Wheels with the matching 105 rear hub and an SP Dynamo front to Velo Orange rims. Making this bike a cool touring/rando machine. She kept the bike and rode it on and off about 8 years, recently selling it. She’s a racer at heart and mostly rides race bikes when not on tour and doing rando rides. But I was still sad to see it sell. Hopefully it makes someone’s day and gets zillions of more miles!

Cara’s 650B Miyata mixtie.

This bike also came to me and I knew right away it was something special. I hung it up saving it for just the right person.

Cara came along and was looking for something special and it was just her size, and seemed like a perfect fit. I saved as many original parts as I could, modifying and polishing the cranks into a 1x. It got the rear triangle spread out to 130mm, braze ons changed around and added cantilever bosses for the 650B wheel size. It was originally for 27 inch wheels and road caliper brakes.

It got a new gold powder coat super close to the original color and was build up with new hand build wheels, fenders, Velo Orange fenders, bars, and classic style Tektro levers and cantilever brakes.

Nick’s Pre War.

Nick found me on YouTube! He wanted to add brakes to his fork. He found another fork at but it was too tall, so he found my video on adding more threads to a fork. Then he discovered we lived in the same town! So, he came by the new shop for me to have a look. He was technically the first customer. Instead of doing all the rigmarole it would take to put a way less cool fork in I talked him into having me add cantilever/V-Brake bosses to his fork. The stiffener tubes were in the way, but I thought it would be super cool and subtle to add them “aero” style to the back of his fork blades!

He’d already added the more modern cranks and three speed rear wheel. The shifter already had a V-Brake lever built in. All the pieces fell into place. It’s subtle, it’s neo-retro in all the right ways and it’s both right at home with his build and raw metal with brass look. Sometimes it’s amazing how one little mod can round out a bike so well. And a cute little bird thought it was so cool it popped in to check it out.