Re-Locating Cantilever Brake Studs

Recently I started a project on my daughters bike.  She has a Trek MT 220 mtb with 24 inch wheels.  This bike is built like a tank.  It came with a cheap Suntour suspension fork.  It just seemed like this fork was a lot of extra weight (about 5 lbs) to haul around when she mainly rides around the back yard or on neighborhood streets.  Sometimes we ride on some of the various bicycle trails in the area also.

 I started looking on line for suspension corrected forks for 24 inch wheel cycles.  I did not find any.  So I looked through my collection of bicycle forks.  The axle to crown measurement of a cro-mo cyclocross fork that I had came close.  But in the end I decided to use the steel fork from my old Diamondback Topanga 26 inch wheel mountain bike that I used to have.  I had scrapped the frame but held on to the fork.  The axle to crown on this fork was a little short but the fork was much lighter than the cross fork. I may use the cross fork on another bike later.

  This DB fork has a one inch threaded steerer on it.  My daughters Trek has a 1 1/8 inch dia. head tube and came with a 1 1/8 inch threaded steerer on the suspension fork .  I remembered a friendly bike shop owner had once told me that some product was made that allowed you to install a one inch headset into a 1 1/8 inch head tube.  I couldn't remember what this was but after a little internet research  I came up with a set of shims that press into the 1 1/8 inch head tube then you press in the one inch head set cups and races.

 I ordered the shims and knew we were in business.  One major issue remained what to do about the front brakes.  The fork I was going to use had been for a 26 inch wheeled mountain bike from before the days of suspension forks.  I knew that I would have to move the cantilever brake mounting studs down lower on the fork blades in order to have the brakes work with a 24 inch wheel. I figured out how much to move them down.  It ended up being about 26mm lower that I needed to move them.  So I cut the studs off the fork being sure to measure the distance from the crown to the center of the studs before I did so.

  Then I welded them back on the fork blades at a distance from the fork crown 26mm further away than they had been mounted in the 26 inch wheel position.  I used a TIG welder to do this.  I also made a plate with holes in it to space the studs the proper distance apart and hold them in place while I welded them back on.

  Once I finished the fork I was able to install a one inch headset into the frame and installed the fork.  The bike is several pounds lighter now and also seems to handle a bit better.  With the suspension fork the bike seemed a little raked back like a chopper motorcycle.  The V brakes installed just fine and work well on the new fork.