Category: General Ebike

Introduction
Step 1: Planning
Step 2: Hunting (you are here)
Step 3: Tinkering
Step 4: Buying
Step 5: Build Day 1
Build Day 2
Build Day 3
Step 6: Perfecting
Tools List

Find Your Frame

In the previous Planning step, we determined what kind of frame we wanted to buy:

• Full suspension mountain bike
• Medium-ish size along the lines of an effective 16-18″ seat tube
• Able to be set up as a street machine (high seatpost config in particular)
• 26″ wheel size
• Chromoly steel or aluminum construction
• Threaded bottom bracket
• Straight down tube into the bottom bracket
• Space around the chainstay root able to fit a BBSHD secondary hoursing without drama.

Now its time to go out into the market, find the frame that meets these goals, buy it, receive it…

… and stop!

At least for a bit. Once we have an actual for-reals frame in our hands, we have some work to do to make sure all of our parts assumptions still hold before we take the next step and start buying parts for it willy-nilly.

Why You Want To Wait

I had my eye on a 2000 Marzocchi Bomber X-Fly Z1 fork that looked as if it was brand new, despite its age. It was priced right at about $200 delivered and would be perfect for this build. But the seller disclosed the steering tube had been cut to “about 230 mm”.

Looking at the pictures of the frame I had bought, but not received yet, the head tube on the frame looked like a fork with a 230mm steerer would fit just fine. But until I had the frame in my hands and could measure it (and added in the length of the external headset cups), I was taking a $200 guess if I bought the fork before the frame arrived.

Likewise, my chosen frame claimed 135mm rear hub spacing. Since its a 1999 frame, that sounded right. But lots of times these older frames are being sold by pawn shops or via estate sales and the seller may be guessing, or repeating something they were told with no expertise of their own. Honest mistakes can happen across a variety of fronts that will make big differences in your parts choices.

So did I want to start a wheel build costing hundreds of dollars based on anything but total certainty? Hell no. Neither do you. Cool your jets and wait until you can verify frame measurements from the advertisement. Once you have done that, then you can go and order parts that rely on those measurements.

Cart Before The Horse!

Before we go through the learning experience of confirming measurements, we have to find and buy the frame in the first place. Chances are pretty good that process is going to entail some unexpected learning as well.

For example: Here I am hunting for an older, full-suspension MTB frame. One thing I didn’t expect (and should have, because I was riding back in that day when these frames were common) was the kind of brakes commonly used on mountain bikes back then were frame brakes – cantilevers with bosses on the frame that clamped down on the rim. I found many frames that were a great fit for my needs … but they didn’t have disc brake mounts. And I consider disc brakes to be a requirement for a modern bike (and especially an ebike).

Going hand in hand with this, cable housing in the days of yore was nowhere near as effective as it is in modern times. So bikes were designed with lots of space to stretch bare brake and shift cables. Also the functional best practice solution for braking is now hydraulic – which uses pressure hose and not cables.

Lastly, I found older frames might not use the most common rear spacing. Forget about Boost spacing. In fact, I found I needed to make sure I had at least 135mm so I could use a more or less modern 9/10/11 Shimano cassette body.

Once these things became apparent after looking at a bunch of frames, I started paying close attention to these items first. If a frame looked like a winner, I immediately looked to see if it had disc brake bosses. No bosses… instant reject and move on. I saved a lot of time that way, ignoring how nice a frame may be and instead focusing on a core list of must-haves and immediately moving on if one was missing.

I was also looking carefully at whether I could adapt the cable routing on a given frame candidate.

These were not things I had expected to care much about, but after I began shopping I came to realize they were essential.

The Marketplace

So where do we go online to look for a used bicycle frame? There are some crowd favorites

Craigslist

This venue offers great possibilities, but also carries perhaps the most personal and financial risk. Transactions are most likely going to be face-to-face handovers of cash for merchandise at a public parking lot mutually agreed-upon. It goes without saying warranties or purchase protections do not exist, and you can decide for yourself whether you want to get out of your car and walk up to a stranger who knows you have – at the least – several hundred dollars in cash in your pocket.

Thats not to say that Craigslist purchases are a bad thing. They’re popular for a reason. However, there’s a bit of the Wild West going on there with regard to unrestrained capitalism and personal responsibility.

Facebook Marketplace

I kind of put this in a similar category as Craigslist. I have friends who swear by it over Ebay, but I’ve never found it to be particularly comprehensive in terms of the products that can be found there. You’ll peruse ads and look for pictures of bicycles. There won’t be a lot if your locality is anything like mine. Facebook searches by default in a 40-mile radius around where my personal profile says I am located

Pinkbike

A great marketplace for mountain bike parts is Pinkbike. The site is largely populated by people well-experienced in the sport, and you can expect to see some pretty high end stuff for sale there. It also has a formidable database search capability. At the time of this writing, 1125 All Mountain/Enduro frames are available in North America. Within a few seconds I can refine that search:

• Frame Material: Aluminum, Steel and Chromoly (466)
• Frame Size: Medium (176)
• Wheel Size: 26″ (49)

Perusing 49 frames that are pre-qualified to a significant extent will not take long. If I expand the search to include Large frames, I have 68 to look over.

Ebay

Of course we’re going to go look on Ebay! Globally, thats where all the buying eyeballs are, and that means thats where a whole lot of sellers are as well. We’ll see as wide of a selection there as we do on Pinkbike, but with much more primitive search tools.

I used “mtb frame” as a search criteria, and from there EBay let me select 26″ wheels as a filter. Since Ebay listings are notoriously bad for sellers listing specific criteria that their filters can use, I didn’t want to go any further on search filtering, and ended up with about 913 results.

So… figure if you are shopping on Ebay you need to set aside about an hour each time to go thru the list that comes up.

Others?

The above is not meant to be an all-inclusive list of places you can find a frame. They’re just the ones I used, although Craigslist or Facebook were not exactly my preference and I only mention them here to be as comprehensive as possible.

Score!

In the end, after about three weeks of poking and prodding every evening, I found a frame that seemed almost too good to be true: An Intense Tracer from (I discovered later on) the first production run in 1999. It was very reasonably priced.

This frame pretty much ticked every box and added one or two I didn’t have on my list:

• Size Medium/Large. (effective 18.5″ seat tube length, measured Center-to-Top). Top tube config means plenty of standover height.
• Excellent condition. On close inspection the frame had very few marks and appeared to have lived most of its life in storage.
• Overbuilt aluminum frame with extra-strong rear triangle (important for a mid drive where the chain will be pulling stumps).
• Disk brake bosses!
• Rear shock is external to a rigid ‘triangle’ that has plenty of space and is almost uniquely battery-friendly. Its almost as if someone from the future went back in time to design this bike to hold a battery.
• English-threaded 68mm bottom bracket.
• Lots of clearance up front at the root of the chainstays to clear the motor’s secondary housing.
• Nice straight, angled down tube so the motor will tuck up into it just fine.

SO… job done. We have a frame. Next we have to see whats up with motor fitment. The next phase of our build is to buy the motor, now that we’ve got the frame to measure it up to.

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Step 3: Tinkering

Introduction
Step 1: Planning (you are here)
Step 2: Hunting
Step 3: Tinkering
Step 4: Buying
Step 5: Build Day 1
Build Day 2
Build Day 3
Step 6: Perfecting
Tools List

We’ll begin the series with the earliest stage in our ebike build. Be aware, though… this Planning stuff is pretty dry. Not so many pretty pictures in this installment.

Preparation is Everything

So you’ve decided to build an ebike. You’ve got enough basic mechanical ability (and/or the gumption) to tackle the task from the ground up. Great. Before you start, you want to sit down with a piece of paper and plan out your build. BUT before the on-paper part starts, lets start inside of your head and think out some things:

How Do You Want To Ride (what is the bike’s job)?

Before you decide anything about the bike, first decide what the bike is going to do. Is it a commuter? A cargo carrier? A beachfront cruiser? A singletrack mountain bike? Does it need to be multipurpose and straddle a few categories? If you don’t know already, this is the time to look at bikes that do the thing(s) you want to do. Once you know those things, you can look at the parts available in the marketplace (starting with the frame) to make your bike come to life.

What Did I Decide?
I needed a relatively small, lightweight bike easily stuffed into and hauled out of the back of a station wagon. So easy portage (not riding criteria) was my first requirement. Next, I needed this bike to be good for relatively short street runs. My primary use-case was a quick jet to the office after dropping my car off at the repair shop, and a run back to that shop from home the next morning when the car was done (stuffing the bike back into the car and driving to work from there). So… in its primary job, the bike needs to be comfortable for 4-5 mile trips, not 20 mile, afternoon-long rides. Next, since the bike can be stuffed into my car, a secondary use-case was to take it on trips. I’d want it for general light-to-medium ride duty on streets and trails. Singletrack not so much. Dirt and gravel roads: yes please.

Factor In Your Terrain

At this planning stage, you also want to pick your chosen assist method… the motor. The motor is integral to the bike and you want to figure out what its going to be – at least conceptually – sooner, not later. If you end up deciding you need a mid drive for instance, that is going to have a major influence on your frame choice since you have to install the motor to the frame… so that frame has to be able to fit that motor.

Fundamental to the motor decision is expected terrain: If you will ride on table-flat land (or, at the most, rolling hills) then a geared hub motor is a viable option. A direct drive hub motor could also work. If you need the versatility to tackle hills – even steep ones – then a mid drive is a must. It helps to have an understanding of the strengths and weaknesses of the various ebike motor types, so look here for specific discussion on them.

What Did I Decide?
I needed to tackle any terrain. Choosing a mid drive was a no-brainer, since they can tackle anything a bike can ride over. Having several of them and being very comfortable with building them to last, without any wear and tear issues, made the decision all the more easy. Additionally, I had a 68-73mm BBSHD sitting on a shelf as a spare in case of emergency (both of my daily drivers – the Bullitt and the Envoy – use that motor). So to keep out-of-pocket costs down I wanted to use that extra motor in this build.

This all told me I need a frame that works well with a BBSHD.

Decide What Kind of Bike You Want

So far, you have figured out what job your bike needs to do, the kind of terrain it needs to live in and as a result of those things, what kind of motor it needs. Now figure out what kind of bike fits those goals (or throw all that out and pick what looks cool). You probably don’t need to look at electrified bikes when going through this step. Just look at bikes, period… with an eye toward being able to slap a motor onto whatever ends up looking good to you.

Once you have settled onto the style of bike you want to build, your next step in planning is to set up a build sheet.

What Did I Decide?
Knowing I needed a smaller bike for relatively short jaunts, the bike type that jumped out at me was a ‘mountain bike’. Further, since I wanted to achieve a fully functional bike yet stay at a modest size, I knew I wanted a frame that used small-ish 26″ wheels. Those are no longer commonly in use – so I’ll probably be looking at an older, used frame.

Next, I wanted it to be full suspension and not a hardtail. By that I mean I want a live rear triangle suspended by a cushioning rear shock, and a suspension fork for the front wheel. Because I have decided to use a BBSHD mid drive, I knew they fit better on older, more traditional frame triangles where the down tube runs straight down, directly into the bottom bracket at a sharp angle. This sharp angle gives plenty of room for the mid drive motor to tuck itself up towards the frame and away from the ground, yielding minimal lost ground clearance. And also, sharp angled-straight down tubes are a feature of older frames. Newer designs use curved tubes, like the one below. A BBSHD on this kind of frame would cause the motor to hang straight down.



Also, since I have built several BBSHD’d bikes and I know their installation ins-and-outs, I know an English (threaded) bottom bracket is the best style of bottom bracket to easily accept a mid drive motor.

Lastly, the modern trend on quality bikes is to use carbon fiber for the frame. But I know the torque stresses that come with a mid drive ebike introduce long term survivability issues with carbon fiber bottom brackets. As the saying goes, ‘steel is real’. Carbon fiber in DIY builds is known to pose a failure risk. Also c/f bottom brackets have to be built thicker, and this makes a motor like a BBSHD unlikely to fit. Ideally, I wanted a chromoly frame. Next in order of preference would be an overbuilt alloy, followed by titanium (which is very bendy) with my very last choice being carbon fiber.



These features, all together, are much more common on older frames, so all these factors further reinforced the likelihood I’m going vintage.

What Is our net end result?

The ideal frame that I’m going to be looking for on this project is as follows:

• Full suspension mountain bike frame.
• Not a Large size because it has to fit easily in the car. Not a Small because of my anatomy. Somewhere in the range of a Medium (17-18″ effective seat tube), then. I can get one of those to fit me with a longer seatpost and handlebar stem.
• Able to be set up as a street machine (high seatpost config in particular).
• 26″ wheel size.
• Chromoly steel or aluminum construction.
• English-threaded bottom bracket with chainstays that can handle (i.e. tuck in the secondary gear housing) a BBSHD without chainline drama.
• Straight down tube into the bottom bracket, old-school style.

And of course add in I want it to be in good shape, so I’m going to be looking at condition and possible flaws very closely.

The Build Sheet (your project bible)

A Build Sheet is essentially a list of everything you need (EVERY Thing) to build a bike. Initially, your build sheet won’t list every single part your build will actually use. At this stage, you put in a wish list and see what happens when the bottom line adds up.

Why not be precise? Well, you want to be as accurate as possible. However the purpose of this initial exercise is to give a cost estimate. You may see that price at the bottom of the list and realize its too much. At that point the build sheet becomes a tool to choose different parts to get the budget under control.

Here is a sample build sheet for the bike build that is our example for this series.

What Did I Do?
I used this exact example sheet for this project, and you are looking at a copy of it – made at the end when all the lines are green – with the costs snipped out to try and help me forget how much I spent. I did add some notes and urls after the fact but otherwise this is the exact sheet used to manage the project.

Making Your Own Copy

NO I will not grant edit access to this sheet… If you want to make a copy for yourself, do this:

1. Open up the Build Sheet via the link above
2. From the sheet’s menu choose File –> Download
3. Save the sheet to your local disk in Excel format.

From there you can either use the copy directly in your favorite spreadsheet program, copy it back up to a new Google Sheets spreadsheet etc. etc.

Why this Sample is such a big deal

This is every part on the project bike. All of them, right down to the cable ferrules, the decals… even the tape. And since this is a more or less ‘generic’ bike, these line items are going to be what you need, too. Substitute in your derailleur in place of mine. Your frame in place of mine and so on. If you were overwhelmed by the thought of figuring out all the tiny bits needed to make a bike… this is your cheat sheet listing everything.

How it Works (project management)

Note the color-key at bottom-left. According to the table, every single line item on the list is in-hand (colored light green) except a couple, which I have categorized as maybe not being needed. This is what a sheet looks like at about the end of the project.

At the project’s beginning, each of these line items is likely to be in red: “Need to Buy”. As your project matures, the red lines individually turn to blue (ordered and being shipped) and then to light green for ‘I got it’. If you have to send a part away for refinishing or something similar, the line turns dark green while the part is away at the shop.

If you buy something and it turns out to not work, or in particular to suck for some reason, switch it to blood red “Tried and failed” so when you build your next bike you have a record of your mistakes.

• Column A “Item”: Describes the line item. A general part description like “Handlebars”.
• Column B “Model/Item”: A more specific description of the item. If the Item is Handlebars then the Model could be something like “Jones H-Bar 660mm, black”.
• Column C “Tracking Number”: When your line item is blue that means you ordered something and its on the way. Put your tracking numbers on this sheet. You can go down the line and click on each of them to check tracking (right click and do a google search on the number works for most shippers).
• Column D “ETA”: While your line item is en route, put the estimated time of arrival date here, so you can see if something is overdue.
• Column E “Source”: Where did you buy the item from? You might use this to identify and consolidate buying sources and shipping charges prior to making the buy. Possibly to get up to a minimum order amount for free shipping. When I already have an item in my shop and I don’t have to buy it, I list that as “parts pile” and set that line to green.
• Column F “Cost”: I use this for items not yet purchased (red). The total at the bottom of this column is the amount I still have to spend to complete the project. When I make my own lists, I do not list costs for ‘parts pile’ items in an effort to kid myself as to how much I am spending on this bike.
• Column G “Paid”. When an item goes from red to blue, the purchase amount goes from the Cost column to the Paid column. The total at the bottom of the Paid column tells me how much I have overspent so far on this project.
• Column H “Notes”: If you need to write something that doesn’t fit into the other columns, it goes here. I put in some notes on this sheet not for my own benefit but for the reader looking at this list for the first time.
• Column I “URL”: A purchase link for each item on the list. Sourcing parts can be overwhelming. This list shows sources for everything on this project. Where I list an item as ‘Parts Pile’ I went and got a link as you can’t very well pull parts off the shelves in my shop like I can. Also some unique auction items, like the frame and fork, only have a generic url. Those were one-of-a-kind items. If an item is no longer available from the seller I bought from, I plugged in a substitute url. Usually from Amazon. Remember: when sourcing hard to find parts, Google is your friend.

This build sheet, as-is here, should give you a list with purchase links to every part you could need to build an ebike. You can’t use all the parts I did, nor would you want to. But now you have a road map to all the parts needed to build a bike.

Use Your Build Sheet

OK, so you have listed all the parts you think you will need. You scoured the internet to find sellers for each item you want to use, and listed what each item is going to cost.

Thats no small job. You’re going to need a bunch of evenings or a whole Saturday (or both) to get through the exercise. But its going to be worth it. Especially for the very next step:

Go / No Go?

Look to the bottom line on the sheet. Can you afford this bike? Its possible the answer is no. Running this build sheet exercise stopped my Bullitt project dead in its tracks. When I saw the cost of building up a frame kit and electrifying it, I bailed and built something else (a couple of years later I built it anyway).

If you have concerns about project costs, now is the time to make adjustments to make the project realistic, or chuck it out the window without having spent any real money.

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Speaking of costs, its worth noting a DIY bike is not necessarily cheaper. You could go cheap, or you could also go with top components that are better, stronger and more reliable than any manufactured bike that has to make a profit. The Apostate is such a project.

What About Cost Of Tools?

There is a whole separate installment on tools. Plenty of them are specialized. There aren’t many that can be worked around. Since I build bikes as a hobby, and use tools that oftentimes I’ve had for years, I do not include tools on my build sheet. That is true even if I need to buy a tool for a current build – (in fact I had to buy a headset press because I couldn’t find the other one I own).

Whether you include tools on your Build Sheet is up to you. Just make sure that, as part of your project cost assessment, you go into it with eyes open regarding the tools needed to build a bike.

While You’re At It

You need a place to work on a bike. If you don’t know exactly how thats going to happen, now is the time to start figuring it out. Most likely final assembly will take more than a single day (for me it was a solid 3-days, with numerous short afternoons and evenings working thru the Tinkering and Perfecting phases).

If at all possible, make your workshop a place where you can leave everything overnight. For instance if you can, leave your car in the driveway overnight for the weekend, so you can work in your garage.

However…

If you created the build sheet, have a list of parts to buy and you can make the numbers work, its time to move to the next step… hunting for your frame, followed by the motor. Why just those pieces, in that order? We’ll see in

Step 2: Hunting

Introduction
Step 1: Planning
Step 2: Hunting
Step 3: Tinkering
Step 4: Buying
Step 5: Build Day 1
Build Day 2
Build Day 3
Step 6: Perfecting
Tools List (you are here)

Step By Step

Be warned: Including a total list of all the tools you need to build a bicycle makes this post enormous. Almost 4,700 words total plus pictures. Go get a sandwich and a drink before you start reading.

The tools needed for each step are in their respective Step section.

Remember:
This article is for the most part ONLY about listing the tools in a given step. However in some cases, for the more esoteric tools, I give some extra description to help illustrate why a special tool has value versus doing things a cheaper way. Alternatively I may talk about why the cheap tool is as good or better than the expensive one. With that said, I will generally try not to talk about using tools here, and save that for the individual Step where they are in direct play.

Step 1: Planning

There are no tools needed in Step 1 as its all a brain exercise. However, as part of your planning its a good time to assess whether or not you have the tools you need for this job overall. What will it cost to buy what you need? Factor that into your overall project cost and Build Sheet and budget accordingly.

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Step 2: Hunting

Tools in Step 2 are pretty much a computer, an internet connection and available funds to buy the bike frame and motor. Translation: No tools needed in this step.

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Step 3: Tinkering

To do the basic fiddling with your frame that this step will entail, you are talking about some basics only:

A Tape Measure

This can be as simple as a literal soft tape measure like what a tailor would use, or a modern chrome steel or plastic-cased retractable measure with a lock. I use both.

Here’s an example of the soft tapes I use

I buy them in the 24-pak like in the link. It seems I can never find my tape when I am looking for it and secreting one in the glove box of my car, one or two in each tool box and so on is the way to go for me. And for $7.99 for all 24 of them… well, that price speaks for itself. No they are not high precision… but they are good enough.

These tape measures have an unusual thing in common that means they will not typically be found in a local store: They both provide metric measurements. So you are buying them online.

With a few weird exceptions, all bicycles have been on the metric system for many years. You need metric tape measures. Since there are numerous exceptions you want both scales on your device.

Calipers (optional)

If you are a tool geek, The Calipers are an essential weapon in your arsenal. They are especially useful on a bicycle build where you have so many annoying, oddball measurements. Is that seat tube 31.6mm or 34.9mm? Its 34.9. OK is the exterior seatpost diameter the expected 36.4mm, then or did the numbskulls who manufactured the frame use thick paint to screw up your life (you need to know this stuff to attach a seatpost collar that fits)?

You can live without calipers and make do with a tape measure… assuming that what looks like pretty much 35mm must be 34.9. And that tube measures a skootch over 36mm so it must be a 36.4.

Or you can eliminate the need to guess. My metric Mitutoyo good-for-200mm dial calipers are old-school analog, so I don’t have to deal with dead batteries ever again like I did for my cheaper but still damned expensive RCBS digital calipers. Still, the digital set lasted me from 2013 until 2022, so I got my money’s worth I suppose. And they aren’t broken. If I keep buying batteries I can use them for SAE measurements. I guess.

Hex Keys

For any bike build, hex keys are essential. I generally like the ones sold by Bondhus as they are solid, USA-made tool steel at a good price.

If you can buy only one set, get the extra long type with the ball ends. If you can splurge a bit (these wrenches are cheap so you should) then also get the stubby-end high-torque version as well as the short wrench set. That way you have a wrench that can pretty much fit anywhere you need regardless of available space.

L to R: Long ball end. Stubby end. Short. These three pictures are not to scale relative to one another.

I also have a set of Wera (Germany) wrenches which I can only find on Amazon. Wera wrenches are not slab-sided hexagons and instead have a shape that relieves pressure on socket cap corners. They have it patented under the trade name Hex-Plus, and its a solid upgrade. The beefy, color-coded version with a spring loaded bearing on the ball end that will hold onto a screw for tough to reach locations are even more expensive, but if you want a single set good for lifetime use in your shop, they are worth a look.

Note that these are all metric. The need for SAE hex wrenches is almost nonexistent for bicycle parts (SRAM brake lever handlebar mounts are the only one I can think of). ALSO: I typically include the short or long ball end set in my preferred onboard tool kit that goes with the bike.

Motor Mounting Tools (optional)

If you are mounting the motor for test fitment at the Tinkering step as recommended here, you will need any special tools required to mount that motor. In the case of the example bike we are building, that means a Bafang 4-point inner lock ring socket. They are available from a variety of sources. Mine come from Luna Cycle (no longer available for sale). Here is the ‘traditional’ Bafang-sourced 4-notch tool from Empowered Cycles. Here is a fancier version from Lekkie.

Without question, this socket and a torque wrench is the right tool for the BBSHD job. Those little knuckle-smashing Bafang wrenches are Chairman Mao’s revenge from beyond the grave on imperialist running dogs the world over. They cleverly give only the impression of functionality as they cannot let the unfortunate capitalist lackey deliver enough torque with it (unless you make your hand bleed) to keep that motor from slipping sooner or later (usually sooner).

The one I linked above, I own myself as a temp-mount shortcut… but I never use it. It at least has the advantage of being a fairly strong steel (without the usual sharp finger-creasing edges).

Torque Wrench (optional … for now)

This depends on whether or not your chosen motor needs one. In this project we are using a Bafang BBSHD mid drive motor, and it does. We don’t necessarily need a torque wrench to do motor mockups at this step, but it can come in handy, in particular if you need to determine exact spacer size to align the motor just right.

I use an automotive 50-250 ft-lb micrometer torque wrench from Home Depot for that job. To deliver the serious torque a BBSHD needs for a done-by-a-grownup installation, there’s no substitute for the leverage this wrench gives you, and the Bafang socket tools are usually made for a 1/2″ socket head. Worth noting (we’ll get more into this below): The big HD wrench is calibrated to +/- 3% accuracy.

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Step 4: Buying

During the Buying phase, as parts are being ordered and arriving on your doorstep, you may be fitting parts onto the bike as test-fits to help you decide what other complementary parts should be purchased as follow-ons.

As such, while there are no tools specifically required to buy bicycle parts (other than a keyboard, internet connection and so on), during this phase you could end up needing any number of tools found in Steps 3 and 5.

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Step 5: Assembling

Wheelbuilding Tools

Remember… in the Introduction I said we’re cheating on this one and we farmed out the wheel build. Wheelbuilding is not something someone who needs a tutorial on building a bike wants to be tackling along with learning all of the other ropes this series is focusing on. So we are not going to be worrying about truing stands, spoke prep, tuning forks and spoke keys.

A Bike Stand! (optional)

This is one of those optional deals that you are going to hate yourself for cheaping out on, once you go to the expense of actually getting one and you see how much easier your life becomes. And if you buy a cheap one, its going to suck because a cheap stand with an ebike on it is seldom going to be strong enough to hold up all that extra weight (psssst… take the battery out).

If you are reasonably crafty, you can make yourself a bike repair stand out of PVC. Just don’t use furniture grade PVC and up the diameter of the pipe so it is crazy strong. This one uses 1 1/2″ pipe and reportedly cost around US$35 in materials. But notice also it doesn’t clamp anything to anything, so bumping into the bike while its on this thing is going to lead to exciting results.

Me, I use two different Park stands in my two shop locations (ok so full disclosure: my shops are a storage unit in one town and a patio in another). One is a Park PCS-10 stand that I bought in 2017. Its been my workhorse for almost six years. The one they sell now – the PCS 10.3 – is quite a bit more expensive than the US$192 I paid for mine, but it looks to have a couple of improvements.

My second repair stand was acquired recently and is a bit of an indulgence. But I’m not sorry I sprang the big bucks for it. I have a Park PRS-25 ‘team issue’ portable stand that folds up nice and easy and has a few added benefits I appreciate, like using hex tubing so the bike cannot shift side to side and topple over. But… four hundred bucks for a repair stand. You gotta use it a lot for that price to make any sense.

Maybe.

Torque Wrenches (plural!)

The fact you are considering buying a torque wrench at all is a big step up over your typical shade-tree bicycle mechanic. With that said, if you don’t own one now, you don’t need to spend a bundle on a precision instrument. A Park TW-6.2 3/8″ torque wrench relied upon by the bicycle industry and insisted upon by snooty internet forum experts is going to run you in the ballpark of US$130… and its one of at least two you need to work on a bicycle. This 3/8″ wrench is required for the bigger (and absolutely crucial) jobs like torqueing down crankarms. The smaller Park TW-6 1/4″ torque wrench that you’ll use for almost everything else on a bicycle is another US$115 or so.

Thats kind of a lot. Here’s the thing: You can spend a lot less and still get most of the benefit of a torque wrench. The Park wrenches are sturdy enough for repeated daily use. For the occasional bike mechanic, thats not necessary. Additionally, the Park wrenches are both calibrated to be accurate within +/- 4%. So lets consider that … an industry-wide standard of quality (wink).

What about lower cost options? How accurate are they?

My first bicycle-sized torque wrench was this one: the Venzo-branded 1/4″ wrench-and-socket package that retails at the moment for about US$50. It too is rated for a +/- 4% accuracy level. Even though it is rated for 2-24Nm, you wouldn’t want (or need) to push it past 10 Nm. For a larger 3/8″ wrench, I initially used a variation on this widely-rebranded Chinese import wrench. This Amazon-branded version runs just under US$30 and again its rated for +/- 4%.

Neither of these wrenches will hold this level of accuracy for as long as a more expensive tool, but if you only use them occasionally, you don’t need them to.

What does the author (thats me!) use?

Some time ago I stepped up my game on the torque wrench front. My little 1/4″ wrench lost its accuracy after a lot of use, and I could no longer trust it. The same went for my no-name 3/8″ wrench. While I trust the Park brand name, their torque wrenches are not particularly noteworthy as far as I can see in their construction, although they are premium priced. Certainly not a bad choice, but for the money, with some research, I could find better.

I went with a German brand: Wera, which are calibrated from the factory at +/- 3%. Importantly: they offer a USA address to perform re-calibration services should the wrench get a little wonky from extended use. No need to buy another wrench if it loses the spring in its step. Get it professionally re-calibrated by the manufacturer.

1/4″ wrench: Wera Reversible A5 (2.5-25 Nm)
This one wrench is perfect for nearly every job needed on a bike. It scales up to medium stuff without breaking a sweat. Handlebar stem bolts on our project bike need 5 Nm. the chainring attachment bolts need 8 Nm. Excepting the cranks, you shouldn’t need to go over 10 Nm (its max of 25Nm is 18 ft lbs).

3/8″ wrench: Wera Reversible B2 (20-100 Nm)
Thats 15-73 ft lbs in SAE units, which fits perfectly within a bicycle need, whose peak is about 35 ft lbs for an aggressive crankarm tightening (as a general rule of thumb don’t exceed 30 ft-lbs if you can help it).

And no… neither one of them are inexpensive. Like the Mitu’s above, I consider them crown jewels of the toolbox that I expect to last a lifetime of hard use.

Headset Press

In the past, specifically when I built Frankenbike, I used a very basic, very cheap headset press that did the job just fine. BUT something like 5 years later I couldn’t find the damn thing. So I upgraded just a bit when I bought another one for this project.

The design of this tool is reminiscent of the Park HHP-2 tool, but its literally less than one-tenth of the price. It works on the same principles as the more expensive tool, and is just fine for the rare or occasional user (then again, so was the even cheaper one I bought in 2017).

Star Nut Setter

I didn’t have to use this tool for this build as the used fork I put on the bike already had a star nut inside of it. However if you are buying a new fork, it won’t. You’ll have to set a star nut in the steering tube of the fork.

You could do this with an M6 bolt screwed into the star nut, and then hammer on the bolt to bash the nut into the steerer and hope it goes in straight. I’ve done that myself (when I couldn’t find my setter tool) and I have to say its a dumb idea. You’ll almost never get it in perfectly straight, and if you do it’ll take a LOT of pounding. If you use the proper tool, it automatically centers the star nut, seats it to the proper depth and works with one or two quick shots with a mallet.

It turns out Jenson USA sells this tool for about 1/3 of what Amazon sellers want for it. Just make sure you buy other things in the same order to get free shipping. They are an excellent parts and tool source.

Crown Race Setting Tool

You could spend a zillion dollars on a fancy crown race setting tool, or just get a piece of PVC pipe that is 1 1/4″ in diameter. Park Tool wants US$86 for their CRS-1 Crown Race Setting System. I think a length of PVC is … what? 86 cents? I got fancy with mine and chamfered the inside of it with a pipe reamer so it was a perfect fit. You don’t need to do that.

If you have a 1.5″ tapered steering tube, use a bigger size of PVC.

cable/hose cutter

These cable and housing cutters are the same ones I use for making electrical connections. They work for cutting the shifter cable, the shifter cable housing and hydraulic brake hose. In fact, that black hex nut visible in the pic actually doubles as a hose end reshaper thingie. Cutting hydraulic brake hose deforms it. Stuff the end onto the little cone inside the hex reforms it into a proper circle so you can fit a new hose needle / end back on.

Brake Hose Needle Driver (optional)

The ‘needle’ is the end fitting on hydraulic brake hose, which actually comes under some pretty high pressure during the braking process. For years, I jammed these little suckers in by hand. You do it by using manual dexterity and swear words to get the little thing fit into the hose just enough to stay in, then use a small hammer in one hand while holding the hose in the other, and bash on it, trying to hold the hose tight enough to make progress without smooshing your fingers with the hammer.

You can also bang the hose end on the garage floor to help finish the job after you decide you have hit yourself with the hammer enough times.

OR you could wise up like I finally did and buy the right tool for the job. I was disgusted at how easy it was once I had the proper tool.

Brake Bleed Kit (optional?)

This is not needed if you are using cabled brakes (please don’t do that), which do not need bleeding.

Once you resize your hoses you need to bleed the system. It doesn’t take much. A couple of syringes, some rubber hose and some brake fluid (I hope yours use mineral oil and not corrosive-to-paint DOT fluid).

Rather than buying a Magura branded bleed kit, I picked up this syringe kit and this little 100 ml bottle of Royal Blood mineral oil brake fluid. If I was feeling adventurous, I could spend less and use generic mineral oil or baby oil, but one bottle of the real thing will last quite some time. Since brake spacer blocks come with each set of MT5’s, and I have I think seven sets, I also did not need to buy spacer blocks.

For Magura brakes, you will also need a very small crescent wrench to tighten and remove the bleed hose onto the caliper.

Cassette Lock Ring Socket

I use a fancy Park FR-5.2H. I work on enough cassettes – and got it years ago – so the sting that comes from the price of this little beast has gone away. I appreciate the ability to pick it up and use it like any other wrench.

An occasional bike mechanic will save a bundle and use something like this little Park FR-5.2 with a crescent wrench for less than US$9. I’d show you a picture of mine but I only see it every few months, whereupon I set it someplace safe and don’t see it again for another 3 months. It’ll turn up.

Chain Whip

If all you do is put your cassette onto your rear hub, you don’t need this tool. But if for some reason you want to take it back off, a chain whip is essential. Most workshops have several of these. I have a couple of cheapies like this one or this one. Both of these will give you cassette lock ring sockets, too. I was recently stuck needing one while away from my shop and sprang for the Park SR12-2. Its quite fancy and works great. It had better for the price they charge.

Metric Hex Keys

This is the same set we used and discussed in Step 3 above.

Chain Breaker

I use the same one in the shop as I keep in my onboard toolkit. The basic, dependable Park CT-5 Mini Chain Brute.

Chain Pliers

Again, using the tool I take right out of my onboard tool kit. Either Park MLP 1.2 master link pliers, or the cheaper Oumers master link pliers. Both serve double duty as openers and closers. When you buy your own set of master link pliers, don’t get snookered into buying pliers that only open or only close. Those exist solely to make you buy two tools.

Needlenose pliers

Pretty basic stuff here. Needed simply to squish/crimp the cable end tip cover on the shifter cable after it terminates at the derailleur.

Air Pumps (tire and shock)

A tire pump is obvious, right? But we’re trying to do a complete tool list so there it is. Also necessary is the shock pump, which you use on your rear shock and your air fork. You can’t use a tire pump on a shock for a bunch of reasons, regardless of whether you have a chuck that will fit the valve. I use the Air Tool shock pump from Specialized because it has a T handle, and a 2-stage valve chuck that will prevent air loss when disconnecting. I had a cheaper pump from Amazon that had these same things but it died on me after a few months and only a few uses. Buy once, cry once.

T25 Torx Wrench

Needed for brake rotor bolts and all of the fasteners on Magura brakes. Additionally the T25 is popping up here and there on other parts, and is something of an alternate standard to a hex socket. The seatpost collar you will read about in the Perfecting section uses one. I have a whole set for my in-shop toolbox. Even if it wasn’t labeled, you can tell by the scuff marks on it which one the T25 is.

Electrical Connection/Crimping Tools (optional?)

This is something you probably should do, but you can do without if you really must. First of all, the tools necessary, and the procedures needed, are entirely covered in this 2-part series that begins here with this link.

Here’s the deal: The BBSHD motor’s power connection is a long dual-wire affair extending from the motor about 2 feet and terminating in a pair of 45-amp Anderson connectors. Now, you can buy an Anderson-to-XT90 (female) adapter, for instance, and use that to connect to your battery without shortening the wires (you will need to wrap them into a ball and stuff them somewhere) or needing to do any crimping. But thats going to be sloppy, at best.

When I built the Stormtrooper, the cable lengths worked out fine and I didn’t need to cut and shorten anything. I was able to insulate the archaic Anderson connectors and tack on an XT90-to-Anderson adapter and no one looking – even closely – at the connection would be any the wiser. That project was the exception, not the rule.

For our subject Apostate build, the distance from the battery to the motor was only a few inches, and with no battery bag to hide wiring sins its right out in the open. So there were issues with protecting the connection as well as a need to shorten the wires.

What you need, and whether you need anything besides an adapter is entirely dependent on the physical requirements of your bicycle frame, and whether you have a place to hide excess cabling. I personally have no qualms about stuffing a rubber-banded coil of cable inside of a battery bag only I will look inside of. You? Its your call. The link to all the tools you need and step by step instructions on what to do are above.

Silicone Tape (aka Extreme tape. aka Plumbers tape)

This is one of my secret weapons. On the Stormtrooper, with its white frame, I spiral-wrapped the main wiring harness and battery wires in white silicone tape. Matching the frame, they blended right in; hiding in plain sight. I use black silicone tape as handlebar grip tape on almost every bike I own. Similarly for this project we will see I use this tape in red extensively to blend in the wire tunnel, and a little bit of grey on the rear triangle. In older photos you will see white tape, which is not a match to grey alloy, but close enough to turn the volume down until I found my grey tape.

One advantage of silicone tape is it has no adhesive and sticks to itself naturally. You wrap it around things and it stays put because it stretches like a rubber band, and then sticks to itself. Permanently. Until you take a knife to it and then it splits apart and comes right off.

Zip Ties!

Zip ties are the hallmark of many DIY ebike builds, where they often seem to be used everywhere, with abandon. I try to use them as little as possible. When I do, just like the silicone tape, I use a color that matches whatever it is they are looping over to minimize their visibility. Exact paint matches are never possible, but I have found even a rough match is enough to make them less noticeable versus the typical, common black zip tie most DIY builders plaster all over anything and everything.

Introduction (you are here)
Step 1: Planning
Step 2: Hunting
Step 3: Tinkering
Step 4: Buying
Step 5: Build Day 1
Build Day 2
Build Day 3
Step 6: Perfecting
Tools List

This is a Big One

This is an ambitious topic. There’s a LOT here. The entire series ended up being over 41,000 words, across 11 installments. Organization was a challenge, but I think it is laid it out in reasonably broad brush strokes that make sense. The Tools List at the end is organized in discrete sections for each Step.

What Does ‘From Scratch’ Mean?

I’m going to go through a complete project build that starts with a bare frame. I then add all the parts to that frame to make a fully functional electrically-assisted bicycle. We won’t be concentrating so much on electrical / motor specifications, as we will picking out every single part needed to build a bicycle. Right down to the shifter ferrules and cable crimps. Building a bike is a lot less intimidating when you have a complete list of everything needed, along with the tools required to install them.

This will be a ‘frame-up’ build: start with a bare frame and make it into an ebike.

I originally planned this article long ago. It was obvious to me there was a need for a sort of ground-up tutorial. I have participated in a lot of conversations with people who wanted a fun project, but realized quickly they were in over their heads.

Thats where I was myself the first time I did it – back before ebikes, in fact. I built my own analog bicycles back in the day. So when it came time to join the Dark Side and build electric bicycles, I leveraged what I already knew. I just had to add some bits to the parts list to account for the electrics.

Throughout this series, I will try to balance the value of taking a deep dive on a specific task, to just referencing that something needs doing, and perhaps linking you to an existing step-by-step tutorial. Some will be my own. I’ll reference many articles published on this site to cover a lot of that ground.

Where Am I Cheating?

I didn’t build the wheels. Really… wheelbuilding is a fairly advanced topic. For a person who needs help from a ‘how to build a bike’ article, that person should not also be taking on wheelbuilding lessons. Let a pro do it for you.

In my case, supply chain issues compounded by my regular wheelbuilder’s busy schedule meant I needed to find a way to get wheels professionally made for this bike… within a specific time frame, with specific parts. I’ll get into the wheel parts saga in detail in the assembly sections.

Anything Else?

Yes. We will be buying a battery. Not building one. If you need instruction on building a bike, learning how to also safely build a battery pack – something that can burn down your house and kill people if done wrong – is not something you should be taking on.

Also, I’m describing how to build THIS ebike from scratch: A full suspension, BBSHD-assisted, mid drive e-MTB. I chose this build because it is a pretty generic animal. Its not something weird like one of my gargantuan cargo bikes, or an all-wheel-drive beast. Those are great bikes, but not projects that appeal to the first time builder, nor are they of mainstream interest.

So… you aren’t going to see me discuss building a hub-assisted ebike. I’ve stated publicly in other fora I am done building hub bikes (with no plans to change this). However, I would like to, at some point, add a supplement to this build series to discuss what is done differently if building a hub-motor’d ebike from scratch.

Its not a major departure from this instruction set (its simpler) and only involves a few different specialty tools – chiefly a crank puller and a bottom bracket tool. And we’ll need to address torque arms. And…

… Never mind. Lets save that for another time.

Oh And There’s Also This

Lets call this a Mission Statement: DIY Does Not Have To Mean Half-Assed.

Look around on the internet for awhile. You will know exactly what I mean when you see all the projects where duct tape and zip ties are used as major components.

This project is intended to build a bike that is as close to factory-quality as possible. In fact, where it comes to the bicycle components themselves (brakes, headset, hubs, rims and so on) it will exceed them. We are not building a bike for profit here, but rather for excellence as a bicycle.

There will be things I deliberately do that spoil the polished look. But when the Perfecting stage is posted with the final production pics (not the bike shown on this page) you should be seeing a bike awfully close to that ideal.

Background on the Subject Bike

As mentioned above, I wanted to do this series some time ago. Unfortunately, after trying to get it off the ground, I realized I needed a fairly mainstream build to work with as it went along. It took awhile before that opportunity presented itself.

Recently I decided to build a small, self-contained, full suspension bike for use around town on short errands, and light trails. A bike I could easily toss into my car and haul back out again. Finally, this was the ‘normal’ bike for this writing project.

The Apostate is the result.

Quickee General Layout:

Lets take a brief look at how this is going to go down:

Step 1: Planning

Decide what kind of bike you want to build:

• Cargo? Full suspension mountain bike? Hardtail fatty?
• Put together a preliminary parts list to give yourself a ballpark idea of cost (don’t worry there’s a sample list ready for you to customize). Your parts list will be the backbone of your project management too.
• What kind of motor are you going to use? Hub (geared or direct drive)? Mid drive (from what manufacturer?).
• Where is the battery going?

Step 2: Hunting

Step 1 told you what kind of frame you want, in at least general terms. Now you get serious about buying one. Looking around the marketplace at real products will teach you new things you didn’t realize you needed to know. Read specs closely. Buy the frame that meets your needs.

Step 3: Tinkering

Now that your frame has been delivered, you can start confirming measurements so you know for-reals what the dropout widths are, seatpost diameter and so on. With the frame in your hands, you buy parts with confidence knowing they will fit (this includes your chosen motor, battery and controller). Having the frame in front of you rather just reading specs and seeing pictures is likely going to give you new – and perhaps unexpected – insight on the job ahead. You may change some of your parts decisions mid-stream.

Step 4: Buying

Now that you have looked long and hard at your frame, and made your final (?) parts decisions, its time to cast your net wide and start buying all the parts. The parts list you roughed out in Step 1 and finalized in Step 3 becomes crucial here. It will manage the entire process of buying and tracking parts shipped from myriad locations.

Step 5: Assembling

This is the big one. You’ve been receiving little boxes from parts shops for weeks. Now with everything in hand, the rubber meets the road: Put that parts pile together and make an electric bicycle. Since I did the actual build in about 3 days, I split up the assembly articles into three parts, each covering what was done on Days 1, 2 and 3.

Step 6: Perfecting

Once you finish assembly, the chances are near zero that you picked all the right parts the first time around. Expect to learn new things when you actually ride the bicycle. Maybe the handlebars would be more comfortable if they were a little wider, or the stem was a little shorter. Or longer. There’s almost always something that needs a tweak.

The Apostate was no exception. Right after the first test rides were complete I knew I wanted to make a couple of sizing changes. From there it went straight into the back of a car where it went riding daily for a week in The Grand Canyon. After that fairly extended initial period of use, I had a few additional things I wanted to change.

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Are we ready to get started? Lets go!

Step 1: Planning