Rivendell Appaloosa: General Use Green, Tall Wheels and No Real Hurry
This is the first modern build I’ve done for quite some time, which feels slightly strange to say, because on paper the Rivendell Appaloosa is hardly modern in the usual bike industry sense.
No batteries. No hydro hoses. No carbon layup story. No integration for integration’s sake.
But compared with the run of vintage mountain bike projects that have taken over the garage recently, this one is a different thing entirely. The Appaloosa takes a lot of the same ingredients I keep coming back to — silver parts, friction shifting, useful gearing, comfortable bars, big tyres, rim brakes, beautifully made odds and ends — and puts them into a frame that was designed for this kind of riding from the start.
This is a size 54 Rivendell Appaloosa in General Use Green, built around 700c wheels. The result is tall, floaty and properly compliant. It has that big-wheeled, easy-rolling feeling where the bike never seems especially rushed, but it also never feels like it is dragging its feet. It just moves along with a calmness that is hard to get from smaller vintage frames that have been adapted into modern all-rounders.
The build started, as many of these things do, with the wheels. I laced polished SimWorks rims to Dia-Compe ENE Ciclo hubs, keeping the whole bike visually soft and silver. There is something about a polished rim and a silver hub that still feels right on this kind of frame. Add in brass nipples, tan sidewalls and the new Ultradynamico Rose Race tyres, and the whole bike starts to look like it has been assembled from the correct corner of the internet.
The tyres are a big part of the personality. The Rose Race tread looks delicate but still purposeful. It is not a mud tyre and it is not pretending to be one. It suits the Appaloosa perfectly: lanes, bridleways, dry woods, gravel, towpaths and the kind of mixed riding where you leave the house without being entirely sure what surface you are going to end up on.
The cockpit is probably the most Rivendell part of the whole thing. The Bosco Bullmoose bars dominate the front of the bike in the best possible way. They make the bike look upright, useful and slightly odd, which is exactly the point. They also make the frame feel even taller and more relaxed. Paired with Oury grips — although I came very close to going cork — the front end has that soft, practical feel that suits a bike built for long, unhurried rides rather than short efforts and numbers on a screen.
Braking is handled by Paul Component Moto Lite V-brakes paired with Love Levers. I know cantis are often the more romantic answer on a frame like this, but the Moto Lites make complete sense here. They are clean, powerful, beautifully made, and still keep the silver, mechanical, serviceable feel of the build. The lever feel is excellent, and visually they sit nicely against the polished cockpit and green frame.
The drivetrain is a nice mix of Rivendell logic and practical range. Shifting is via Rivendell x Nitto shifters, with a Rivendell/Silver rapid-rise OM-1 rear mech at the back and a Deore front mech up front. The crankset is a Crust Heartbreaker 2x with 42/26 rings, paired to an 11–36T 9-speed cassette.
That gives the bike proper usable gearing. Low enough to keep it civilised when the bike is loaded, the road points up, or the ride turns into a bridleway crawl. High enough that it still rolls well on the road. It is the kind of drivetrain that makes more sense the longer you ride it. No drama, no performance theatre, just a useful range and a nice mechanical feel.
Finishing kit stays firmly in the silver-and-brown zone. A Nitto 65S seatpost holds a Brooks B17 saddle, which feels like the obvious choice here without feeling lazy. The SimWorks x Honjo Turtle bell adds the right amount of brass, and the Velo Orange Riddle Rack gives the front end just enough utility without turning the bike into a full touring rig.
The overall result is a bike that feels hard to categorise, which is usually a good sign.
It is not a gravel bike, even though it will ride gravel.
It is not a vintage mountain bike, even though it shares a lot of that spirit.
It is not a tourer, although it clearly has the bones for it.
It is not a town bike, although it would be excellent for that too.
It is just a general-use bicycle in the best possible sense.
That phrase can sound a bit dull, but on this build it feels like the entire point. The Appaloosa does not need a narrow use case. It is there for the ride where you might end up on lanes, woodland, gravel, a pub stop, a school run, or a longer loop just because the bike feels too good to turn around.
After a long run of older frames, seized parts, compatibility puzzles and restoration rabbit holes, this build feels refreshingly complete. Not simple, exactly — there are too many good parts on it for that — but coherent. Everything belongs. The green, the silver, the tan tyres, the brass bell, the big bars, the 2x drivetrain, the tall 700c wheels.
It is modern, but not in the way the bike industry usually means modern.
It is modern because it is current to how I actually want to ride.
And that might be better.
Build spec
Frame
Rivendell Appaloosa, size 54, General Use Green
Wheels
SimWorks polished rims
Dia-Compe ENE Ciclo hubs
Hand-laced build
700c setup
Tyres
Ultradynamico Rose Race edition
Brakes
Paul Component Moto Lite V-brakes
Paul Love Levers
Cockpit
Rivendell Bosco Bullmoose bars
Rivendell x Nitto shifters
Oury grips
SimWorks x Honjo Turtle bell
Drivetrain
Crust Heartbreaker crankset
42/26T chainrings
11–36T 9-speed cassette
Rivendell/Silver rapid-rise OM-1 rear derailleur
Shimano Deore front derailleur
Finishing kit
Nitto 65S seatpost
Brooks B17 saddle
Velo Orange Riddle Rack