Bontrager Race-Lite Retro MTB Frame1993

Size 17” centre to centre / 19” centre to top

So you know what this is; arguably the best engineered and riding steel hardtail from the early 1990’s. Not only that, this is the lighter Racelite version with machined headtube and two-piece seatstays.

It gets better: I imported it from Kansas USA about 5 years ago and have never built it up, let alone ridden it so it’s quite possible it’s never seen rain.

The silver paint is original. The decals are new (3 years ago) but annoyingly there was a mix-up in the ordering process so instead of the standard “over paint” protective vinyl-type, these are the thin “under paint” type and and wrinkled badly during application, especially around the down tube bottle bolts as there were no cut outs. On the plus side you can easily remove them and buy the proper ones in your choice of colour from Retro-Decals or similar for around £30.

The paint is excellent. It’s deep and shiny. There are a few small chips here and there and a small amount of chain suck. There are a couple of scrapes on the left rear seat and chainstays which could be easily touched in. The original anti-chain suck plate is included. Rear brake bosses are not shown in the photos but are included.

Bontrager sizing can be a bit confusing. Having checked a geo chart from 1992, the seat tube suggests it’s a size Large. But the top tube length is quite short for a “Large” sized frame of this era which would typically be around 23 to 23.5”. The Bontrager brochure says 23.2” with the Composite fork. I bought this as a complete bike and it arrived with Rockshox forks so it could be the “suspension corrected” version which had a few minor tweaks to work better with a slightly longer suspension fork.

So to help you decide whether the frame would fit you, I installed the Bontrager Composite fork (390mm a-c) to take to take the following actual dimensions:

- seat tube centre to centre: 17”

- seat tube centre to top: 19”

- top tube centre to centre effective horizontal: 22.5”

- head tube end to end: 4.25”

- fork steerer diameter: 1”

- front mech clamp diameter: 28.6m

- seatpost diameter: 26.8mm

Please ask if you have any questions on these.

For shipping, dropout spacers will be added and each tube will be wrapped un thick new foam pipe jagging. It will be placed in a sturdy frame box and shipped insured to value via Parcel Force. International postage is welcome via eBay GSP or you can collect from CV47.

I waited many years to find a Racelite as good as this.

I’m also listing a set of Bontrager Composite forks in a separate listing and if you buy both I’ll do a slightly better price.