Wired Cola

It started with the hub.

Then an idea was formed in my head: build a cyclocross bicycle whose drivetrain and–what the heck–braking system was impervious to mud.

The frame (well, in a separate transaction, the fork, but I bought it to match up to the frame) came last, after I scored a surprisingly good piece of kit in an eBay auction. Follow the photo above to flickr to see my build notes.
The frame was tricky because I needed horizontal dropouts, disc brake tabs, and a lot of mud clearance. The Norco 5Hun was an attempt to cheap my way into a solution, but in the end the biggest problem was that the 5Hun frame would have required a 450+ mm seatpost to get to an appropriate seat height for cyclocross. I was trying to put lipstick on a pig and call it a dance partner. Fortunately, Rita came along and saved me from myself.

Right now, this bike wears cyclocross tires (I think they're 32mm front and rear), but I have a notion that for true mud-cheating hilarity, I should change to something like a 1.9" 29er tire, and float over everything. I am also eBuying a hilarious collection of cogs for this bike, which means that I can now change the gearing at will. I have a crazy theory that I will buy some Origin 8 drop bar ends, a set of Tektro RL520A brake levers (these are a functional substitute for the much-loved and now-discontinued Dia-Compe 287V), and Tektro's new RL740 cyclocross levers. These parts would create a weird drop-bar with normal drop-bar (and top-mount) levers, all of which would work properly with the discs I'm running, and also would handle my grip shifter.
The technical details of why all of this is either hard or quite possible are a bit silly and boring, but suffice it to say that there are separate standards for road and MTB handlebar diameters, and a few different kinds of brakes, too. This means that crossover configurations like the one I'm striving for require some particular parts choices.
The cork grips are just for fun. As usual with my project bikes, this one has scavenged parts from all over, including a couple of bikes that were working just fine.
My preliminary test-ride has proven that the gearing is reasonable, and the bike feels much nicer than I expected. My rough guesses about things like the cockpit setup were very good, and I am looking forward to riding this bike more, possibly a lot more. This thing started out as a narrow-focus almost-a-joke project, but now I think it may become my most versatile bicycle of all. Don't be shocked if I decide to ride it in a road race next spring.