Yeti ARC 1992 Rebuild | Bike Check

October 26th, 2016

By Andrew Dodd in Bikes,Features

Yeti ARC 1992 Rebuild – retro dream build!

We love a nice retro mountain bike here at Factory Jackson, and this Yeti ARC 1992 is an absolute knock out dream build!

Doddy spent a long time salivating over this bad boy at the Cycle Show – and got all bleary eyed remembering the bits he could never afford as a kid.

Take a look at some of the amazing detail on this Yeti ARC 1992…

This Yeti Arc 1992 is one of the best looking builds we’ve ever seen!

Yeti Arc 1992 – custom restoration

This bike has been carefully specced out with all the kit from the period – and really is a super bike.

Purple anodising was most definitely over-played in the early 90’s – but now draws the eyes of anyone that walks past. It just stands out more than any other anodised colour.

This Yeti ARC 1992 is completely over the top with every possible thing in anodised purple – and I love it!

Yeti Cycles is one of the few bike brands out there to have a truly loyal following and a number of dedicated fan sites – including the UK based Yetifan.com site.

What John Parker created way back in the mid 80’s still stands today as one of the most iconic logos; colour ways and bike brands of the lot.

And the Yeti doing a broad slide in an Etto helmet and Oakley Eyeshades is probably the coolest thing to grace the head tube of any bike, ever!

When the craze for decorating your bike with colourful anodised bits was going crazy, it was the riders with cash that went the whole hog on brands like Grafton or Critical Racing – whereas younger riders like myself used money from Saturday jobs to buy affordable hop-ups like the Ringle Mojo cable hanger. I remember a lot of riders to used to wear these round their necks too, along with Onza Chill Pills and other similar straddle cable hangers.

If you were skint or tight you’d go for Tektro cable hangers – and get laughed at when the anodising would wear off after a few rides!

This Yeti ARC 1992 has a lovely set of Critical Racing cantilevers, with a Ringle Mojo straddle cable hanger and a set of Madison Aztec brake pads. Obviously the fork brace on the Manitou II forks isn’t original – this one looks like the Anti Gravity anodised fork brace – it must have taken some major league retro rummaging to find!

Purple anodised Answer Hyperlite bars and a Ringle Zooke stem grace the front of this Yeti Arc 1992. Quite the opposite from todays stumpy stems and wide bars, back in the day it was all about narrow bars and stems that wouldn’t look out of place bolted on the back of a canal boat.

The Hyperlite bars weighed about 144grams, and were just 584mm/23in wide – pretty sure I cut my Taperlite (the cheaper version) bars down by 2-3in – and fitted bar ends too.

No wonder I used to scare the crap out of myself on any down hill in those days!

Grafton one-finger brake levers are so cool – and incredibly simple. On this build they are paired up nicely with very rare Grafton shifter perches for Shimano Rapidfire shifters.

Don’t think I even saw these the first time round – the owner of this bike sure does spend a lot of time hunting retro stuff out!

Note the Oury grips creeping in to shot too, which are another prime addition from that era.

It’s purple over load time with the Grafton cranks and bottom bracket being joined by purple chainrings; SRP chainring bolts and even some Grafton crank caps.

Too much? Perhaps – but I’d sell a kidney to own this thing!

All the purple left on eBay and the Retrobike forum was used in the rebuild of this Yeti Arc 1992!

The eagle eyed amongst you will spot the Ringle Anti-chainsuck plate tucked in behind the seat tube, as well as the Ringle quick release; SRP break away bolt and even alloy jockey wheels.

And look at the condition of the 1992 XTR mech – it looks brand new!

The Tioga Disk Drive tension disc wheel is one of the most iconic mountain bike parts out there. They offered two models – this classic version that has a metal mesh reinforcement, and a lighter Pro model that was slightly lighter and lacked the mesh.

The concept of the Tioga Disk Drive was to replace the spokes of a wheel with discs and kevlar webbing. There was a slight vertical flex to the wheel offering a degree of comfort – and they made the most incredible rumbling noise out on the trails. (check out the film Tread to see founder of Rockshox – Paul Turner – shredding on a GT RTS 1 with a Disk Drive. The scene was pretty much filmed to show off the noise!).

The downside? They cost loads, and were prone to breaking – the kevlar cords were known to part from the disc and loosen. Apparently chain lube often played a part in this!

Gotta love the clash of the brown Ritchey Z-Max WCS (World Cup Series) tyres too – these things were super soft compound and were around in the era of coloured tyres that was kick started by Onza’s White Porcupines. I actually prefer the Ritchey tyres though – something about them looks quite classy.

It’s nice to see the original Shimano SPD pedal on this Yeti ARC 2991 build too – the PD 737.

This pedal revolutionised clipless pedal technology for off road riding as the cleats went from huge exposed road style cleats to recessed designs. The design was so good that even the latest pedals use a very similar design now – and the same cleats. These early pedals – alongside the DX model – had plastic collars that used to shatter though and could be a pain in the ass to remove if it happened.

A lot of riders would fit aftermarket alloy collars in their place – that came in every shade of purple you could imagine!

The Selle Italia Flite Titanium was by far the most stylish and comfortable saddle in the 90’s, and is probably the nicest shape saddle ever produced. The Ringle quick release lever is a nice touch too – though there’s absolutely no way anyone I knew that had an anodised post would lower it for anything. Not a chance they’d risk the scratches!