Archive for the 'nos' Category

Bike Nerd? You better believe it!!

Published on March 7, 2009 in Basso, bicycle, bottecchia, campagnolo, centaur, deore, dura ace, fixie, mtb, nos, Raleigh, road bike, Trek and ultegra. Closed

So it’s time to out my other little fetish in life, apart from cars and dressing in neoprene rubber that is. Bicycles. I’ve gone through quite a few over the years, from my first, a metallic green Raleigh Chico, a Raleigh Bomber (realistically the first mountain bike style bicycle available in Ireland), through a Raleigh Equipe racer and then a Raleigh Mirage MTB. Since Raleigh Ireland went down the tubes I’ve moved to Trek for my follow-on bikes, with a Trek 6500 MTB and a Trek 1000 racer.

The current stable comprises the following:
  • What’s left of the Raleigh Mirage – not much really….The front wheel & hub, the handlebars & stem. Broke the original purple Mirage frame twice. The first time it was a simple crack around where the rear righthand side dropout is brazed into the chainstay. Simple re-braze and touchup paint. Second time was when the seat stay came away from the seatpost. This time Raleigh, after much cajolling replaced the frame & forks with what you see before you now. Over the time I’ve had this bike I’ve changed just about eveything on it bar the front wheel & hub, the handlebars & stem. And the stem is about to be changed to a nice shinny Marin cro-mo item. I even have some NOS Deore DX front and rear derailleurs to go on it to complete the DX themed geartrain along with NOS Deore DX front & rear hubs. Also love the Deore DX brake and shifter combos, so much better than anything at the time or than XT which replaced it (I have a spare set of NOS DX ones in the same cupboard as the other DX bits). I’ve upgraded the brakes to bling purple anodized Dia Compe 987 cantis. Funny thing is, I bought the Trek 6500 to replace this bike a few years ago, and it’s this bike that I still prefer to cycle around on. Go figure. Steel is real!

  • The 2006 Trek 6500

  • The 2007 Trek 1000 (modified but about to give up all of it’s goodies to my current project). I’ve changed the bars to FSA OS Aero Wing bars, ITM 100mm stem, Specialized Avatar BG saddle, Mavic Ksyrium Equipe wheelset and it’s got a Polar CS200 HRM mounted.

I’ve also built a bike or two from parts – a Concorde steel frame & Paganini fork combo (sold immediately after build up) and my current project, which the Trek 1000 is donating it’s choicest upgraded parts to, a Basso Loto steel frame with a set of Dedacciai Black Force 2 carbon forks in place of the original steel forks. The next project after that will be building up my 2003 Cannondale Jekyll frame into a complete bike and I might change the Trek 1000 in to a Speed Bike/hybrid with flat bars :o)

Then there’s my collection of classic parts – 8 speed Dura Ace groupset parts, 8/7 speed Ultegra groupset parts, misc. Campagnolo parts, mostly NOS, a NOS Bottecchia Corsa frame made from Columbus SL tubing:

A badly rusted Concorde frame, also made with Columbus tubing. The top tube needs to be replaced, but I’m loath to do it as the Concorde name is pressed into the tubing just ahead of where it enters the lug on the seat tube. So I’d obviously loose that feature on this frame by replacing the top tube. Fork crown has been badly taken down with a file to allow crown races to fit, unforetunately it’s been taken down so much that the crown race just flops about in it’s seat. Now I could get new metal added back to the crown and then have it machined to the correct size when I’m having the top tube replaced, but I might as well be honest with myself – perhaps a hasty burial in the local recycling centre might be more appropriate….