[Ice]

 



 

 

[The Old Coot]

OK I'll bite.

My "Old Time Coffee Bike. It's a GT Airstream with fenders, seat bag and a Brooks Saddle. A fun "Old" bike for cruising around on. See I like cool old bikes and not just the Enfield.

When I could ride it this was the speed ride. A Cannondale R2000 light (19 pounds) great bike. I use to do about 100-125 miles a week in Florida before moving to Ohio where I'd be road kill in a week

[malky]

Some quick phone shots.
Indian Hybird Shakti " gas pipe" bicycle. Dutch Lepper hairspring saddle, and Indian fake Miller dynamo. It cost me $28 in complete knock down kit from. Everything had to be built, hubs, wheels etc etc. It is absolute garbage, but pleasant to ride, no gears 28" rims .

[ace.cafe]

I haven't ridden bicycles since the 80s.
I had a Bianchi Record 748, and a Bianchi Superleggera.
Chrome-moly frame days.
The Record 748 had a Campagnolo Record gruppo with a few things deleted by Bianchi to save cost, and replaced with such things as Gipiemme crankset and Universal brake levers.
The Superleggera had a full Campy Super Record gruppo.
I put Nisi ultralight alloy wheels, double butted lightweight spokes, and cotton tubular sew-ups on them both.
 

[Chuck D]

OK I'll bite.

My "Old Time Coffee Bike. It's a GT Airstream with fenders, seat bag and a Brooks Saddle. A fun "Old" bike for cruising around on. See I like cool old bikes and not just the Enfield.

When I could ride it this was the speed ride. A Cannondale R2000 light (19 pounds) great bike. I use to do about 100-125 miles a week in Florida before moving to Ohio where I'd be road kill in a week

It's funny, your Cannondale looks a bit dated already even though it's probably less than 20 years old.
 Road bikes intended for serious racing now use "compact" frame geometry and are made of carbon fiber which is just pretentious for plastic. They're ugly and graceless in my opinion. Yours still retains the graceful lines of the older steel bikes although of aluminum construction. This is further enhanced by the highly polished Shimano Dura Ace components. Shimano used cold forgings for their high end parts so they could be as sculpted and light as possible without sacrificing durability. They were pretty like jewelry. Components nowadays, even the expensive ones are invariably anodized black. Meh.
Another nice feature of your bike and older bikes in general was a "quill" type handlebar stem which allowed a good range of vertical adjustability without resorting to stacks of spacers in the headset. One Allen key loosened and tightened an expander inside the steering column. Simple and quick.Why they did away with that system I cannot fathom.
Don't even get me started on the moronic and wholly unnecessary splined bottom brackets which superceded the square taper which worked perfectly fine for over 60 years.
Your wheels also look to have a rational number of spokes in the classic cross three pattern. In the unlikely event that you break a spoke, i'm sure you can open up your brakes enough to ride home. A modern wheel would be an unusable potato chip.
Yes indeed it's a pretty thing and no less functional for it.

[Chuck D]

I haven't ridden bicycles since the 80s.
I had a Bianchi Record 748, and a Bianchi Superleggera.
Chrome-moly frame days.
The Record 748 had a Campagnolo Record gruppo with a few things deleted by Bianchi to save cost, and replaced with such things as Gipiemme crankset and Universal brake levers.
The Superleggera had a full Campy Super Record gruppo.
I put Nisi ultralight alloy wheels, double butted lightweight spokes, and cotton tubular sew-ups on them both.
 

Ahh... Nisi Sludi rims. They were on the wheels of the cool older guys I hero worshipped. I did have two sets of Fiamme gold label "Ergal" wheels. Tied and soldered of course . My race set wore Vittoria silks and my trainers a set of "Wolber Invulnerables" (they were anything but).
I started riding and local club racing right out of my teens as a junior. That would be about 1976. Merckx hadn't quite retired yet but he was pretty washed up by then. My gods were the new generation. Moser, Maertens, Saroni, Kelly. And the Americans Wayne and Dale Stetina and of course, Davis Phinney.
We all wanted our bikes to look just like theirs. If they drilled out their cranks and chainrings so did we. If they used straight block freewheels so did we. As soon as I graduated from restricted junior gearing, on went the 54 tooth big chainring. What a regular prat I must've looked!
I lived and breathed this shit right into my mid 20's beyond all proportion to my actual talent as a racer which was modest at best.
Made a lot of friends though and we all still ride and tell lies about the old days.

[The Old Coot]

We use to say "Steel is Real" I had a Waterford touring bike with rack front and rear that I loved. No it wasn't all that light or fast but I could carry all I needed for a week it handled well and was tough. Not tough enough to keep for being stolen one night though. Touring bikes were built for a different type of rider than the Racer Boys or Stump Jumpers. We were the guy on the open road with a "T" shirt just moving along at maybe 15 MPH but doing so all day long, I did 200 miles in a day a couple of time loaded down and 100 miles was a walk in the park. Of course I was a lot younger then. Now I get winded just thinking about it.

[malky]

Another nice feature of your bike and older bikes in general was a "quill" type handlebar stem which allowed a good range of vertical adjustability without resorting to stacks of spacers in the headset. One Allen key loosened and tightened an expander inside the steering column. Simple and quick.Why they did away with that system I cannot fathom.

Manufacturing costs I would imagine, no threading of the fork steerer and no specific length of the steerer as if you're buying after market, it's cut to suit. Also with the clamp and spacers it's less than an hour's work to strip out the forks, replace the head bearings, reassemble and ride away. As far as the aesthetics go, it looks like shit. Give me a quill.

[Chuck D]

Manufacturing costs I would imagine, no threading of the fork steerer and no specific length of the steerer as if you're buying after market, it's cut to suit. Also with the clamp and spacers it's less than an hour's work to strip out the forks, replace the head bearings, reassemble and ride away. As far as the aesthetics go, it looks like shit. Give me a quill.

That's a Nitto stem if I'm not mistaken. They make pretty stuff.
You're of course right about the manufacturers streamlining production. If they simply standardize the length of the steering tube and forgo threading, the savings per unit add up. But as you say, it ends up looking shitty.
In practice, the few times I've replaced headset bearings, it was on the old loose ball type like Campagnolo or Stronglight which were tricky to get adjusted right and would develop a "pit" in a few thousand miles anyway. Then sometime in the 80's tapered roller bearings became common in the aftermarket stuff. I'm pretty sure the big guys like Shimano and"Campy" or "Campag" as you people who talk English funny say, were specing them OEM by that point.
Hell, I've got a Chris King headset that I put in my Waterford over ten years ago that I haven't had to touch since.

[High On Octane]

I was never into road bikes, but I used to BMX like crazy until about age 27 when my knees started giving me trouble.  First bike I ever bought brand new with my own money was a Robinson Rebel, white frame on black.  It was a great bike, fast and light and pretty durable too.  Also had a couple different GTs and Dynos, but they always seemed too heavy and bulky.  Then I came across a DK 8pack that was just a frame and fork that I got for cheap.  I proceeded to spend about $500 in aftermarket parts; 3 piece crank, triple trap platform pedals, Sun BFR double wall wheels, chromoly bars, Odyssey brakes.....  Was a bad ass bike when I was done, but after a couple more years my body couldn't take the daily abuse anymore and sold it to my boss for $500.

Now I part out BMX bikes just to build tricycles.  Hahaha!  At least I'm on a team now and get recognized for my crazy antics.  Actually, it's still in the final stages of work, but we're hoping to get a big article published about our team for a new upcoming magazine.  We had to send in a bunch of personal bios and pics.  Hopefully it all works out! 

[malky]

Beautiful 1953 Flying Scot, built by Rattrays of Glasgow,surely up there with Italy's best.

[Chuck D]

Beautiful 1953 Flying Scot, built by Rattrays of Glasgow,surely up there with Italy's best.

Yep, that's a looker.
I always love how the fork blades of that era have that tight radius curve right at the bottom near the dropouts. It's very elegant to my eye.

Some nice photos on this site when you have the time...
https://www.flickr.com/photos/ciclidevotion/

[malky]

Some nice photos on this site when you have the time...
https://www.flickr.com/photos/ciclidevotion/

Thanks, excellent.

Some cycling coolness.

[Chuck D]

Thanks, excellent.

Some cycling coolness.

[The Old Coot]

And now the Enfield of Bicycles!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fj9pnETLEso