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What can I do here to make Square Wheels less sad??


Page Turner

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Ah.....lots of good memories there. I remember struggling with Campag's efforts with a touring rear der when Suntour came out with their one and it was a revelation.

I picked up in another thread that you used gear-pullers to free stuck Chain-sets and up to now I thought I was the only one who did this....which was unlikely I confess.

I intend to post pictures of my newly acquired Moulton Esprit when I have it all assembled. As it uses a 9-26 Capreo cassette and there's no chance of me pushing even medium-sized gears, I spilt the Capreo cassette and another Shimano one I had in my workshop and replaced the three largest sprockets with 24/28/32 from the other cassette. Given the 17" wheels this gives me 20" to 95" which may be enough to get me up the hills...or nearly. I also changed the 105 53/39 Chain-set for a Spa square  taper one with TA chain-rings and 165mm cranks as I thought this might help my knees.

The things I have to do to keep cycling.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Logging miles may be a problem but it's even shinier than you imagine.....stainless steel frame my dear fellow.

...I had this impression of you as a humanitarian, yet you continue to rub my nose in your obviously newer, shinier, and more technologically advanced bicycle.:( ...I'm going to be forced to attempt to one  up you either with something ridiculously Italian, in the chromovelato style, or just let fly some photos of the full chrome Paramount. don't make me go all chromovelato on your ass, man.:angry:

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...I had this impression of you as a humanitarian, yet you continue to rub my nose in your obviously newer, shinier, and more technologically advanced bicycle.:( ...I'm going to be forced to attempt to one  up you either with something ridiculously Italian, in the chromovelato style, or just let fly some photos of the full chrome Paramount. don't make me go all chromovelato on your ass, man.:angry:

I admit that this is true and I'm ashamed..... just now and then this cruel streak emerges and I can't help myself.

Today I intend to take my new bike and show it off to a keen cyclist friend of mine who is unemployed, dependent upon food banks, has just lost his wife and has had to give up his children for adoption. I'll only leave when I hear the first sobs but I know that I'll feel really bad afterwards. Try not to condemn me....it's the human condition and it's really complicated.

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  • 1 month later...

My goodness.....a cornucopia of retro bikes and there seems to be no end of them. Thing is I rode and worked on some of them when new and it makes me feel old or at least older. It's a strange feeling and I don't know whether it's good or bad. Your home must be a real treasure trove for bikes of this era...I mean all these and sunshine too while here it's thick fog and cold and I have yet another urinary infection so am feeling poorly. It's so unfair....perhaps you would consider catching something. It would make me feel so much better.

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...check out the drop on those bars. :)  It was foggy here, too, for a couple of hours yesterday morning, then it burned off.  Everyone I saw on my ride was wearing tights, long sleeved jerseys, and I saw one balaclava...........it was about 60*f and sunny by then. :D

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That's quite a drop but I have a shelf full of bars similar to that one. I left Drop bars behind when I had my circulation problems in my hands and switched to these. I clipped the ends which allowed me to insert a mirror (essential as I'm very deaf). Now that I'm riding a Moulton with suspension I find that Drops are once again fine....all a bit late in the day though.

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I don't think I could bear it if I thought you owned all of these bikes. Odd that the first has Allen-headed bolts on the seat stays....and only on the seat stays too. Both seem to have short chain-stays yet the frame angles and trail seem different with the second one more relaxed. What variety and what quality though I realise you must have had first pick somehow.....probably by underhand means.

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I don't think I could bear it if I thought you owned all of these bikes. Odd that the first has Allen-headed bolts on the seat stays....and only on the seat stays too. Both seem to have short chain-stays yet the frame angles and trail seem different with the second one more relaxed. What variety and what quality though I realise you must have had first pick somehow.....probably by underhand means.

...the champagne beige one is an earlier bike, 70's I guess.  The orange one has the TT cable braze ons you'd expect in the later 70's, early 80's.  I tell people that the San Francisco bay area of NorCal is the elephant graveyard of high end bikes, but nobody believes me.........all of this stuff came off the local Craigslist at one time or another.  They were all project bikes, needful of various repairs and replacements, which made them affordable.  

The guys who used to buy this stuff are all dropping 5 Grand on a Specialized plastic race bike, so there's not that much competition.  The last bike I bought was a Gios Compact that hung on for a month on CL without a buyer, and was around $350 American when I just could not keep myself from buying it any more..  

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OHoooooooooo.....the Faggin is beautiful....that must give you a lot of pleasure.

Would you own any George Londstaff bikes by any chance. I ask as he was regarded by many to be the Doyen of British frame-builders. I had a custom frame for my wife made by  him and it was a thing of beauty. I'll scratch around and see if I still have a photo.

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OHoooooooooo.....the Faggin is beautiful....that must give you a lot of pleasure.

Would you own any George Londstaff bikes by any chance. I ask as he was regarded by many to be the Doyen of British frame-builders. I had a custom frame for my wife made by  him and it was a thing of beauty. I'll scratch around and see if I still have a photo.

...most of the really exotic UK stuff never made it here.  So no on the Londstaff.  It's interesting you should mention it, though, because there's a really interesting Alec Bird bike in my size that's been hanging around for quite a while on the Craigslist for not too bad a price, relative to the market here. Probably needs some love, but don't we all ? I cannot imagine the sort of person who put those pedals on there.

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Sorry but that should have been Longstaff....my error. The man specialised in Trikes and in fact died while on his tandem trike with his wife. Unusually he was an Engineer by profession and ran a small engineering workshop for his bread and butter though his passion was building bikes. He mad the most beautiful tourer for a friend of mine and when we went down south to collect it I thought he wasn't going to let it go. He came outside with us when leaving and photographed the bike even as we loaded it into the Estate. He was still standing there as we left.....

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Sorry but that should have been Longstaff....my error. The man specialised in Trikes and in fact died while on his tandem trike with his wife. Unusually he was an Engineer by profession and ran a small engineering workshop for his bread and butter though his passion was building bikes. He mad the most beautiful tourer for a friend of mine and when we went down south to collect it I thought he wasn't going to let it go. He came outside with us when leaving and photographed the bike even as we loaded it into the Estate. He was still standing there as we left.....

...what does show up here (a lot) is custom frames by American builders, which are pretty swell bikes, IME.

The last one is by a guy named Michael Johnson, who is pretty obscure as a builder, but did some exquisite detailing. :)

 

 

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I do like the Davidson  but....the stem is a gross breach of good taste for which you should be publicly flogged...I mean...what's wrong with a Cinelli 1A or something similar?

I would imagine that there are countless small frame-builders building exquisite frames who have gone unrecognised and have eventually failed.

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Oh my....bloody hell...is there no end of these bikes? I do have a friend who has above a hundred classic bikes and all in working order but the quality of yours is superior. It's so unfair ...I mean given your coarse nature and lack of sensibilities it just seems wrong that you should own these bikes...it's against nature. I can only pray that there will be some natural calamity (lets face it you're in the right place for this sort of thing) which will destroy every one of these lovely machines and set the world aright on its gimbals.

Not that I'm at all jealous you understand.

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..there's a bright yellow Waterford Paramount out in the garage that needs a little work, maybe some tyres, and some photos.  I want to do that one next, because your yellow bicycle reminded me of how wonderful is that color for a bicycle. :) I know that red ones go the fastest, but I think yellow ones are that happiest.

This is supposed to be the year my neighborhood goes underwater, so there might be some deals to be had come Spring.:(

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..there's a bright yellow Waterford Paramount out in the garage that needs a little work, maybe some tyres, and some photos.  I want to do that one next, because your yellow bicycle reminded me of how wonderful is that color for a bicycle. :) I know that red ones go the fastest, but I think yellow ones are that happiest.

This is supposed to be the year my neighborhood goes underwater, so there might be some deals to be had come Spring.:(

Waheeeee!

It does seem that my being a good person for all these years has paid off and natural justice has reasserted itself. I'm nipping down to my workshop to clear a space for the new arrivals.....not that I take any pleasure out of your misfortune you understand....oh dear me no...that would be wrong. You will take care that mine won't get even a wee bit damp won't you.

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Are you kidding?? Look at how much room you have between your top tube and down tube! And look how your seat stays soar above your rear wheel to reach up to your seat! You don't see anything like that on my bikes. (this one is a 49 cm I think)  Ya, you have tall bikes. I have tall bike envy. 

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Edited by smudge
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...my pal Amanda has similar frame size problems. I think she rides a 49 or 50, too.

 I feel your pain.  there's nothing worse than seeing nice bicycles that might as well be wheelbarrows as far as you're concerned because they aare the wrong size. :(

 

Nice bridge photo.:)

I figured since you are posting bridge photos, I should too. It's from a couple springs ago.

I've decided my bikes look good and stout. The tall bikes look sexy, but my short bikes probably fit my personality better.  ;)

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