Back from the USA

It's been a bit of a update hiatus for a few weeks - went to the US for a mate's wedding in Houston TX, and also went to New York, Washington DC and San Francisco. Plenty of single speed and fixed gear action in both NYC and SF.

So I bought another set of cranks... believe they're Campagnolo Croce D'Aune, which is one down from Record around 1990. I might put these on my commuter Salsa Casseroll single speed. They're 172.5 so might be a bit long for the the Peugeot.

Just before I left for the US I picked up the mixte from the sand blasters - they did a great job, as they say, the proof is in the pudding!

Upon coming home, I was greeted by a number of small packages for the mixte, including the axle below, a pink and white Fizik ladie's saddle, and a NOS 90's Campy Record headset. The headset will go onto my Colnago fixie, and the Dura Ace that is currently on it will be switched onto Andrew's Colnago... The headset from his Colnago will then go onto the mixte! It's musical headset time!!

More pictures shortly of the new parts.

Planning on dropping into MCR to get the seatpost machined down to fit the frame, and get the primer down on the frame, this weekend. Looking forward to some quality sanding time!

collecting parts...

While the frame is being blasted (should be ready tomorrow), I've been trolling eBay (addicted?!) collecting bits and pieces.

Amongst them, some long reach tektro 556s - long reach calipers, a pretty Campagnolo Chorus crankset from the '80s, a 110mm Campy track bottom bracket spindle, and a 22.2mm bmx seatpost.

The tektros are needed to allow enough drop to meet the 700c wheels.

As suggested by Mick at busyman bicycles (thanks Mick!), I'm going to see if I can reuse the cups from the French bottom bracket, and install an appropriate length spindle. The Sheriff has donated it's bearings from bottom bracket that came with the frame, so it may be possible to avoid the expense of a Phil bottom bracket. I also have a 115mm spindle lying around somewhere, and also the spindle out of the sheriff is about 115.

All this hard work needs refreshment - thanks for the coffee from John at Fiorelli!

Mixte gets a front end!

Went down to the Abbotsford Cycles swapmeet this morning.

Because of the French fork and headset issue, the Mixte will get a new 700c English thread chrome fork, which needs a set of bars, stem and headset. The Kalloy 100mm stem was a bargain from the swapmeet - three bucks. While the bars are new, they're alloy and at $25 they're not too expensive for a lighter front end. I'll drop these to Dan at shifter to get powdercoated white, and depending on what crank we end up with, maybe the crank will be powdercoated white also.

The vintage lamp (which is incomplete) also caught my eye, and at five bucks it was hard to pass up. The idea is that it would be mounted on one of the lower rear stays, with a conversion to a modern LED set up. While it would be nicer to get a bullet shaped rear end for it, and stick a LED lamp into it, I have dummied up a Cateye Opticube 3-led front light in the back of it, and it looks ok. Might be able to get away with a chrome paint on the body of the opticube.

As below, Sheriff II is now stripped ready for paint. Peugeot is a little behind, as it'll need to go to the bead blasters before getting primer. I've read that Blastoff in West Heidelberg will do frames, at around thirty bucks. I'll speak to them this week, and hopefully they'll be able to fit it in relatively quickly.

Troy at Motorcycle Crash Repairs (MCR) is a champion and has agreed to help get the paint down on the Moser and the Peugeot. He's suggested not to use the acrylic primer-in-a-can and get the good stuff high-fill primer down at the shop... then elbow grease to sand it down.

Not sure what colour Sheriff II will be, but Peugeot will probably a powder pink. Trying to convince the boss that it should get some pearl in it, but she's not sold.

The Sheriff Mk II

From far off Italia comes the next steed to get a working over by the re(wind)cycle crew. The frame is an early eighties Francesco Moser made from lightweight Colombus steel. Delivery was a little tardy but when the packaged came beautifully wrapped and covered in fragile tape all was forgiven. The frame is straight and neat although the paintwork and decals leave a little to be desired, but for fifty euros (plus 'pacco ordinario' delivery) you can't complain!

First things first we need to get rid of this paint. A quick trip to the local hardware store and I had the necessary equipment. I needed some paint stripper, a cheap paint brush, a scraper, some chemical resistant gloves and some other safety gear. Don't mess around with paint stripper. Although it looks something a little like jelly it will burn through your skin and strip the lining from your lungs if you are not careful.

Watching the paint stripper work is amazing! Before your very eyes the paint starts bubbling and frothing and with a quick swipe of the scraper off it comes. As I took the paint off I discovered that the Moser is actually half chromed. Unfortunately the chrome has some rust spots on it although I have read somewhere that Coke-Cola and aluminum foil will remove it, so I may as well give that a go.

Next step is to remove the headset and bottom bracket and then a hit it with some sandpaper and maybe a little wire brush action if any of the rust is stubborn.

Disassembled

The Peugeot is now disassembled. The frame itself, while still hefty, is not as bad as initially thought. The main weight offenders were the wheels and crankset.

The braze-on cable guides and pump stops have been removed by hacksaw and file, and will shortly be off to the bead blasters to get cleaned up for paint.

Disassembled, it is now confirmed that, being a French bike, all the threads and fastenings are arse-about. I get the feeling that they decided to thread it all backwards just to spite the English. This means that we have a French thread bottom bracket (obsolete) and french sized headset (obsolete), stem (obsolete) and handlebar size. Fantastic.

Seeing that the bottom bracket is cactus, along with the headset, there are only a few options for each. The headset is the 'easier' of the two fixes, in that a new fork with a conventional English thread is easy to do. This also means a new stem and bars. Dan  at Shifter Bikes had one kicking around the shop that was the right price.

The options for the bottom bracket are:

1. find a shimano UN72 (removable left and right cups) and use Phil french lock rings

2. use a Phil cartridge bottom bracket, and french lock rings

3. ream and re-threaded the bottom bracket shell to accept a (larger) Italian thread.

I think that the shimano option will work out cheapest, followed equally by option 2 and 3, given the labour to get the shell re-threaded. Also, the Phil option will allow the BB to be reused on another bike in the future, by using the appropriate lock rings.

All the bits are getting expensive - plus I keep getting out-bidded for parts on eBay!

Some new pictures of the Peugeot. This is one heavy bike!!

At first glance these seem to be 700c wheels, but may really need a rebuild in order to run well. May be able to get away with a rebuild, but in that case it is probably easier to go for a new pair - in any case we will need a flip/flop rear hub to be laced.

The fenders are a little rough, so once disassembled we'll need to make a decision whether to keep them, find another pair, or run without fenders at all.

Note the head tube lug work and pin stripe detail - perhaps when we paint this we can mask the lugs and paint in a separate colour. It would be nice to get some period Peugeot decals also - Cyclomondo has some, not sure if they're the exact kit though.

The fork will need to be chrome plated, and then a decision made as to whether the fork legs will have the matching frame highlight colour.

Our project bike - Peugeot SF-10, purchased for the princely sum of $61. Hopefully it has plenty of gear that is re-usable and able to be polished or powder coated. More pictures when it is picked up tomorrow!