Autumn leaves.. Awesome goodness [bikes]

up for autumn builds are two frames, Ribble and San Marco..

Ribble

Pierced top tube, Reynolds 531 tubing, extra strength.

3 stripes on bottom bracket cup. Luckily, it doesnt have adidas money all over it.. (why Kalavinka??)

San Marco

curves of the wind... -Defined!

Griffin on a cupcake. nothing gets better than this baby

click the names.. it'll let you visualise some more of the beautiful autumn leave goodness

FRESH. ALAN. [bikes]

Dear readers,

Due to severe freshness, I am not able to keep my mouth shut. Friend got swag [fullstop]. He copped the best looking golden Alan off the bay for chips not even with salt and vinegar. Bear in mind that these fancy sweeties are now anti-produced, so for a price of two hundred quid, this ones a very, i repeat - VERY rare and yet a good buy.

Re-polished vintage Campagnolo headset and Alan's authentic lugs. Superb condition.

Smooth 51cm Alan frame. Swinging for AZNs as the seatpost would be set high and give a wow look.

This came all the way from Aberdeen, Scotland, to be finished and ready to be ridden by its lucky owner. Check my flickr for more detailed pics.

What might come on it is the golden Nitto Jag Stem which came off the Makino, Campagnolo Crankset and aero seatpost. The friendly Brooks. And a B43 rear fixed wheel for comfort and would feel like singing in the rain riding through London's traffic and its vast chaotic roads.

C.. Ch.. Check it out. Wha.. W.. Whats it all about! [bikes]

What is up for restoration now is a -b e a u t i f u l- frame i got from the bay for salty chips regarding its kind.. heres a stingy sneak preview:

Can you guess what frame it is?





Campagnolo Brevetti dropouts

nice seat stay yoke. nice drop on that top tube. immaculate lugs joining them together.
keep guessing..

resilient seat post insert. Minimal clearance around the wheel. absolutely stunning.
youre getting there..

GAZELLE Low Profile Cinelli Approved Track Frame Made In Italy.
i just had to get all those capital letters in.

I got the frame already set up as a bike - a beautiful bike it is! A bit of paint chips and little surface rust here and there, but really it adds a bit of attitude to it. The Cinelli frame is paired with an unknown 700c fork, therefore, the lo pro geometry doesnt stand out and wouldnt give its astonishing original look.. so for now, the looks still aint for show yet, itll need a swinging 650c fork hooked up before we can do all that. then finally, the final touches will be made to complete the perfection it deserves.

SEPEDA MERDEKA. The Freedom Bike [Bikes]

Well, its actually been days after completion. Tried it out on the Bridges Ride, and felt smooth as fuck..

Very minimal clearance on the ITM forks since a 28c tire is bein used. Actually, when i do trackstands on it, the tyre tend to be touching on the fork walls, so its quite tricky at times.


Beasty-killer look. scary...

Sugino Crankset along with Toshi Straps. And to top it off, Vertex chain.

In conclusion, so far this is the best road bike Ive ever been on. The Makino felt alot more tight and solid hence being a track frame. The Puch frame IS relatively heavier than the recent frames but the frame feels absolutely resilient. With thick tyres, brooks saddle, comfy Toshi straps, and a Cinelli Sesamo stem with home country inspired colours, altogether make this a very enjoyful and comfortable which is ridden with pride. NICE.

Stripped then Tipped.. [bikes]

have been trying to get the Puch done.. the paint condition of the frame was most paramount to get done above all the other customisation planned to accomplish perfection. So the frame went to a strip club and got itself stripped with some HOT and itchy paint strippa

Stripped, and then Tipped.. ..with paint





Its getting there... more pics @ the Puch set of pics

Proposal: Sepeda Merdeka - The Freedom Bike. [bikes]

Ok, since ive been selling both my Ammaco bike as well as the Makino, my legs are made pedal-redundant and therefore, i need to build up a bike for myself, and fast.

That'll be the 'ol Puch frame from the world war 2 which was most sought. Also, the Indonesian-colours inspired stem, Cinelli Sesamo, will be hooked up on the bike along with some ITM Spider Carbon Forks - which makes that a Post World War 2 bike with a twist of the future. Some nice red hubs like Goldtec, Miche Track will act as sweeteners to the bike, but definitely not Phil hubs, thatll just stretch the budget too far..

Got some HALO Freedom discs from the forum quite a while ago, and i think that is what inspired me to build 'Sepeda Merdeka' - The Freedom Bike. With a rim width of 19 and 28c thick Vittoria road tyres, the bike is going to ride smooth and freely on rougher terrains.

Lo's for Pro's [bikes]

Building up a Lo Pro finally accomplished with great big grins.

More Pics here

51cm Rossin Lo Pro @ £112: Good Buy. [bikes]

OOOO YEAH!!!
a few minutes ago I was looking at ebay - the usual boredom treatment. and then I came to THIS!!!!

The starting bid was £30.. and the buy it now was £100. posting was 12 quid.

...So I concluded, firstly, it is a Rossin frame. Secondly, it has columbus tubing. thirdly, its bloody CHEAP for the frame itself!... about 5 seconds after visualising goodness.. called my mate who was gonna build the WW2 frame up, and told him to catch it as he always dreamt of a lo pro and it was his size. So the bird was caught...

Run along boredom, say hello to excitement!!!!

Selling my Makino.. [bikes]

I finally come to a point where i thought that someone might need this frame more than I do.. Someone who has bigger thighs and carves and would take her really fast to infinity.

So, up for sale in the London FGSS Forum is..

its here

Cinelli Pinocchio? [bikes]

Just got a lovely Cinelli stem from BLB - it was the last one there, used but worth only 10 quid. They said it came back from the 1980s, and during the time, only little were produced. I dont know exactly whether there are more colours available but an anodised stem with an innovative design coming back from the 80s would be pure genius and most likely expensive back then! Polished it up to reveal its true vintage colours.. - which really reminds me of the Indonesian flag and that's another strong reason why i bought it! Then took pics:

Its a lovely stem isnt it? looks sharp and futuristic! have to say that this was definitely a good buy not only for the stem but also what happened today.. This could be a reminder of the Ritz Carlton & Mariott Hotel bombing which happened at about 8.30am..

But then again, i'd rather not be reminded to that... Back to the topic: So what im really curious of now is.. Brick Lane Bikes said that the stem is a Cinelli Pinocchio. but then i did a brief image search on google and found a quill stem. It may be the vintage version? maybe not? or maybe the older version of Cinelli Alter??

Update: (4 Aug 09.)
After scrobbling through ebay looking for cinelli stems available for the UK. I found this..

Cinelli SESAMO..

and like how Cinelli always does it, they come in all different colours

Post World-War 2 Frame. [bikes]

Right here is a dramatic puch frame i had stored for about over a year. I got this frame from Hackney and now is sold to a friend of mine, Dana. Just now i got my curiosity on the Puch and finally had the motivation to search it on the net, and what I found was mind-blowing. Puch only start re-producing bicycle frames after 1949 and until the 1970s. And looking at it, it looks like it came from the early 50s. Pics:

The frame is quite heavy. But theres absolutely no doubt it is weak, its stiff as a bull. Would need a lot spirit-soaked wipes to get the rust off then we gona spray paint the frame metallic black but leave the front lugs in its raw metal state. Some chromed forks are gona go on this one so I reckon it'll be tough lookin with some blingin..

Summer: Time for Lo Pros [bikes]

Not really.. most of the tricked up bikes come out during the summer anyways. all kinds like: cruisers, bmx, roads, tandems, lo pros, track bikes and a lot of odd looking bikes that doesnt work like a bike! Some, where you lay down and your hands actually controls the rear wheel and we pedal the front wheel.. God, I forgot what the name was, but it does look more disastrous than it sounds.

Back to topic: Lo Pro! YES.. friend decided to have a lo pro geometry for his bike, and what is even better, he decided to build it up with me! So, here's the frame: Handbuilt and brazed by Orbit with Reynolds 531 tubing. SHWING!

I think, ill give that another SHWING!

The plan is, paint the frame metallic purple kinda like the Motorola Razr's colour, i dont know which type exactly but he showed me a picture of that particular phone with a lovely glowing metallic purple. Armourtex in hackney must have that colour in their catalogue, i reckon. So we'll give that a try. Then, a 650c fork is gonna be hooked up on so that a 650c wheel(obviously) could fit there. And due to the never ending want of less spokes,, Spinergy with their 8 spoked carbon wheel didnt do the justice for him. But an Aerospoke definitely will :D. Furthermore, silver HALO rims are coming into the frame as well as some sweet Nitto Bullhorns. Ok, time to close our eyes and imagine what it'll look like.. imagine.. oh, imagine.. might as well turn on John Lennon singing imagine if youd like

Track frame built! [bikes]

Friend finally decided to go with the efficient way of life, take off old stuff, put it on new frame.

supa-tight clearance!




So no Nitto bullhorns, neither his old handlebar because it looked a bit silly(well, i kinda screwed up a bit in the cutting so the bars didnt look right). But then I just got these blue UNO handlebars off a friend from the forums for quite cheap. Hooked it on friend's bike to give it a bit of colour.. and now the bike looks like it came all the way from France..

more here

2nd project: STOLEN LEADER

YEP. Swallow it all in. This bike was stolen.

Specs:
50cm Leader LD-781R
FSA IS-Headset
700c something DESIGN Carbon forks (forgot the name)
FSA Carbon Crankset
Shimano Dura Ace BB
650c HED front tubular wheel
700c rear flip-flop hub (Fixed/freewheel) Velocity Deep V's
FELT carbon seatpost
Selle carbon saddle
KMC chains
Wellgo pedals
and unknown cheap stem and risers

Posted it up on the London forums and was said to be purely anti-porn. But what the heck, it was a friend's bike. I mixed and match colours and parts all to his likings and at the end, come to think of it, losing it did kinda hurt. Luckily my friend was in India when he heard the bad news, i dont get bombarded with useless ballistic grammars.. but seriously though, what can you do when your bike gets stolen? just wait and watch.

But then, about a week ago, someone said he spotted a new matte black with 650c HED wheels riding through Kings Rd. in West London. Asked him whether if it was my bike but he cant remember completely. So, Im still keeping an eye now.