Forked Up

Posted on May 23, 2015 by Nola Wilken

Looks like a nice Reynolds 531 fork, doesn’t it? Not! While recently test riding one of my projects, I noted a lot of lateral flex in the front end of this 1976 Raleigh Gran Sport:

I immediately thought that the giant bars, which are already flexible in and of themselves, were exerting forces over the front wheel, and combined with the long reach stem, gave the bike a very strange wobbly feel – somewhat akin to the handling characteristics of a mixte frame. Certainly, this was not caused by the frame geometry itself, I was sure.

So, I installed some regular, narrower bars, but the same strange flex continued to occur. Then, I rebuilt the headset, thinking that it was out of adjustment, and I adjusted the front hub again, even though it was also just fine. Still, the flexible feeling continued. Then, I disassembled the fork yet again (grrrr…) and examined it carefully. Usually, you think of impact damage when looking at a fork. But the blades and steerer tube were perfect. There were no cracks or bends, and the paint and chrome showed no signs of any kind of damage. I squeezed the fork legs together at the dropouts and found that they flexed quite a bit. Fortunately, I had lots of other steel forks around to compare this fork to. While all steel forks will flex when squeezed, this one REALLY flexed quite a bit more – several millimeters more by the naked eye. I didn’t think the variation was caused by different tubing material, because I compared this fork to not only another Reynolds fork, but also to an ALAN fork, which is known to have a lot of flex.

I had previously checked the brazing at the fork crown, but now thought that I had better get my pick out and go over the brazing carefully. Sure enough, on one fork leg, what I had thought was brazing, covered in a bit of road grime, turned out to be just…road grime.

Brazing material is missing, tiny pinholes visible.

I prodded the area, got out my tiny flashlight and could see that this fork leg, while not on the verge of imminent failure, was not properly brazed into the fork crown. It looks like the lug and/or fork leg were over-filed and too loose when inserted, and there was too large a gap to fill with brazing material. Or, possibly the gap was too tight when brazed, and the leg loosened up over time, revealing the complete lack of any silver in the gap. Below is a comparison of the two legs, the first one showing the normal looking braze.

Brazing okay on this leg.

Gaps in brazing on this leg.

I am thankful that I discovered this now, and thankful for my rigorous test riding standards. And, fortunately, steel does a good job of warning the rider of a potential failure. It’s another reminder of how important it is to not blow off any odd or unusual feel that your bike gives you. Be careful out there!

Totally Tubular

Posted on May 17, 2015 by Nola Wilken

After reading up on how to mount tubular tires, I can’t imagine why tubulars are no longer popular. There are really only about 10,000 steps involved in the process, which can span several decades if done properly. And, tubular tires are lighter and more svelte, and ride better with lower rolling resistance than clinchers, yes?

So, when it came time to put new tubular tires on the French Mystery Mixte I am restoring, I was glad to finally have the chance to immerse myself in the tubular experience. Kind of like surfing the waves…on a bicycle. It also helps that marijuana is now legal in Oregon.

First of all, I needed to find some MUCH wider tubulars than the skinny 20 mm racing tires, shown above, which came mounted to these very nice vintage Clement rims. After a few years of searching, (Time is not linear, when dealing with tubular tires, nor is it to be regarded in any way. Get over it.) I came across these 30 mm Challenge Strada Bianca tubulars, which really looked perfect.

Once they arrived I was suitably impressed, and offered my prayers to the tire goddesses. Offering prayers is one of the 10,000 steps involved, and it’s kind of like the 1st step of a 12 step program–you can’t miss it and expect to move forward in the process.

Now we move on to the steps involving the tires themselves, not to be confused with the steps involved in preparing the rims. Since the tires are round, it makes sense to mount them to a nice round tubular rim, and stretch the hell out of them by inflating them up to 180 psi. It is helpful, but not required, to have some extra tubular rims around for this very step. Sadly, I had donated my only set (Nisi rims which I had removed from one of my project bikes) to the Community Cycling Center last year. (No good deed goes unpunished.) So, I mounted them to the very rims upon which I needed to complete the other few thousand steps (Glue sniffing high coming up…in a few decades), inflated them to 60 psi for a few thousand hours , then to 120 psi, for a few more thousand hours (180 psi to be disregarded). Then, to properly age them, I threw them under the dank crawl space in my basement, in accordance with this helpful advice from BikeSnobNYC.

After a few years had passed, I started to work on the hubs (oops, I forgot to rebuild them BEFORE I started this process, but because Time is not relevant here, it ended up not really mattering).

If one can have an out of body experience while rebuilding hubs, I can attest to the experience with these amazing Fratelli Brivio (F.B.) hubs. These are the most beautiful and well machined hubs I have ever seen.

F.B. hub cones and axle – 53 code on cone face – zoom in to see

I did not polish these hubs. I simply cleaned them with a degreaser and then was blinded by by shiny finish. The “53” code on the cones is, I suspect, a date code, and that would correspond with the other components on the bike. I’ll keep it in the back of my mind for now. I rebuilt the hubs in the quickest Time ever. I now see the logic of this. The nice hubs make up for the Time warp involved in properly gluing and mounting the tubular tires.

After rebuilding the hubs and truing the rims, it came Time to contemplate what to do about the glue residue remaining after I had pushed the old tubulars off the rims. After reading too many articles to list here, I determined that: 1) old glue doesn’t matter all that much so don’t worry about it, and 2) old glue is really scary and will cause the newly glued tires not to adhere evenly to the rims, so lose sleep over it. Then, I read this guidance from Jim Langley and decided that I would sort of remove some of the old glue on the rims as follows: I took the plastic handle of one of my brass brushes and spun the wheel in the truing stand while applying pressure with the handle to the rim edges to remove any blobs adhering to the most critical surfaces. I then took a cone wrench and applied the curved surface to the inner part of the rim, and smoothed out the remaining glue there. I had also dug out the glue that was imbedded in the spoke holes, which was necessary in order to true up the rims. And I had to remove a bit of remaining tape that had molecularly bonded with the remaining glue, and came off in small, sticky strings (string theory?) which took quite a bit of Time.

Then, I cleaned everything with alcohol and a clean microfiber cloth. Whew!

Day 10,453: Aaahhh. It is now Time to apply glue to the rims and to the inside of the tubular tires. Before beginning, it was necessary to have my shop vacuumed and sterilized by an industrial cleaning company, so that not one speck of dirt or dust could make its way onto the rim or tire surfaces during this surgically precise procedure. As you can guess, that process took quite a bit of Time, and may have never actually happened (in the alternate tubular universe).

I decided to use Panaracer glue, for no particular reason. I read the instructions indicated on the glue tube (prior to sniffing the glue), so I felt really well informed about how to use the product. Then, I ignored the instructions completely. The final process of applying glue to the rims and the inside of the tubular tires is a real leap of faith. I applied beads of glue to the rims, skipping over the spoke holes, about 4 sections at at time. I took an old, but once nice paint brush and smoothed the glue out over to the rim edge, which is the most important place for the glue to end up. I opened all the doors and windows in my shop area, but even so, I found that it was best to simply stop breathing, for about an hour, as I was painting the glue onto the rims. Then, not in accordance with the instructions, I painted the glue to the interior of the tubular tire, after having cleaned the surface with some alcohol.

Then, Time was finally of the essence. I needed to mounted the gluey tire to the gluey rim, and true it up so that the tire was properly mounted with no high or wobbly spots. Because the glue had become very tacky at this point, and because my brain was possibly oxygen starved (or on a glue high), I had a bit of trouble getting the tire to true up on the rim, even though I had practiced this maneuver as a “dry run” a few Times before. While I changed my Latex gloves several Times during this process, I ended up using a rag to move the tire around over the rim. But, finally I mounted it reasonably well and checked the tire on my truing stand.

I had to take some Time off before tackling the other rim and tire, and I am feeling better. Now the that the glue has hardened, I can’t wait to corner at really high speeds to see if the tires will roll off and kill me.

Before that happens, here are some of the very helpful resources I consulting during this process:

And, of course: BikeSnobNYC

1980 Meral 650b Evolution

Posted on May 9, 2015 by Nola Wilken

1980 Meral 650b conversion – before

1980 Meral 650b Conversion – different fenders and racks – and showing a little wear

Two years ago, I built up this lovely Reynolds 531 1980 Meral sport touring frame, and converted it to 650b (it was originally built for 700c wheels with minimal clearances). I used a combination of new and vintage components. My initial build had some issues, primarily involving fork shimmy as well as the Panaracer Col de la Vie tires feeling ponderous and slow. That problem was easily solved with the amazing Compass Loup Loup Pass tires.

With that issue resolved, I began riding the bike a lot more and using it as my primary commuter and weekend rider. But then, it was a dark and rainy night when…I was climbing a steep hill, approaching a light, suddenly a pedestrian walked in front of me, and I had to swerve while driving the pedal down. That caught my shoe up in the fender stay bolts of the pretty hammered fenders I had installed, and I nearly crashed. While I knew about the toe overlap issue with this build, and had adjusted to it, more or less, this was one of those situations when toe overlap became unacceptable.

As I was thinking about changing out the fenders, I felt it was the perfect time to consider replacing the heavy and not so attractive Ticino rear rack. While rummaging through my parts bins, I came across some rusted old F. Fiol front and rear racks, which I had removed from an early 60’s rando bike. They are made from stainless steel tubing, which I discovered once I started cleaning the rust off with a brass brush and some cleaning oil.

I didn’t want to give up the beautiful hammered fenders, but finally concluded that I had to do something different. I probably needed narrower fenders, which didn’t use a stay mounting system with large bolts sticking out.

Then I remembered the simple but sturdy aluminum fenders I had used on my old Centurion Pro Tour. I dug them out, and realized that their stays were flush mounted to the interior of the fenders (just what I needed), and that they were a bit narrower, albeit with much less bling, being of a very understated design. Amazingly, they still looked great, even after about 40,000 miles of use. So, I embarked on a whole new fender/rack installation.

The racks mount to the fenders, and are made from very small diameter steel tubing. Even so, they are much stronger than expected and I have had no qualms about hauling groceries and commuting gear on these racks. Admittedly, I will not try to haul really heavy items, but I actually think I could even carry minimal camping gear, and certainly enough gear for credit card touring with these racks.

F. Fiol rear rack

F. Fiol front rack

Once that was done, I decided to tackle the other issue that had been bothering me about the build – the constant trimming needed on the front derailleur (a Shimano Ultegra designed for a double crankset). I realized that I had a NOS Simplex Super LJ front derailleur in my inventory, and kind of wondered why I didn’t think of using it before…but, once installed it worked perfectly with the T.A. triple crankset. It requires a bit more robust up-shifting, but there is now no trimming needed, and I was able to reinstall the original 8 speed cassette I wanted to use (replacing the lower geared 7 speed cassette I ended up using with the Ultegra).

During this time, I also decided to stop using clipless pedals on all my bikes. Because a lot of my riding is commuting, the constant clipping in and out at stop lights and intersections caused some chronic pain and swelling in my “clip out” foot. So, what was old is new again. I have always loved toe clips, and even though I have used clipless pedals for about 15 years, it felt great to go back to my roots, and that resolved the issue with my swollen ankle. I had originally chosen these beautiful Lyotard pedals to use on the bike, so it was nice to put them back on, and you’ll see I’m using Velo-Orange leather straps – very well designed because the extra material below the clamp helps to keep everything aligned, making it very easy to slip my shoe in and out of the clip.

Lyotard pedals, Velo Orange leather straps.

I am very happy with the rest of the build:

Cardiff leather saddle – very comfortable, and showing no wear at all.

Velo Orange front pads – I replaced the Kool Stop brake pads with these to get some better toe-in – and they work great.

Reynolds 531 frame is very responsive.

Yes, battery powered lights, for now.

A nice clean bottom bracket, thanks to my Velo Orange mud flap

It was easy to transfer the mudflap to the new (old) fenders.

A delightful bike – comfortable, handles well, eats up miles – and no toe overlap. See you out there!

Restoring Vintage Bicycles from the Hand Built Era

Portland, Oregon, USA

Monthly Archives: May 2015

Forked Up

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Totally Tubular

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1980 Meral 650b Evolution

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