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vanhelmont

Not period correct, that is. The only thing that stands out is the Chorus cranks, but I wanted 175 mm, and vintage cranks in that size seem to be a little hard to get. I tried a Superbe Pro rd, but the parallelogram was a little loose,

so I ended up with the correct Nouvo Record, which shifts lousy forever.

I was trying to think of anything i did to the bike that worked the first time, and couldn't think of anything until I whipped the end of the tape with twine this evening.

The first time I painted it, I didn't use a proper primer and it came off if you even looked at it too hard. The repaint allowed me to thin the lugs a little more.

The fork is British, but I don't know anything about who made it. It has an appropriate Wagner crown and nice flamboyant blue paint.

A couple of appropriate parts are the Lapize strap (I only found one so far) that wasn't on my bike when it was stolen because I used the toe clips without straps in traffic, Christophe clips, and the Ideale saddle with micro adjusting clamp I got cheap on Ebay because it looked terrible. I wish I had taken a before picture, but the adjusting screw had never been touched and it was sort of sway backed. I gave it some mink oil, tightened the screw a little, moistened it and wrapped it with twine to reshape it, and it came out OK.

The only ride so far was to the grocery store, and everything seemed fine, except the brakes squeek. After I shellac the Tressostar tape so it stays white I'll try a longer ride.

Gtane

vanhelmont,

Even if it's not strictly period correct, it's certainly a striking machine. Very nice and clean lines too. Super work, and I really like the idea of the whipping.

Sorry to hear that you're having trouble with the shifting of the Nouvo Record. I've always had great success with Campagnolo friction changers. I hope it works out for you. If it helps, for mine I check that the parallelogram pivot points are well greased and that the spring is not tired (although that's pretty unusual). I also strip down and regrease the jockey wheels.

Thanks for posting.

Tim

vanhelmont

Thanks Tim.

Since it's pretty flat around here, on my test ride to the grocery store I actually didn't shift gears, but while setting it up everything seems to work as it should. The "shifts lousy forever" comment is in reference to the superior shifting of Suntour, and the superior reliability of Campy.

A while back Stephan quoted an article that "Campy NR would shift poorly forever."

Chas I think made a similar comment once, and I read in a book by Lemond that the reason the pros used Campy when Suntour shifted better was reliability (I don't suppose it could have had anything to do with sponsorship money?).

Superbe Pro is supposed to be pretty durable, but the one I decided not to use probably has a lot of km on it.

I meant to show my starting point for this project, a forkless frame with a badly dented top tube.

The moral of the story is be a little more patient, and try to find something more complete to start with. Unless you have more time and money than you know what to do with. That old frame takes longer and costs more to fix than you think!

Dave

verktyg

Frank Berto in his book "The Dancing Chain" said it all. He fell into disfavor with Campagnolo in the mid 70s when he published the results of his derailleur testing in "Bicycling" magazine. His results showed that a $7 Suntour V derailleur outperformed a $34 Campy Nuovo Record in every way.

The vanity issue was the real reason why Campy was so popular and Suntour didn't become acceptable for another 10 years. Who wanted a $7 RD on their $500+ pro bike when they could have a Campagnolo Nuovo Record RD with jewelry like cosmetics.

Campy stopped producing NR components by 1986 but there was so much of the stuff in the pipeline that you could still get a top quality bike with an NR gruppo up through 1988! So much for customer loyalty!

Campy first introduced a Nuovo Record style rear derailleur in 1951. The basic design changed very little during the entire life of the product family. The newer style Super Record derailleurs that came out ~ 1980 had some improvements but they never caught on and were still no match for the Japanese derailleurs.

I've said this before, a well lubed and adjusted plastic Simplex Prestige or Criterium derailleur will out shift a Campy NR on anything but a 13-18 corncob freewheel.

Campy NR RDs were designed for a maximum 26T rear cog and 53-42 chainrings. I've run some NRs on a 28T cog and even seen one working on a 30T sprocket but Simplex plastic derailleurs were designed for 30T sprockets with 52-36 chainrings.

In 1975 I got one of the first sets of Suntour Cyclone derailleurs to come on the market. I bought them for the weight weenie factor but found that they outperformed Campy by a longshot. I was still using the rear derailleur until it got sucked into my rear wheel about a year and a half ago. So much for Suntour reliability vs. Campy. Cool

Chas.

sandranian · Site Admin

Campagnolo is always better than Suntour.

Chas: Stop muddling the argument with facts.

Thank you.

verktyg

Gtane

Dave,

Thanks for the update and starting shot. That just makes the bike all the more impressive.

Suntour is definitely one of the unsung component manufacturers, and certainly for rear changers. I have a Cyclone II that I've owned for many years and it was always good to use, as well as being extremely light. A lovely piece of kit and not that expensive at the time. I hope to see it back on a bike again one day.

Tim