Saturday, July 11, 2009

More Condor

Campagnolo Gran Sport rear hub

In response to Oli's question in the comments on the last posting:

When the Condor frame arrived on Tuesday, I had collected most of the parts I thought I would need, and even built up a nifty pair of suitable tubular wheels.
Some of them have worked out, and some others caused me a bit of grief in the attempt to get the bike rideable for the SOLO bunch ride on Friday morning.

First up, the frame needed some love before any parts went on.
At some time the BB threads have been stripped, and rebuilt with bronze, so I ran the Campag taps through, and faced the shell.
The headtube had never been reamed, and is splayed from having oversized headset cups pressed in, so I reamed and faced with the Campag tool, skimming a couple of millimetres off the overall length to accomodate the still-low stack height of the Campagnolo Gran Sport headset.
The forkblades were bent to the right. I did a fair job of straightening them, using my Hague fork jig as a reference, but I may yet ask Oli Brooke-White to get them perfect on his world famous VAR fork straightening jig.

The drivetrain went through a few iterations.
The Campagnolo Record derailler that I wanted to use didn't have the capacity for the 52/42 rings and 14-26 freewheel, so I swapped it for a 1970 Nuovo Record, which turned out to be too worn to use.
Third time lucky, I degreased an '81 Nuovo Record as an interim solution.
Eventually, I'll get the drivetrain configured to work with the Record derailler.

The Campagnolo crankset, bottom bracket and pedals are all temporary.
I have a set of Campag 'con denti'* track pedals in need of a home, and a lead on a set of TA Professional* cranks.

Where I can, I use Suntour Ultra-6 freewheels on bikes with 120mm dropout spacing, but on the Condor the chain catches on the seatstay when shifting from the smallest sprocket. I dug up a nice looking Suntour Perfect 5 speed freewheel, but one of the sprockets was too worn, so I am using the largest 5 sprockets on an Ultra-6 14-24 until I can get an IRD 5 speed 13-24 from the House of Dogboy.

Most of my English bikes have centrepull brakes, so I was planning to use a pair of Universal Super 68 sidepulls, until I found a set of unused Universal Extra calipers lurking in a box of Trademe acquisitions. These are the 'period correct' Universal sidepull, so the 68s can wait for another project.
The gold Universal brakelevers are undeniably a taste crime, but I want to milk the last mileage out of their perished and tattered gum hoods before I swap them for a pair in plain aluminium.

Headset________________Campagnolo Gran Sport
Bottom bracket__________Campagnolo Record
Crankset_______________Campagnolo Nuovo Record 172.5mm
Chainrings ______________Ofmega 42/52
Brakes_________________Universal Extra sidepulls
Brake levers____________Universal
Shift levers_____________Campagnolo Record braze-on
Front derailler___________Campagnolo Record 1st Generation with cable stop
Rear derailler____________Campagnolo Nuovo Record PAT. 81
Hubs__________________Campagnolo Gran Sport 32/40
Freewheel______________Suntour Winner Ultra 6 14-24
Rims__________________Fiamme Red label tubular
Saddle_________________Brooks Professional, butchered
Seatpost_______________Campagnolo Nuovo Record 27.0mm
Stem__________________Cinelli Mod.1 steel 13cm
Handlebars_____________Cinelli Perfection 42cm

*John Barron photo

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