A Better Climbing Gear!

I've been hoping to find myself some better climbing cogs for the Colnago. With the rear end having 126 spacing, and the hub being a 126, I am pretty much limited to 6 or 7 speed. The Super Record derailleur also limits me to roughly a 26-28 tooth big cog.

After searching the 'bay for quite a while, I decided to call my buddy Charlie. Turns out he had several NOS freewheels in his stocks. Several Regina's and an NOS Suntour 14-26. The gearing and the price was right on the Suntour, so while its not Italian made, it had all the other right factors - including price!

I have not ridden it yet, but it seems to operate pretty well.

Drillium!

I've always loved the look of drilled vintage components. The weight savings realized by doing it is trivial, however, the class that it adds to a good looking component is immense.

I think a Drillium project might be in my near future.....

Photo credit to 'Drillium Revival'.

177 Miles On A Vintage Bike

This past weekend was the annual Rock N Roll MS150 bicycle ride. The event goes from the Memphis, TN area to the Tunica MS casinos via a nice winding route. This was my 10th year participating in the event, and I've been lucky to be part of the ride committee for the past two years (not much participation on that team this year though).

My company sponsors our team, and even pays for jerseys for us to ride in. Pretty sweet deal! I also enjoy getting out and just riding for a whole weekend. Not training, Not racing, just riding.

So the weather for the weekend could not have been better. The temperature was perfect, the clouds were just enough to keep us from getting burnt, and the wind was pretty nice to us most of the time.

For this year, I elected to ride the Colnago Super I built this summer. At the beginning of the ride, I got a lot of looks from folks on carbon bikes. Their eyes said 'what is he doing out here with that old thing?'. Later in the ride, I started getting all sorts of comments from folks who really appreciated seeing a well maintained vintage bike. Over and over again, I told the story of finding it and the build. People were amazed that I had no trouble keeping up on a bike that was older than them.

The best compliment came when I pulled up along one of the LBS shop owners. As I rode up, he eyed the bike for a few hundred yards and said 'now that is a bike with class and character'. That made me feel real good.

One other fun detail of the weekend was day 1. On day one, they had an option for riding a century. I've never ridden a century in all my years riding (20+). Countless metric centuries, but never a regular Century. The weather was so good, I just had to go do it. I finished with a comfortable (not fast) time and headed to the banquet hall for some good food.

Day 2 was just as nice, but we only had a 75 mile option.

In the end, I rode 177 miles in two days. Definitely a personal record and one I'd like to duplicate next year.

Great Riding Bike!!!

Well, last week, I took the Colnago to my usual group ride out in Collierville. The usual suspects were there and they were ready to roll out hard. This group has been steadily getting up to about 20 to 21 mph and that pace is pretty hard for me....

The new bike definitely attracted attention. People were pretty impressed with its condition, and also with the fact I was going to ride it on the group ride.

We took off and I had no issues keeping up. My buddy Paul had warned me (from on board his Cervelo) that the downtube shifters would be an issue. They weren't. Frankly, I never once had an issue with shifting. I got 'the feel' of it quickly and had no issues whatsoever.

In the end, the thing that caused me the most trouble was the single bottle cage and its location. Its much lower than my other ride, so while reaching for my bottle, I managed to drop a bottle a mile from the finish and that kept me from finishing with the group.

Who says vintage bikes can't keep up with modern equipment!!!

Colnago Saronni completed!

I finished up the ride this weekend. I finally received the NOS 3ttt handlebars and promptly installed them. Of course mating the 3ttt stem to the bars of the same vintage meant that it all went together really well. I elected for modern Deda bar wrap instead of going with something like Benotto cellotape, but I'm glad I did as its pretty comfortable.

Setting up the brakes did not take much work as they were pretty much ready to go, and setting up the levers went well as well.

I'm a lifelong weight weenie, so I had to put it on the scale. Complete weight, ready to ride is 20.5lbs exactly. Not at all bad for a piece of vintage iron! And this is significantly lighter than any of the downtube shifter bikes I rode back in the day.

As soon as the bike was finished, a friend stopped by and we went out for a ride. The ride was initially cut short as I had not tightened the rear quick release enough and the wheel shifted on a short climb while under power. 1/2 mile later, the drive side BB cup started backing out, so we headed back to the shop to re-tighten that and locktite the cup in place. I knew better and should have done that during the initial build...

After correcting those minor problems we took off again on a quick 30 mile ride. The ride is everything I expected. Stiffer than the bikes that I rode when I was younger, but still much more comfort than the alu and carbon bikes I've ridden for the past 10 years. It climbs well and the gearing is fine for our local roads. I purposely made the cockpit 1cm shorter than my modern bike and that is plenty comfortable.

This is my first Campag equipped bike and I really do love it. Everything is so solid and smooth. I've not ridden a downtube shifter equipped bike since the mid-90's, but I adapted very quickly and had no problems with the shifts.

The only two negatives involve the brakes.... I expected the brakes would have very little power, and I definitely got what I expected. I'm going to order some modern blocks to fit the holders and keep enjoying it. The other issue is the hoods and non-aero levers. I'll get used to them, but the cable housings definitely throw me off....

No doubt, she's a keeper!

Colnago Saronni Super

Closer to done now.

This weekend, I finished all the component polishing and detailing. For every part, I've completely disassembled the part, cleaned it completely, polished it with mag polish and then rebuilt with appropriate grease.

The result is very nice. I strung up the bike and got the shifters working nicely. Everything shifts beautifully, and I really can't wait to ride it. All I lack now is a set of handlebars. I managed to snag a set of NOS 3TTT bars for the bike to go with the 3TTT stem I have already on the bike. With some white tape, I think it will look pretty good.

One other interesting detail is that this really is a replica bike. Colnago built this as a replica of Giuseppe Saronni's winning bike. He was a two time Giro winner, as well as winner of the World Championships.

A friend on RoadBikeReview.com sent me this link with pictures of Saronni's actual bike.....

http://i-vol.com/bikes/83_colnago_super-saronni/saronni_colnago_83.jpg