SeaWolf97

I normally ride Rando bikes, but found this beautiful Guerciotti yesterday , had to have it.

No model name/number to be found , except below seat post it is stamped "tourist286"

Campy Chorus - "Carbon BB-System" brifters
Veloce 9 speed derailleur

BB says "133313 below it's a 3 (then looks like degree symbol) 60x59

nice candy apple red anodized with polished alum lugs

zazenzach

is it carbon?

never seen a gueracotti with lugs or dropouts like that. pretty interesting.

Bianchigirll 

I doubt it is 16 lbs. The frame is Aluminum and dates to around '87/88 and I believe is a rebranded Alan frame/fork. I am not sutre what the model is but I belive the Campagnolo Triomphe cranks and calipers are likely original. I think this frame model was called Sprint so I would called a Sprint Triomphe.

Assuming the Ergo shifers and whaterve wheel setup they on it works OK I would not go more than $350-400ish. A 60cm frame like that will be somewhat noodly and really should not have a 8+ speed wheel shoved in the rear dropouts.

Chombi

It's a "screwed and glued" aluminum frame made by Alan for Guerciotti in the 80's. It's a pretty good bike, as far as early bonded Aluminum frames came, back in the 80's, its general reliability thoroughly proven IMO, by the fact that Alan cyclocross frames made with the same screwed and glued frame building tech, were very popular and successful back then.
They do have a known weakness though, the earlier frames that Alan built had a wreath-like pantographs pressed on to the front of their aluminum head lugs. On some bikes these lugs tended to crack vertically, right throught the middle of the wreath pantographs. I suspect that the application of the pantographing introduced a weak spot on the lug that could eventually crack after some miles. Alan eliminated the wreath pantographs on their later frames, and the problem seemed to have been mostly eliminated. Other things to watch out for, is damage on the aluminum cable guides and stops on the frame. Sometimes the get crushed or cracked from impact or stress from cables bouncing or getting yanked around as the bike is ridden as the aluminum is quite soft, so careful cable and housing management is important with these bikes...The quality of ride and handling on these are quite subjective from one rider to another. Some love the bit of extra flexibility that these frames have compared to steel frames (especially in bigger frame sizes) and some find it a negative.... I suggest that you test ride one before getting one for yourself to find out if it will match up to your riding style......
I own a 56cm Alan Carbonio Record which is pretty much the CF version of this bike, and it's the best handling bike I have ever ridden so far, and it is also the stiffest of all my C&V CF bikes....
BTW, 16 pounds is certainly doable with these frames, as long as the right "weight weenie" components and parts are used. But I agree with Bianchigirl that with the particular components mounted on this bike, it's doubtful that this It's a 16 pound bike. Most likely more like 18/19ish pounds minimum.... especially with those brifters on it.....

SeaWolf97

thanx much for the informed answers


>>Campagnolo Triomphe cranks and calipers are likely original

no Triomphe markings , but I dunno if they did that.
the double is 52/42

>> Alan built had a wreath-like pantographs pressed on to the front of their aluminum head lugs

no wreaths

everything including seat post is marked Campagnolo , I believe all is original ,,,except saddle and mismatched Weinmann schraeder rear wheel.

I put a board across the scale and balanced the bike, subtracted the board weight and came up with exactly 20 pounds with pedals , bottle cage and leather saddle.

have already purchased it , it's a little big (what is the "59x60" ?) ..my Rando bikes are 59's and I'd always thought my next would be a 57

IF I decide to restore & ride , what would the correct cassette be ?

Chombi

Those components do look like they are Campy Triomphe, as Bianchigirl mentioned. They did not put any marks on them that said so.
That's good news about the absence of the suspect wreath panto graphing. Not a 100% guarantee against any head lug cracking problems, as any bike can have a defect in that area, but I think there's a lot less chance of it ever happening on this bike.
Correct cassette as in brand?......or number of speeds and cog tooth counts??
What brand/model hubset was used on the wheels. Did you measure the rear spacing on the frameset? 126 or 130mm??

SeaWolf97

she was right ...I looked up SPRINT and found other nearly identical ones.

58cm Guerciotti Sprint Road Bike Campagnolo Mavic SSC Starfish | eBay

the front, which MAY be original is a Mavic and hub, QR ..etc are all Campy.

are you thinking the brifters are NOT original ? All SPRINTs had downtube shifters ?

If I'm going to turn this into a rider (don't think it's high enuff value to restore)
then I won't really be concerned about brand/model on rear wheel. (currently a
Weinman with Schrader valve


number of speeds and cog tooth counts?? yes, rear derailleur is Veloce 9 speed
and crankset is a double - 52/42
spacing seems to be 130mm (I roughly measured at 133)

I'm a laid back , 65 y.o. rider (VietNam Vet), who is comfortable on a STI 21 speed Randoneering steel bike presently. I cruise about 13mph with bursts to 18, and only moderate hill climbing. Expedition rack and 3 panniers , so I must be running approx 40+ pounds , loaded.

Got the Guerciotti reasonably enough that I don't mind putting a little more into it, but if bill would be too much, then it may go to CL.

billnuke1 

My Guerciotti.

Chombi

Yes, I think they were as these bike were produced when downtube shifters were still pretty much the standard on race bikes.
There should be shift lever lugs underneath those cable stops for the brifters on the downtube if you want to revert it back to downtube shifters....which I think you shouldn't if you want the the "laid back" riding quality that you prefer on your bikes.
The Weinmann rimmed rear wheel sound to be a replacement maybe to provide more gear inches with its bigger cogs for an easier ride. It would be good to find either a new wheelset, as the present rear wheel is so mismatched to the front. or something that matches the front wheel
BTW, make sure you measure the rear spacing with the rear wheel off the bike, as the previous owner(s) might have just squeezed in a 130mm wide rear wheel, which most consider is not always a good idea to do with an aluminum bike.....

zukahn1 

Based on your description of components and what I see I looks like there has been a lot of stuff mixed matched somewhat hap hazrad way exspecially for Campy stuff I would be surprised if it all works together.

howsteepisit

There appears to be a crack in the st/ht lug between the R and the C

Chombi

Oi! Good eye!,...I did not see that!..... It does look like a vertical crack. Not good.....
You'd think Alan would have learned that pantographing the aluminum head lugs is not the best idea....especially as there's so many letters in "Guerciotti" and they placed them so close together.... Specialized, Centurion, TVT, Giant and Trek bonded bikes from the mid to late 80's had similar aluminum head lugs and I haven't heard of the same problem with them, so it must definitely be the pantographing on the Alan head lugs that is mostly causing these cracks....
Uhmmmm....Any chance you can still return this bike to the seller for non disclosure of the crack?

SeaWolf97

damn , you guys are right. I didn't see that either had to run my fingernail across it to verify.

crack looks fairly old and not like it's spread recently ... not sure where to go from here , returning is out, it was a garage sale find. I don't really want to part it out.

maybe just find a cheap rear wheel , ride the bike and see how it all is ...hadn't even ridden it yet

Chombi

It does look like an old crack...... but in good conscience, I cannot recommend riding this bike, unless that lug is either repalced or fixed in some way.
But if you do decide to do so, just be careful and make sure you check it regularly to see if it is getting any bigger after some miles.
Some had tried out repairs on Alan head lugs before, like aluminum welding, but it will require a good, knowledgeable/experienced welder that can do the proper weld and also control the possibly damaging heat that might get to the glue bonds for the frame tubes going into the lug. There's also the question on whether these lugs were heat treated in some way. Welding might affect that treatment and a way to restore it should be considered.
Do a search on the forum and a few possible fixes should come up.......
Good luck, and keep us posted.

Bianchigirll 

A little JB Weld and she'll be good as new!!



otherwise you have a nice 'kit' for a project. Any interest a welded trek?

howsteepisit

My guess is that crack is caused by the stresses induced when the HS was installed, press fits on aluminum doesn't seem like a good idea to me. That crack will spread as the bike is ridden, due to the shock waves from road surfaces. As to the age the reason it looks the way it does is from road grime, and determining the age by looking at a photo is a fools errand. Note that it did not crack through the pantographing.

I don't know what I would do, but I'd probably ride it and watch like a hawk to see if its expanding, which it will. After a while, you will get tired of stopping every mile to look at the damn thing and retire the frame to a nice wall hanging.

Chombi

It is interesting to note that this is one area where Vitus frames really shines better than Alans. I never saw the same cracking problems with Vitus one piece headstocks. Also never see any pantographing on them. Pantographing whether pressed on or cut in that area could either introduce stress risers or microcracking in the aluminum, especially bad if done close to the edge as in this case. It's just not a logical place to have it.

SeaWolf97

I don't know anything about the stuff ... Is this a viable solution or a joke ?
the crack is hairline , don't think you could get anything into it.

the derailleur is a 9 speed , the brifters are not marked ... is there a way to tell if they are compatible
other than counting clicks in each direction ?

yes, I'm starting to recognize there are a bunch of mismatched components. Is it worth the effort since
I'm currently happy with the 2 (of 4) bikes I have ?

After weighing this one in at 20 pounds , got to wondering what the everyday riders weigh ... with racks/bags/tools/spare tube/U lock&cable lock etc etc ... one is 37 pounds, the other 42.

Chombi

JB weld is just epoxy resin, with aluminum powder mixed into it to make it look like aluminum when it cures.....
JB Weld does not really work well to fix things like this. It works best as a material to plug holes on "non- stressed" aluminum items (like motorcycle engine aluminum side covers or oil pans). Holes that do not involved the high tensile stresses as would be present in a crack like the one on your Guerciotti's head lug. Only way to fix it would be either to replace the lug with a new one or weld the crack with a full penetration aluminum weld, both methods that require the services of one with the experience and expertise to do so......certainly not a DIY project for most of us.
Alan used to provide frame repair services that includes replacement of cracked lugs, but I heard that they stopped doing so some years ago (I'm not even sure that Alan still exists as the same company out there).

SeaWolf97

I counted clicks on the Ergo shifters and they do seem to be 9 speed , so is the
Veloce 9 rear , so I'm going to have to locate a 700c with 9 speed cassette before
even giving it a try .... or risk running the chain off the current 7 .

How can I check the chain to see if it's 9 speed also ?

Chombi

Two things to check before you go further with the chain and wheelset....
Make sure you check the width of the rear triangle without the rear wheel on the bike, just to make sure the previous owner did not squeeze in too wide a rear wheel with the 9 speed freewheel, that could stress the rear triangle. Steel frames can take this type of stress but not aluminum which could eventually crack from the stress. If the spacing is indeed 130mm, without a wheel on the bike, then you might be generally OK as either the frame left the factory that wide, or the previous owner we able to cold set it to 130mm. Known to have been done before on aluminum frames, but is never a recommended thing to do. As for chain width, personally I never had a bike that had more than 7 speeds/126mm rear triangle width. but the 7 speed drivetrains sis require a "narrow" chain. so, I have period narrow chains made by Sedis/Sachs on my 7 speed bikes. I'm not sure if they got any narrower, but I suspect there's just either standard or narrow spec chains. and if your bike has a narrower chain than what was typically used on 6 or 5 speed drivetrains, you most likely have a chain that would work with a 9 speed freewhee; or cassette. Otherwise, if in doubt, 9-11 speed chains are not that expensive if you have to buy one.....

nesteel 

Strip the bike down, take it somewhere that does NDT crack detection (or buy the kit to do it yourself, if you're so inclined) and pinpoint the end of the crack as it currently sits. Drill a small hole at that location to "stop" the crack from spreading any further. The chances of the crack "jumping" that hole are very slim at best. Of course, you lose a bit of originality by putting a hole in the head lug, but it is a solution to keep the crack from possibly spreading.