mainstreetexile 

I saw a craigslist listing, no images, just a single line of text:

Vintage 1980 Charles Roberts custom racing frame with all Campagnolo components. Can be ridden , but probably more of a collectors piece.

I hadn't heard of Charles Roberts before but some web searches informed me that they were and are custom / semi-custom frame builders from England. They seem to be pretty rare because I couldn't find much information on them, and nothing on ebay or on craigslist to gauge an appropriate price for it. Intrigued, I emailed back and forth with the owner a couple times, found out was my size (58cm) and my girlfriend and I were on our way that afternoon to pick it up.

The bike was in amazingly good shape and after airing up the tires, I took it for a short test ride and immediately bought it. It has:
- full Reynolds 531 butted tubes, forks and stays
- full Nuovo Record group (derailleurs, crank, bottom bracket, headset, brake levers, brakes seatpost)
- Cinelli bars and stem
- Avocet Racing III saddle
- 700c Super Champion Gentleman rims laced to Record hubs

We talked to the owner for a while, who was a really nice guy. He used the bike for criterium racing in Hartford, CT in the early 80s and mainly rides his touring bikes now so he hadn't ridden the CR in a while and was ready to move it along to a new rider. He said he had ridden it hard but maintained it well and cleaned it after each ride. Based on its condition, I definitely believe him since it almost seems like a NOS bike. The pictures below are before I even cleaned it up at all. All I've done so far is re-grease the stem and seatpost and wipe off some of the congealed dust from the bottom bracket area and various frame nooks and crannies.

I doubt I'll change anything other than putting new tires on it (currently has 25s but it looks like there is a lot of clearance for wider tires, probably throw 28s on). I'll probably re-pack the hubs and bottom bracket, but maybe not until winter. The gearing is a little high for me with 44/52 chainrings and a 13-24 suntour freewheel. I'll probably change the freewheel, I have some 5 speed 14-28 shimanos but I think the nr might only handle 26.

Not sure of the year, can't find any serial numbers on the frame to confirm it's an 80 (anywhere in particular I should be looking?) but the NR components are dated 73. I'm still not sure how much the bike is worth, but this is one I definitely plan on keeping for a very long time. The NR components alone are probably worth more than what I paid. He also threw in some extra parts he had in storage, official Campagnolo grease, some white Campagnolo hoods, a honey pre-softened Brooks Professional. I am one happy dude.

Pompiere

That is a great find. Like you said, it is hard to gauge the price, but if you are happy, then that is all that matters. Getting to meet the original owner and learn some of the history is a bonus.

oldmuthariley

Lovely! here's a link https://www.robertscycles.com/
give them a call / mail and they can tell you all you need to know

Oldpeddaller

The year is about right - Chas Roberts handbuilt 531 frame with over BB gear cable routing - superb! NR gruppo and in tip top condition - what a brilliant bike! Don't worry that the date code on the NR parts are different to the frame year, by then Chas Roberts only built custom frames and most people would build them up with parts from their existing bikes - so it's all authentic. I'd put the other saddle on and ride that beauty as she is!

unworthy1

The "shorty" Campy DOs are a strong clue that it's post-'78, despite the other "earlier" clues like over BB cable routing, nutted brakes and clamp-on FD and shifters.
I'd be a happy dude to score that bike, too!

ozneddy

I know it would get dirty but---- WHITE BAR Tape !

LeicaLad 

Fabulous bike. Lucky, indeed. Keep and ride.

Congrats!

TheOtherGuy

Beautiful bike! I'd guess a couple years earlier than '80, but some builders were a little slow to jump on modern trends (and some didn't believe in all the braze-ons), so '80 may be right on.

mainstreetexile 

Thanks everybody! Great tips on helping to pinpoint the age of the frame with the dropouts, cable routing etc.

Another reason I thought it might have been earlier is the Reynolds decal. Based on the CR reynolds page, they have this as an earlier version from the 60s-70s, it looks like they changed over to a diagonal version with the extra text in a gold area at the bottom of the sticker:

https://www.classicrendezvous.com/Bri...ds_gallery.htm

I'm sure that's not a very reliable indicator though either, since they could have just had some older Reynolds decals around that they slapped on.

I also found that the senior Charles Roberts died in 1979 and his son Chas took over, so I was just curious which era of Roberts this was. Most of the Chas ones I've seen have had a small "Chas Roberts" decal on the top tube near the head tube.

Good eye on spotting those dropouts! I didn't even realize the dropouts were the shortys, they measure 25mm. When I was measuring them, I noticed that they have the raised flat spots on the inside for the portcatena screws but they are flat/filled in/painted over. A little more digging shows that "The Portacatena was introduced at the '77 Milan show, and made it's first catalog appearance in 1979," so that would definitely put it post-77 and likely confirm it as a 79-80. Exciting stuff!

due ruote 

+1 Anyway there's only one thing better than dirty white bar tape: dirty, frayed white bar tape.

Super bike, I love its understated elegance. Great color too.

MileHighMark

Very nice.

It's begging for some white bar tape (maybe some Bike Ribbon).