Old 10-30-22 | 04:54 PM
  #750  
Paintking
Senior Member
Titanium Club Membership
15 Anniversary
 
Joined: Jan 2011
Posts: 518
Likes: 476
From: Raleigh, NC
Originally Posted by fvernon
I'm currently restoring a 1977 Romic, and it's definitely in the current running for my 2023 Eroica bike...yours looks nice; is that the X-100 Road? I'll echo what others have said: big tires, plenty of gears. 2 water bottles would help. My 1977 Romic and 1979 Centurion Pro Tour can both take up to 35c tires, though I was perfectly fine on 28c this past spring.

Here's a sneak peak of one potential 2023 Eroica California ride: my '79 Centurion Pro Tour. I recently picked up a Deerhead/600EX FC-6206 triple crankset, and I'm seriously considering installing it to match the early XT Deerhead FD/RD combo. Plus, there's something odd about the Pro Tour geometry where it really wants very specific cadences to match its speeds, and doesn't handle gear gaps as well as other bikes out there, so I'm hoping that a triple paired with a tighter cassette will improve the overall ride characteristics. I love the 86bcd SR Apex as a wide-range double, so that'll head over to the Romic.

Nice Centurion fvernon. And looking forward to seeing your 1977 Romic someday. I'm not sure about the model number of my '87 Romic. I assume its an X100, but I haven't found anything on the bike that identifies it as such (maybe there's something in the serial number?). All I know is that its 531 Reynolds tubing, which Ray Gasiorowski is said to have used for the X100 bikes (Columbus as well), and that this bike was specifically built for a woman as a tri-bike.
As you probably know there's isn't a great deal of info about Ray and his bikes, just some good notes from his shop and a couple of local Houston newspaper articles. Here's 98% of what anyone knows about Romic, Romic - History of a Houston Bicycle Builder. I've never had access to look up my bike in those notes to see what's there. When this bike popped up on Facebook Market place, it was the first time I'd ever heard of Romic. When I bought it from the original owner I was a bit surprised to learn that she walked into a bike shop up north (Wisconsin or Illinois) and ordered it custom. She thought it had been made right there and had no idea that it came from Ray in Houston.
__________________
Paintking: too many bikes, but always room for another
Paintking is offline  
Reply