Originally Posted by
bikingshearer
I'd think pretty hard and then choose the '57 because because of the 1950s version of "racing geometry," so it has longer chain stays, longer wheelbase and slightly slacker angles than the shorter, more upright geometry of the 1970s. It would probably be a flatland-only bike; there is no way a Campy Gran Sport derailleurs and a Magistroni crank will give me the kind of gearing I need to get my carcass up the hills around here, but it would cool as hell for shortish rides to a coffee shop. If ithe Universal Extra brakes are the center-pulls that are similar t the later 61s, they would be okay. If they were the sidepulls (and therefore Univerrsal 51sm which will stop you in a week and a half), I would find a way to make Mafacs fit on it instead, which might be a challenge thanks to that weird Italian fixation of the period with short-reach front brakes and long-reach rear brakes.
I'll be interested to see why iab is asking.
This is where I'm at. I know the '50s British geometry for over-land racing or time trialing, with my Rudge. If the Italian style was similar, as photos of Iab's other prizes and discussions of racing the "White Roads" suggest, I'd want the 1957.
My Mondonicos pretty well represent the '70s and '80s prevailing geometries and I can make them work, but I also have a 1952 Rudge time trialling bike, and I'm busting to get it done because of my age - nearing 70 this year!
The following is hypothetical, but plausible. In the '50s and well-before, Velocio and other early French randonneurs set up their bikes with a rear sprocket or sprockets, and a forty-something big chainring paired with a 20-something bailout, perhaps depending on a suicide shifter in the front. (There are photos of these bikes). Since the French Alps are not more "tame" than the Italian, at least from my limited Midwestern perspective, I'd be really surprised if (the hypothetical part!) innovative Italian cyclists did not set up the "dentist bikes" of the day in a similar fashion. The great British time trialists of the day seemed to do the 900 miles using the gearings of the narrow-spread or medium spread 3 and 4 speed Sturmey-Archer hubs (or other multigear systems) of the day: the equivalent of AM or FM hubs, for example. If he had them, Hannibal would have geared down his Cinelli mounts to get his armies to Britain.