Picked up an old Triumph from Craigslist. The seller said he took it to a local bike shop and they said it was not safe and that he shouldn't fix it up. The top part of the lug in the picture is separated from the tube. A welder friend of mine said it's not a big deal, and that the weld itself is in fact underneath the tube - we looked and sure enough, there's the bead of welded material!

Any opinions from the knowledgeable bike folks out there? Is a slightly bent lug a cause for worry?

thanks, ya'll.

Braze doesn't magically disappear, so if this bike was used for a number of years - safely - there's no reason you couldn't safely ride it now. If it was never brazed decently in the first place it would have broken by now.

Used for the type of riding it was built for, it probably has a few years left in it.

you bought a frame that someone else was afraid to ride?

I bought it for the other parts on it - chain rings, cranks, stem, handlebars, brakes, etc. All of those components are in good shape. Plus i got 4 wheels (of varying quality). total cost? 20 bucks. I originally assumed i would not use the frame or use it to experiment with (i'm learning as i go). But, if it's safe, then i might as well put it to some good use.

probably fine. If there is no movement, and no cracked paint, it's not going to fall apart. It's not bent like it was in a front end collision, is it?

i'll have to look more closely, but i don't think it's bent. there are parts where paint is scraped up, but no cracks from what I recall. I will look again tomorrow.

thanks!

That's not a weld; you have steel joined with brass, which is called brazing, which is a kind of soldering. Welding is where you use the same kind of metal to join the pieces.

BTW, your pic is useless; you'd need to get it in focus for us to be able to tell anything from it.

it was taken quickly with an iphone.

see the shadow underneath the lug in the upper center? that's how much it is separated from the top tube. the brazing underneath that intersection of tubes is intact.

It looks like a void area that wasn't fully penetrated by the brass. It looks a little ugly, but probably isn't a structural problem.

I'd brush off the loose rust, drip a little OA or vinegar on it to clean it up, dry thoroughly, and brush some linseed oil in there to help prevent further rust.

John, thanks. and awesome avatar! is that a real patch?? if so, where can i get one?

If it is, I'm in trouble, the headtube lug on my old Raleigh looks much worse that that. It's sloppy framebuilding practice, but only really for appearances sake, there's still a fair amount of brass inside the lug to hold it all together.

Edit
Didn't see John's post, sorry, he beat me to it

Yeah, I don't see anything wrong with the join (as far as I'm able to see, that is). But I'd be suspicious of the separation. As in crashed...

The VCAC is one of the oldest cycling clubs in the world, having celebrated its 120th anniversary in 2008. Patches, jerseys, etc. are available to members.

If that had been caused by a crash, the paint would have cracked off in the area where the metal had actually yielded. As far as I can see, it's not done that on your bike, so I'd say that a crash didn't bend the lug.

given all the comments above, i took it to my local shop. sure enough, the bent lug on its own would not be a big deal. However, there was much evidence of a significant frontal collision, including a bent fork and bulges on the tubes - stuff that my untrained eye could not really catch. So, the frame is bust! but i got a lot of other cool vintage components out of the deal.

Thanks, everyone.