Unknown maker, need your expertise
 

Hey bike entousiasts,

I've been on a bike my whole life but never fixed one up.
so I thought, why not restore one in the cold months that are about to come here inthe Netherlands.
So I recently bought an old racebike for myself that I would like to restore to a singlespeed.
I bought it with the name recycle on it, but I'm pretty sure thats a name that was later given to the bike.
So now I'm curious what brand really made the bike.
It might even be Dutch, but I have a feeling its japaneese, looking at the parts.
I tried to look up the serial number but no luck.

If you need more pictures or you have more questions, just ask

Here some info
Serial Number EH 01256
Handle bar: Sakae Road Champion
Shifters: Shimano 600
Crankset: Sr Custom
Frame: Reynolds 531 butted frame tubes
Dropouts: Shimano
Chainring: Shimano

Thanks!!!!!

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I don't know what it is, but the rear dropout has a derailleur hanger, so it was made to have a derailleur; making it into a single speed would be the opposite of 'restoring' it. Which is fine, I'm not complaining about that. But the rear dropouts are very short, which means you can't move the wheel forward or backward to adjust chain tension; this is not going to make a very good single speed bike.

K for Koga-Miyata?
Nice 531 frame set, sorry to see it go single speed.

Maybe a Kuwahara? Defiently a nice midlevel Japanese frame from the mid 80's. As said the 531 sticker is probably wrong I would expect this bike to have a tange 1 or 2 tubset. As others have said not a good candidate for SS/FG connversion.

Yes, it had a shimano 600 derailleur.
Sorry, restore is a poor choice of words.
The dorpouts have very little room, but still some room.
Dont know if its enough to get the correct tension, we will just gave to see.

Thanks for your reply, I really appreciate it. And like I said "restoration" was a poor choice of words.
I want to make a single gear. Mainly because I like the slick look and I live in a country with no mountains.
Do you know somebody who has might know something about this frame?
I've been looking for days

If you are going to make it a single speed with those dropouts, you will almost definitely need a chain tensioner (like this). And that kind of ruins the slick look, IMO.

According to this thread, it's probably a Kawamura

scroll down....

That may be a pretty good bike you have there. I'd think that you could sell it outright and make enough to buy a nice ss already assembled.......you get what you want and a nice vintage bike remains intact; win-win!

Great, you are my hero!!

I bought it for 40 euro on an open marketplace for the whole country to see, and nobody was bidding for 3 weeks.
So the interest wasn't that huge. Sorry for the bicycle purists but I want to build the bike that I have in mind.

I think it's fine to build whatever bike you want. This frame isn't all that special. My point is that it's a much less than ideal frame to build as a single speed. As noted above, you can try to get a "magic gear" (which could give you an undesirable ratio) or you can use a chain tensioner (which is ugly). Otherwise it probably won't work well.

Most definitely a Nishiki, by the serial number and the "K" cutout (Kawamura?).

Serial number decode: E = European market, H=1978.

In the USA market the 1978 model with the "K" cutout was a Superbe. In Europe the model name was probably different.

I don't know about the Reynolds tubing. The Superbes in the USA do not have that decal.

I disagree strongly with this assessment. The existence of a cutout in the bottom bracket indicates a top-end racing bike. I don't know a single maker that did that on anything other than their finest bike. I suspect this is a high-end racing bike, and that crank is a horrible piece of garbage and should be removed as soon as possible and you should get something decent for this fine machine.

In my experience building many track bikes over the years, you likely do not need a "magic gear" or a chain tensioner to make this work - just a simple $5 "half-link" (also called an "offset link") that are available from Harris Cyclery among others. Keep It Simple, Sir.

That will only work until the chain stretches a bit. I guess you could just keep buying new chains.

This.

Kuwahara never punched a K in their bottom brackets... wonder if the 531 sticker was added after some repainting as Japanese bicycles of this era most often used Japanese tubing like Tange and Ishiwata.

In my experience, if the chain stretches enough to be a problem when using a "half link" then it is time for a new chain to avoid excess wear on the rear cog.