krakhaus 

The term "Rule of Thumb" doesn't mean that it's a solid rule, it basically means a generalization.
From Wikipedia: The English phrase rule of thumb refers to a principle with broad application that is not intended to be strictly accurate or reliable for every situation. It refers to an easily learned and easily applied procedure or standard, based on practical experience rather than theory.
And for everyone here beating on the OP for his rule of thumb, maybe make damn sure you don't have your own rule of thumb, regarding bicycle quality or what you find desirable about a bike, because I bet you do.

browngw 

I would love to dive deeper into this "wabbit-hole of woe" but I've got steel rims to polish and I have to find a better kickstand for my latest project.

cudak888 

Hint: Second bike in my previous post above it.

-Kurt

robertorolfo

The word hoarder is so misused these days, despite that TV show that might have shown some people what it really means. It's also generally an insult, or at the least has highly negative connotations. Maybe try "collector" or "hobbyist" in your strange little equation.

As for kickstands and safety levers, my Lotus Legend came with both (plus a 'dork disk') and it's a brilliant bike. Probably faster than most mortals can even make use of. I've since removed the levers (and put them on a different bike), but the kickstand remains. The bike still weighs just 21 lbs with the kickstand and otherwise "stock", and a kickstand is incredibly convenient in urban settings.

3alarmer 

...with the profile in that photo, your description of the color, the early Reynolds sticker, the three speed hub, and the stated time period, I would guess maybe one of the Lenton's from that time. Something similar was sold as a Rudge, but I can't see enough of the details in that photo to tell much more. Read the Lenton History here, which has a lot of pictures you can use for comparison. The first production models were from 1948, which is not too long after WW2 ended.

majmt 

JaccoW

Was it Squeezebox by any chance? He's the one person I have on my ignore list here.

Happy Feet

Yep.

iab 

In the which is better, a De Rosa or Somec thread, I relied, the blue one. Same answer here..

jackbombay

Some of those grades in the Alps are walking hills for sure, but sturmey equipped bikes are not to be discounted, and if one is stubborn enough they can cover a lot miles in the mountains,

205 miles on my Schwinn.

Do you still have his bike?

This is quite good!

chainwhip

Heh.
I thot so too.



This girl has her fashion accessories properly ordered.
(The smile adds an easy 50 points).
Ahem:

icemilkcoffee 

Quill stems lasted all the way to the late 90's. You could tell a early-mid 80's bike from a late 80's and beyond bike by the rear wheel- the earlier bike would have a freewheel and the latter bike would have a cassette.

daka

That is the same sticker that was on my father's bike. I did read Peter Kohler's article on the Lentons and while the color was encouraging he indicates that they were built with 71 deg. angles and the frame angles on my Dad's bike look slacker than that to me. My Dad was a confirmed cheapskate so it is possible that the bike he bought was used and may be older - even pre-war. Kohler mentions a Lenton (II) series but I don't think he has an article on that - the '49 bike is a Lenton (III) series. The '48 bike is a Super Sports and they were painted Orange so I don't think it would be that unless there were exception to the published catalog.

Do you still have his bike?

Unfortunately not. In 1965 my father bought me a brand-new Peugeot AO-8 which kept me off his bike. Later one of my younger brothers took an interest in it and installed a 3X Cyclo conversion and a Simplex on the Sturmey Archer hub making it a 9 speed. But he went off on a hitchhiking expedition across the country from which he didn't return for several years, leaving the bike in my Mother's garage. She moved a couple times in the intervening period and the bike never resurfaced.

79pmooney

One that did for me was a trashed sport Reynolds 501 Peugeot frame I picked up at an "as is" sale at a local coop. ("As is" - you buy it, it's yours. No refund. Also no test ride.) This particular frame was $20, hit by (probably) an SUV - dented top tube, trashed fork and chainstays about to break though I wouldn't discover that for a few weeks. Tape measure said good fit. Built it up with parts on hand and fix gear wheels I had.+ $105 for seatpost (French dia.), brake levers, 1/8" chainring, poorly brazed Bridgestone(?) fork. (Fork was just fine as long as you didn't look up the crown!)

First ride - fun! Most fun I'd had since my racing bike many years ago. In love by the end of that first quick spin. Now it did have two drawbacks that meant it wasn't a forever keeper. The damaged frame. I would not ride it in hills because 1) going uphill on fix gear is hard on the frame (of unknown previous damage) and 2) I did not want to be riding it downhill and have it fail. BTDT. So flat ground only. Also, it was a slinky. (What I call fix gears with very low bottom brackets. This might have been a 27" wheel bike. I was riding 23c 700s. With 170mm cranks and reasonably narrow LOOK copy pedals, I could strike on any corner I wanted, (And so early I wasn't banked far enough to be scary.)

Still, a ride I loved. Put 8000 miles on it and realized if I didn't do something I was going to be riding it to failure. So I did what I had to to do - replaced it with another fix gear; this one with a last forever - dream frame material, a nice high bottom bracket for the 175s my knees love, a super long dropout so I can run any 1/8" cog without messing with chain length. My avatar. It cost me 40X its inspiration. Another dream ride but one that opens doors. I can climb and descend anything on it. Well, not anything but it has gone up to and around Crater Lake by both entrances. Five hilly Cycle Oregons. Some long centuries. Gone down Dead Indian Memorial Highway into Ashland, Or on a 95" gear. (16 miles of ear to ear grin.) And inspired by a bike that cost me about a week and a half of grocery shopping.

Oh, those chainstays that were about to break? Right behind the support. Both cracked for a total of a full revolution. I used to build high quality fiberglass boats as a laminator. Also sailed. Always had good quality boatbuider epoxy resin on hand. Years ago someone gave me some early unidirectional carbon fiber. So I did a CF wrap of the BB and chainstays out past the support. The turns were too tight for that early, stiff, crude CF sample I had and it all started lifting as the epoxy cured. Oh no! Grabbed inner tubes and slit them into strips. Wrapped the mess tightly. Resin squeezed out the inner tube. Whole thing was a mess! Let it cure and came back the next day to assess the damage. Peeled off the inner tube. (Hurray! I had no idea whether the epoxy would bond to it.) And was blown away, The end result looked like a professional vacuum bag job. Just one place where the CF had lifted, Barely visible. Put the parts back on and rode it. Wow! Stiffest BB'd Peugeot ever. Simply a better ride and that was one place the bike was never going to break. (Still not a bike for the hills and it did nothing to improve pedal clearance.) In line with the rest of my expenses on this bike, that repair cost me maybe $5.

This frame checked some of the boxes but had several big X's. Rules - good most of the time.

Ben

SwimmerMike 

Hey @bppo8 I'm fairly new to The Forum also. I had 3 comments on this thread.
1) Anytime you can get 64 responses to a thread in a day means you've picked a topic everyone has an opinion on.
2) There are a bunch of great and knowledgable people on The Forum that are very passionate. I've learned a lot just by reading and when in trouble I asked questions and received some great feedback to solve the problems I was having.
3) Everybody has different goals and interests on what bikes to buy/keep/ride/collect. I'm working on my second bike and I almost bought another vintage bike that wouldn't have interested me when I was looking for my first vintage bike, it had way more issues than I would have wanted to take on at first, but I thought it would be great now (I would have definitely leaned on The Forum if I bought it). but also some advice from The Forum was stuck in the back of my mind when I looked at it: "You can do a lot to a bike, but the size is the size, you can't make a bike that doesn't fit fit you". Some want to restore to period correctness, some want to modernize a classic, some want a great ride, some like patina, some are into pre-war, etc. This is a great hobby where people enjoy thei areas they are interested in and come together to support the hobby and help those that are interested.

Enjoy the hobby/sport - Buy what you like and what floats your boat and enjoy!

Maybe I'll see you out on a ride. I ride the Palo Alto/Woodside/Menlo Park routes at least one a week.

Your neighbor to the south,

Mike

Murray Missile 

My guidelines for buying a "vintage" bike:

1 - Do I like it?
2 - Does it fit?
3 - Am I comfortable with the price?

Nothing daunting about that.

capt_velo

I'm more or less OK with this list. You forgot:

Chrome forks and stays are cool

RobbieTunes 

fify

RobbieTunes 

Exactly. It's a bike. Location Location Location

jackbombay

Bummer, at least you have a cool pic of your father with his bike!

Happy Feet

Here's that Gitane. Is it monetarily "valuable" to collect? No. Bike boom era, straight gauge Hi Ten, steel rims, stanped dropouts.
Was it worth buying and restoring? To me it was.

I'm still looking for the right wicker fishing creel to mount on a small discreet front rack. Must have a hole in the lid for a bottle of wine or baguette to poke out of.

capt_velo

But why was it worth restoring in the first place? How did you determine that the frame was worth your time and money?

cudak888 

No comment.

-Kurt

Happy Feet

For me, collecting (or better restoring) bikes is a hands on doing thing. I don't just only buy bikes to put on a shelf because they are considered "valuable". I look for something that inspires my artistic or mechanical mind.

I tend to look for neglected bikes because that allows me the greatest hands on restoring experience and some freedom to alter because they are destined for the junkpile anyway. But I also look to see if most of the components are there in fair shape so it doesn't cost a lot in basic parts, though I usually buy better saddles, tires and replace bearings, brake pads, cables etc...

In this case the bike was mostly all there, the graphics were mostly intact (major attraction to this bike in particular), and I had an immediate vision of what I wanted to do with it. Basically taking a neglected plain jane bike boom bike and making it a bit "more". I put some flair into the older steel dropbars by bending them, treated the frame with BLO, learned harlequin wrapping, pinstriped the fenders and converted it to SS. When I add the creel it will be a great Sunday country rambler that didn't cost me an arm and a leg. If I wanted, I could give it to someone without regret too.

Here's another example.

Would anyone look at this and think there's a worthwhile collectable bike? Probably not. Not a Ritchey or Fisher or other sought after frame. Nothing special about the components. No monetary value. But I saw most of it was mostly there and undamaged, liked the lugs under the rust and knew it would provide hours of fun restoring into something. It was the second frame I've done a gun blue treatment to and I admittedly went a little crazy with the headlight and rack back then. Now it doesn't have those.

Happy Feet

Another example as far outside the list as possible.

One of my longest running projects this 1960's era Woodward's department store bike has everything going wrong for it collector wise. Plain gauge steel, pressed fit dropouts, cheap components cotters, steel wheels etc... What I saw was a blank canvas upon which I could work without fear of altering something period important, and a cool Resilion coaster hub.

It was my first gun blue treatment of a frame and I left some original paint for contrast. I keep dabbling with it changing things and adding bars, pedals, tires (at least I know where that large headlight will go) but have settled on either a sort of Pathe racer theme or an early motor bicycle idea (like the first Harley's) if I decide to add a gas motor. I recently bought this CCM frame which is toast dropouts are rusted through) but it makes a good wall hanger art. Sand blasted the seat and will add it to he bike after it is re upholstered. The fender was a proof of concept attempt at steam bending wood and using copper water pipe for struts and I will probably redo that better now that I know what to do.

It is a completely uncollectable bike that I will most likely never sell.