I have finally gotten around to stripping down the Univega Alpina Pro I bought a couple of years ago. I probably made a mistake buying it, it was visibly rough on the exterior, but it was nearly all original and my size. And cool! So...you know how that goes.
Anyway, of course I'd checked the seat tube when I bought it, and the stem came free easily enough. Sure enough, those look pretty good, not pristine, but not bad at all.
But the bottom bracket shell is not looking good at all. And I can't see into the stays or main tubes.
It's been several years since I worked on a bike, and I am nowhere near the pro wrench that many of you are. So what do you think, how bad does this look?
I certainly wouldn't go any further with the project without a thorough treatment of OA or Evaporust, but the paint is pretty rough and that's going to take some time. So is it worth all that effort?
I can sell the parts and probably break even on the bike so that's not a worry. Where am I going to find another one of these though?
Any advice welcome!

Threads look good, should all clean up with a light wire brush. I wouldn't let it bother me, others may or may not agree.

+1

gugie edumacated me that the toughest part on a frame is the bottom bracket shell so if the threads are good and it’s not rotted through, it’s good.

I would say that looks pretty bad ! but probably not fatal.

For sure brush it out and then spray something - Frame Saver, POR 15, or heck even WD40 - up inside the tubes to at least moderate the corrosion you cannot see.

is there a drain hole in the BB shell ? For rust like that I'm thinking there was trapped water or at least moisture.

maybe salt or something on the roads in your area

/markp

This looks like a fair amount of rust material, but when steel rusts, the material expands about 10X and can be alarming. I would be looking down the seat tube for condition. Riding in rain makes the rear wheel throw water right at the seat post joint and it seeps in. I would hang the frame up 2 ways to get the seat tube then the down tube verticle, rap on the frame with a block where you don't dent it and see if more debris falls into the BB.

.
...I have done at least one project bike with similar (or worse) rust accumulation in the BB shell. It turned out fine. In my case, I rethreaded it Italian.





After soaking in Evaporust rust remover for a couple of days. Threads look ifffy.


Rethreading to the larger Italian standard.

Ready to repaint frame and eventually reassemble.

That BB shell looks fine. Wire brush it, have a shop chase the threads, face it then stick a good bottom bracket in there and ride it for another 40 years. Also, shoot some frame saver, or whatever flavor rust inhibitor you like, down all the tubes and let it set up before doing your build.

+1 This is going to be zero issue once it is cleaned up. Frame save the bike. (I like the AMSOIl HD Metal Protector - seems like good stuff and is far cheaper than Framesaver. One $10 can does several bikes.) If you keep future water at bay. the frame will die of other causes long before the BB fails. (It it possible you will have to go to Italian threading and BB. I doubt it. Have a shop chase the threads, put in the bottom bracket and see it it's a go.)

Keeping water at bay - if this bike will see more than just perfect weather, don't even dream you can keep water out of the BB shell. Water is incredibly good at getting inside metals that can get cold and act as condensing tubes. Also at finding its way downhill. And on a steel bike, all roads go downhill to the BB. So prep the steel. And if this bike is going to see serious wet, drill a hole in the bottom of the BB shell to let the water out. (I say this and haven't ever done it. I've had bikes with cut-out BB shells, plastic bearing shields like yours and water simply hasn't been an issue. But I have raced in pouring rain and can tell you that drilling holes in cycling shoes is a must! My shoes came with the holes. Never thought about them, either before that race or during. Afterwards, all of us with the proper holes had to listen to the sad stories of those whose soles didn't have the holes! So, the lesson - the best thing you can do with unwanted water is allow it to leave.

Edit: to topic - last summer I bought a Pro Miyata from a forumite. He fully disclosed that it had sat out in the weather a long time and photographed everything. The amount of interior rust was less than yours but lugs, braze-ons and paint chips were all rusted to varying degrees. Threaded seatpin pulled right out second seat adjust. This winter I painted all the exterior rust with fingernail polish. (There are polishes with very nice classic metal flake Imron-like flakes. With a mix of three I got very close in color. BUt it is a don't-look-too-close bike!)

I fully get why you bought this. That Pro is the fit and fun of my old racing bike. The dream. 100% pure race ride that I haven't had for more than 40 years. And so pure race it is wonderful to get back on my other rides!

I had written a reply earlier today but didn't post it and am glad to have more responses.
With the BB shell cleaned out with a shake and a WD-40 soaked rag, the shell turns out to be just pitted a bit. I realized that, as socalife wrote, the volume of rust is a multiple of the amount of steel it's actually eaten, so a thimbleful of rust, as I found, represents a tiny bit of missing steel from various tubes.
Openings to the down and seat tube and the chainstays are a bit rough though, and a few flakes of rust come out when shaken. Looking all the way down the seat tube, there are rust crystals down below the seatpost level. All that concerns me a bit.
So I am going to use either an OA bath or Evaporust to try to clean the tubes up, maybe one at a time, then flush them and treat them with something, probably an LPS rust preventative spray I've used before.
My buddy has a full Campy tool set and I can ask him to chase the threads; he's done it before.
I think I'll have the whole thing powder-coated, too. Chainstay paint is down to bare metal, rear tire rubbed to bare metal, even cables rubbed to bare metal. The bike was ridden hard though apparently not that far, as the chainrings (Sugino TAT) are fine. I'll have to ask whether having the framesaver inside already will be okay.
And 79Mooney, this bike is a Univega Ultima Pro, a mountain bike with super-slack angles. The Pro Miyata in my sig is another matter entirely, though it's likely moving on this summer.

If you have a way to extend the shank for a brake cylinder hone, you could run it up and down the seat tube. Once the loose stuff is removed, Evaporust will get it nice and clean. As for rust preventives, I recall a not-so-recent thread that favored Fluid Film, which is lanolin-based. They now have a competitor called WoolWax. YMMV, everyone seems to have their own favorite flavor.

I just faced the same rust concerns on the last frameset purchase. Mine less than yours in the BB shell, I think. I bought a brass brush set with flexible wire handles to probe into the chainstays & downtube ~7 inches. Some rust there as well, so I did the OA bath (only enough to soak BB & chainstay & a couple of inches into the DT + ST); followed by baking soda solution to neutralize, water hose flush, dry in sun. Since my rust was less than yours, I just did a quick WD40 spray. A week later, ran the brass brushes into tubes and got no rust, so I passed on framesaver.



Here are the rust bits that came out of tubes from brass brushes, which were used after the BB had been wiped as clean as possible. A few ‘bits’ came out with the rust dust.

After OA. The orange frame color that got inside tubes on this early ‘70s Holdsworth, may have fooled me some - with grime it appeared more like rust than paint overspray.

Based on this thread, tung oil cut with a bit of OMS might be a good substitute if Frame Saver and/or one of the other commercial corrosion preventative sprays isn't readily available.

Results so far are pretty damn impressive. I'm hoping the OP of that thread updates it again soon - his experiment has now been running 4 months.

OMS = (something) mineral spirits?

Water bottle boss interiors are in the way of that. But I can probably run a long thin brush down there to get the crystals off, then plug the tube at the bottom and fill it with OA water or Evaporust. I'm leaning towards the former now, thinking I only really need to de-rust the BB, the chainstays, and the lower maybe 6 inches of seat and downtube.

...you can whip up some kludge like this, out of scrap plywood and old inner tubes, fender washers, and a long bolt and nut to seal the BB, Cork the holes in the bottle bosses with machine screws, and then fill the frame with Evaporust, from the top of the seat tube. I hung it under the eaves, on the sunny side of the house, so the solar radiation would heat up the frame. Evaporust works better when it's warm.

Odorless Mineral Spirits. The "odorless" is a bit of a misnomer, as it does have a distinct petrochemical smell. But it does have less odor, is somewhat less toxic, and is a bit safer to use than standard mineral spirits (some of the more harmful and volatile chemicals are greatly reduced in OMS).

Works great as a cleaning solvent and is much safer than many petroleum-based alternatives. It's also reusable for that purpose if stored in a sealed container after use (dirt/crud generally settles out fairly completely). Also thins paint/lacquer/etc . . . .

This is a great idea, and not a kludge at all! I had been thinking of the kiddie-pool-and-OA method which seemed like a PITA due to the space and volume of liquid required. My wife points out that hot glue can also seal smaller holes (like the weep holes in the stays) long enough for this process, and as an art teacher she has plenty of that around. I hope to find Evaporust in a local auto parts store and get this going this weekend. Will report back.

I used a plant trough for OA immersion: plastic about 6" wide x 10" high x 40" long for about £10.

You have to rotate the frame to get to all tubes and you won't reach the middle of the seat tube - used wetted cloths for that.
The upside is it doesn't need much liquid and I put it on a window sill for a couple of weeks so easy to check on.