Is there anything in the vintage world that qualifies as an all road and or a gravel bike?

So much, or so many.

The first example would be the 650b conversions prevalent on this forum. The second would be the fact that those conversions are patterned after the constructeurs of vintage French bikes. Then there are the touring bikes of the late 70's and 1980's (including the 650b Raleigh models). And the fourth might be the sub-genre of vintage mountain bikes with drop handlebars like the work from Charlie Cunningham or (some model years of) the Bridgestone MB-1 or the Specialized RockCombo.

Or even many of the drop-bar hybrids of the 90's, if you want to push it.

Even many of the British steel "road" bikes of the late 70's could fit wider tires that might grade into "all-road", depending how you define that.

Specialized RockCombo from the late 80's.

Road Test/Bike Review (1989) SPECIALIZED RockCombo

Every "road" bike made prior to 1960.

Probably the first one with drop bars. Although pick just about any hardtail mountain bike from 1981 to current, slap a rigid fork on it, and some drop bars. Go wild! Alternatively there is any number of cyclocross bikes that would fit the bill. Alternately to that, pick any touring bike. Same result.

And if anyone is worried about braking, remember that we old mountain bikers did just about everything that is ridden today on rigid bikes with cantilever brakes. Somehow we lived to become old mountain bikers.

British path racers.
1949 Rotrax "Shirley."


1952 R.O. Harrison "Madison".

Both the Rotrax and the Harrison roll on 700x32s, and feel fine on gravel hard pack. I wouldn't take them mountain biking, but no mountain bike can also legally do time in a velodrome. These were serious machines for road, grass track, packed dirt "path" (ovals), and velodrome racing. One bike to rule them all.

And as stated by another member, one of the ultimate "gravel" bikes was/are the TI (Raleigh and it's subsidiaries) Sports models. These were go-everywhere bikes of their time and with a pair of decent tyres (tires), they are perfectly serviceable. Add a drop bar and ride it until your legs fall off. With air and oil, the bike will probably outlast the rider. Remember, the widespread use of automobiles is a post-WWII change and paved roads followed, so nearly all bicycles prior to about 1960, as mentioned, which weren't solely built and tyred for a wooden track velodrome were made to ride everywhere.
I'll also add anything ridden in the first few Tours de France was literally a go anywhere bike.
Even the ordinary (penny farthing) was ridden all over the world, wherever the rider wanted to go.
Phil

One of the earlier modern attempts to collect and commodify the (what is the modern) idea of a gravel bike was the Bianchi Volpe from 1986: Road Test/Bike Review (1986) BIANCHI Volpe

Before you can have 'all-road' or 'gravel' there have to be different surfaces as well as the idea that different bikes would be suited to said surfaces. People were riding every road (which included paved, unpaved, and trail) they could find on regular safety bicycles for years or decades before category speciation occurred.

Prior to the Volpe you have more overlap between what we now consider road and gravel so there wasn't much purpose built for the latter in comparison to varieties of road and touring. MTB changed that and pulled a new dropbar category into existence as a third bike for roadies who wanted MTB but didn't want an MTB, from what was previously smaller custom runs or individual builds. Charlie Cunningham's preference for dropbars on his 26" bikes in the late-1970s, the Cook brothers racing dropbar 26ers through the early 1980s, to the development of dropbar 700c wheel knobbie bikes through the mid-late 1980s. All the while cyclocross is still happening in the background and providing influence even if the bikes are much less represented forward to today and were more specialized.

Looking backwards from today; don't think the tires were there for 26" dropbar bikes to really be considered all-road. Ritchey, and perhaps others, released mixed-terrain focused tires but it doesn't seem like riding a lot of road, unpaved road, and singletrack ever had much popularity. Maybe more towards touring cyclists. General enthusiast cyclists seemed to want an MTB for MTB things with only minimal pavement, or a 700c "road" bike that could handle dirt roads, and a little trail plus "cyclocross".

Wrong. We already went over this, in great detail. Happy 1 year anniversary to this thread: I'm curious - why frame bags versus water bottle cages?

The Rock Combo was the last, or one of the last, production drop-bar 26" bikes. It was released years after similar models from Ibis, Novara, Bridgestone, and probably others lost to time; in the mid-1980s.

Road Test/Bike Review (1987) BRIDGESTONE MB-1

Way long ago in a land far far away the Schwinn Varsity was utilized as an all-road machine. We rode over hill and over dale, paved, unpaved, single track, two track, and no tracks at all.
"All-road" like "gravel" are marketing terms used by the industry to denote to the consumer a particular bicycle is not subjected to the confines of 25mm or narrower tires, and that the bike can comfortably traverse the terrain the trusty old Schwinn Varsity was so capable of doing.

Not the last as the 1993 Bridgestone XO 2 came stock with drops and 26 inch wheels.

It's not hard finding an old road bike that can take 700 x 35c tires.

700 x 38c is not as easy, 700 x 38c tires on a vintage bike?

1948 Peugeot PH-40

1948 Peugeot PH-40

Purchased on eBay France. Vertical dropouts, compact double, generator lighting. Only thing clamped to the frame is the suicide shifter.

Every bike is an all road bike if you're brave enough 🙃.

But that just goes to show there isn't a hard line in determining what "counts" as an all road bike. As many have pointed out, the road bikes of you're went on plenty of "roads" that modern folks would only traverse on a purpose-built gravel bike.

I had a RockCombo for several years, however, I would pick my 71 Paramount over it any day on just about any condition trail. The RC was kind of funky to me…very heavy and felt like you could go over the bars going down steep inclines ( I was borderline too tall for the largest size). I did go over them once on a sudden emergency stop…I landed on my feet in front of the bike…the guy in the car I avoided got quite a show! Got rid of it shortly after. I ride all my bikes on gravel and the Paramount did fantastic at Cino a couple years ago. 32s help but I take my 28mm clad Rivendell on the flat gravel rail trails here in Seattle all the time.

Maybe not, but there are a lot of old road bikes out there that can handle 650x42b tires no problem - like my (mid 70's?) Mondia Super. Just finished building it up as an allroader, but have yet to take it off pavement. I also had a Mondia Special 50+ years ago that I regularly took on what we now call "mixed terrain" rides with 700x32c touring tires (the widest available back then). Long as I didn't get too rambunctious (or try to climb anything too steep!) it worked fine.

Maybe not, but there are a lot of old road bikes out there that can handle 650x42b tires no problem - like my (mid 70's?) Mondia Super. Just finished building it up as an allroader, but have yet to take it off pavement. I also had a Mondia Special 50+ years ago that I regularly took on what we now call "mixed terrain" rides with 700x32c touring tires (the widest available back then). Long as I didn't get too rambunctious (or try to climb anything too steep!) it worked fine.

Do a search for “Jack Taylor Rough Stuff” and “Sam Braxton Combie” and you’ll find purpose-built all road bikes built for riding on fire roads and for loaded touring on nearly any surface dating back to the 70s. Here’s a bit about Sam I contributed to Classic Rendezvous several years ago: https://classicrendezvous.com/countr...a/braxton-sam/. Many of Sam’s bikes featured 650A wheels - the ubiquitous 26 x 1 3/8 (ETRTO 590) tire size used worldwide as both the British 3-speed and the US “10-speed” standard found on bikes from hardware stores, Sears, and the like. At the time, this tire was available in basically every town in the US that had a Western Auto, Coast-to-Coast, or Sears store, where 650A and 700C or 27” would have been too esoteric.

Right, that's why 650b conversions make a lot of sense on older road bikes.

Just to illustrate what has already been said a few times above. Some of my past and current rides that meet this criteria.

The Fuji S12-s as a 650b conversion.


The Raleigh Team USA which I ran in all sorts of configurations.

Gravelking Slicks

Plush Tubulars

Knobby CX

Same with the Orbea Cabestany, it had a ton of clearance.

Mud tires

Road tires

The old Peugeot U-08 got plenty of mixed use also.



Current one is this Panasonic PT-3500 tourer. I've got it geared for hills and loose stuff with GravelKings on it. Built to use at Cino Heroica and will see plenty of gravel and even singletrack where I live.


And while not vintage, it is certainly a vintage flavor. The Guv'nor sees use on road, the bike path, gravel, grassy fields, etc.


And while I'm still sorting it out, this Panasonic Team has enough clearance to run at least 700 x 38's on it and maybe bigger. Who knows what I'll do with this over the next few years.


Our choices are only limited by our imagination.

up until 1974 or maybe beyond.

I raced the Bouquet Canyon road race as a junior, 42 mi lap, a good section dirt, that year it rained, darn near a cyclocross race. I fought to the front before the dirt, that helped, fifth in, third out.
the flat I got leaving the dirt/gravel was not helpful, bike was under control but braking was useless. changing a tire in upper 30's F was no fun.
plus I was nervous about rolling a tire afterward.

Your 89 Rockhopper Comp qualifies! All you need is drop bars, appropriate stem, bar-end shifters, and some Compass tires.
Some inspiration:
26 inch All Road

I grew up in Indiana in the 70's, when gravel roads were common outside cities. County roads in Indiana are numbered, like 100N for the east-west road 1 mile north of the centerline of the county, 100E for the north-south road 1 mile east of centerline, and so on up to usually 1000. There's almost always a road every mile (100, 200, etc), and sometimes a 50 or 25 road. Even hundred roads were more likely to be paved, whereas 50 and 25 roads were typically gravel and would dead-end into a hundred road. A route of any desired distance could be worked out on the fly, with road surface of choice.

In those days, every cyclist I knew preferred paved roads, only using gravel for shortcuts or to avoid higher traffic areas. We were happy when another gravel road was paved. The idea of seeking out gravel was a few decades away.

My ride was a Schwinn Continental on 27x1.25 (31.25mm), and I was better prepared for the chunky Indiana gravel than my friends with fancier bikes on skinny tires. If I was riding on the gravel, I'd be alone. Schwinn, IMO, sold us the bikes we needed, even if we wanted the sportier looking European and later Japanese bikes.

I've ridden a lot of gravel on these Three:

Early seventies Motobecane LeChampion:


Early sixties Allegro:


Early fifties Hetchins:



Brent

Pretty much every canti brake touring bike can be an all road bike. I was able to fit 700x38 back and 700x43 front, Gravelking slicks on my Miyata 610.

In 1992, Performance had the Parabola. I have 700 x 37 mm tires with fenders, but you could probably fit bigger tires if you wanted.


1992 Performance Parabola


Plenty of room for fenders and wide tires


1992 Performance Bicycle catalog