Antipodes

The Triomphe rear derailleur will most definitely shift 7 speeds, and if it has enough throw, perhaps up to 9.

Cueballkrill

Oh that word 'perhaps' put's fear into me that does!

If I go from a 6 to a 7/8/9 would it still fit of the hub? I mean does the space of a 9 piece cog take up more room than a 6?

cyclotoine

Your bike has a 6 speed freewheel. You should be able to fit a 7 speed freewheel with up to a 26t large cog and maybe a 28 with the axle at the back of the drop-outs. If you want to move to an 8/9/10 speed cassette you will need a new hub this would require you to spread the rear triangle. You have 2 options with this: (1) just spread it by hand when you pop the wheel in (2) cold set it to 130.. search the forum and sheldonbrowns info on this.

Cueballkrill

Thanks for the info.

By the sounds of things, I'd be best to stick with the 6 speed, I am in no way competent enough to start going down that road.

Maybe next time

dannyg1 

Looks to me as though the seat tube is of an irregular shape, possibly 'aero'. That'ld explain the RX100 FD choice.

Danny

Cueballkrill

*UPDATE*

I'm treating the girl to a powder-coating, I'm sure she will love it but I have a question.....




How do I remove this rubber piece from the frame? Or would it be safe to leave on?

Cheers,

Cue

unworthy1

I take it you mean that (plastic?) bottom HS cup. There's a tool called a rocket with flared springy flanges that press outward against the tube interior and allow you to hammer against the top of the cup, inside the head tube. Nashbar has a version on sale for about $13, Park Tools has one almost never on sale, but...Park quality. You can alternately use a long drift (punch) and tap all around the cup's top/inner edge. Since my recommendation is to REPLACE that plastic HS anyway, you can also hammer away on the outside, as well...and throw in in the trash. Then get a nice Stronglight alloy HS, French threaded if required, from xxcycles.com, best HS for the money.

Cueballkrill

Thanks for the info.

I've give it a good hammering!

Cheers,

Jon

RK1963

[QUOTE=Cueballkrill;6374271]15 points on the first cog, mine has 13, is that going to be a problem?

No - you will get a better work out. Are you going to re-spray this frame yourself? If so, perhaps you should spray first and clean / acquire parts while the paint "cures?"

RK1963

May be there to block contaminants from the bearings. Is that head tube badge on crooked?

Cueballkrill

I should really update the pictures, I'll do that tomorrow.

The bike looks totally different now.

Cueballkrill

I also managed to get myself a campy freewheel 12-13-14-15-16-17 for $120 dollars (I nearly choked) I think I can going to rename the bike to 'The pain machine'

Picchio Special

A Campagnolo freewheel is way overkill for that bike, IMO. Campy freewheels were pretty rare, even on Campy bikes, and certainly on Campy bikes with the parts group yours has. They were very high-end, top-dollar units, even in the day. Standard issue freewheel on probably the majority of Campagnolo-equipped bikes from the 60's right through the 80's would have been Regina. Something like a 6-speed Regina CX would have worked fine with your bike, been more appropriate, and cost a good deal less.

cyclotoine

That's a pretty expensive piece. I hope you live somewhere flat. I would have sold you a regina for $100 less. You could have spent that money on a lot better upgrades, like the derailleurs. Also that shimano twist tooth will work (shift) a lot better than the campy.

Cueballkrill

Thanks for the input (yet again)

I don't really know why I bought it, I think it was a spur of the moment eBay thing (eBay is as bad as tele-shopping)

However, it’s coming and I'll have to deal with it when it gets here. Worst comes to the worst it will go back up on eBay (uk) and I'll get most of my money back.

So far the taking the bits party, buying things I don't need and reading bits and pieces has been interesting, I hope that it's a learning process (make mistakes now....)

I am happy that I've decided not to try and paint the frame myself, I think the money it has saved me in the long run will help to dampen the price of the freewheel.

Picchio Special

And if you decide to keep and use it, you'll have built up your freewheel with a really nice frame.

Cueballkrill

Thanks for that Picchio, I feel a bit better after reading that!

Cueballkrill

Bike nearly stripped - still got to remove the crank bit.





I've been looking at the headset (it's not branded) the lower cup and upper cone are both metal (not plastic as I though it was)

Now I’m assuming that both the upper cone and lower cup are held into place with friction? I think for this job (actual removal) I'm going to take it to the bike shop to do, and replace with a brand new headset.

Threads were mentioned before (French frame, French thread) but If the headset is held by friction, as long as it fits in the hole that is the job done? No? I still don't really understand why the threading would be important with this headset.... both the forks have a thread along the top, but this isn't a thread along the inside of the upper cone...

Am I making sense or is it coming across as gibberish?

cyclotoine

It's the threads on the fork that are potentially French. The whole headset must match though. You need to determine what thread size you have before buying a new headset. Is there any writing on the bottom bracket cups (i.e. what you referred to as the crank bit)? These could tell us what kind of threading you have. It's great that you took the time to stripe it but blasting it gives it a nice uniform texture that the powder coat sticks too better and provides a much cleaner finish. From what I have seen and heard anyway. So keep that in mind.

Warning: most bike shops (in my experience) do not do much dealing with classic and vintage bikes, make sure you take it too a good shop. It is quite possible the mechanics at your LBS have never dealt with a french bottom bracket (if that is what you have) and they may mess up the cups trying to unscrew the fixed side in the wrong direction. But you had campagnolo on there and if you have campagnolo cups they will tell use what kind of threading they have. If they are english I think you can safely assume your headset is also english (i.e. the standard used today).

Cueballkrill

Thanks again Cyclotine.

I'm still having some difficulty in getting my head around this; I'm going to post a few more pictures tomorrow.

As for the bottom bracket I'm going to be dealing with that myself, my pin head tool should be arriving tomorrow.... I'm sure that will be fun.

This headset 'thing' is really confusing me for some reason...

Cueballkrill

Oh and the stipping of paint, well I was planning on doing a DIY job on the paint, but I don't think I would have done the frame justice.

The company that will powder-coat will sand blast the frame/forks as well.

Cueballkrill

1,370" x 24 TPI Made in Italy Campagnolo (On the bottom bracket)



English thread?

cyclotoine

Correct and congratulations. this makes you life easy, I'm sure the headset is also english. Woo Hoo!

Cueballkrill

So happy I could do a dance around the bike!

unworthy1

True, except I'd point out that the HS is a French *style* in that the top pressed-in unit is a CUP rather than a RACE. I'm just not familiar enought with FR bikes of this era (and specifically Mercier) to rule out a FR threaded HS (that is: just the fork steerer column has FR threads and must match the threaded parts of the HS: the top cup-or-race and locknut...your stem quill would also be marked [or just measure] 22.0mm rather than the English/ISO 22.2mm) However, glad it's not the dreaded plastic Stronglight HS, I just saw black on a FR bike and *assumed* Another clue (short of just taking it to your shop and having a mechanic measure) is the typical FR headset washer has a *flat* portion on the inside, rather than a tab, cause the steerer typically has a flat area filed on the column backside where others have a slot. Chances are good that it's all English threads, as per cyclotoine, but it wouldn't be unheard-of for a FRENCH bike to mix things up