Is vintage steal what i want?
 

I have been looking for a vintage (80-95ish) steel frame to rebuild with modern components and use as a daily rider, commuter, and possible weekend tourer. Some have told me i would be better off with a new surly or salsa, but the tubing quality makes me think twice and i cant afford something higher end new like a waterford. I also have a major, major attraction to old steel merckx, basso, de rosa, ect bikes. Am I dumb for thinking that i can make this work. I commute 3-5000 miles a year. Run 23s and dont use fenders, plan to use sram, and run 700s. I understand that the lack of braze ons on old racing bikes will prevent me from using racked panniers but i thought i could use a seat tube mounted clamp rack or uses an extra long skewer, which is what i do for my front rack . Thanks.

Everyone here is looking for a vintage steal. :D

Why clutter up a Merckx, Basso, or DeRosa with a rack? There are plenty of sweet, purpose-built bikes from "back in the day" that were meant to have racks attached.

My Merckx and my Olmo are rack free. I just can't do it to them. But, my mid 80s Cilo (Columbus Aelle tubing with 600 gruppo) has a seatpost mounted rack, which works great. Make sure you buy the kind with side supports. Also, you'll need to stick with a round seatpost (no aero posts) to make it work.

They're hard to find but there are some silver, quick release post racks with side support out there. I currently have a allen key nut mounted rack, which takes about five minutes to take off or put on. Depending on your needs, the quick release rack can be a good or a bad thing (quick releases work both ways when it comes to theft prevention). Easy to take off, but you don't have the option of leaving it on in public.

The Aelle Cilo is perfect for commuting for me. It's just as much fun to ride as my other bikes; it just weighs a bit more. My roundtrip commute is about 27 miles.

Work your way up to having two bikes. That way, you can have one as a rainy day bike, or a substitute while the other is being repaired, etc. Plus, it's nice to have a change of ride when the weekend rolls around.

Good luck,
Bob

I should have said, i have ridden race geo aluminum for years and have always kept a raining day single speed steel as a second bike. I am turning that single into a 3sp and will probably always have a rack on that one. I would never keep a mounted rack permanently attached to the bike i have in mind. Just attached for special trips and my bi annual tours. Thanks.

Is yer gonna steal, may as well go for a late model, why settle? :D

Putting racks a on De Rose, Merckx would be sacrilege and evoke the condemnation of the worldwide bike community. U would have to "ride" it indoors on a trainer and never see daylight.

If it has rack/fender eyelets, go ahead, but don't steal. I can sell you a nice Raleigh for a good price!

I don't think many De Rosa's or Merckx's came with eyelets.

What's wrong with the tubing quality? The advances in steel processing over the last 15 years have been so great that I feel the quality of new 4130 is sure to be superior to anything made in the 1980s. Of course columbus SL/SP and 531 are not 4130 and therefore are not subject to the comparison, but in anycase a nice taiwanese surly is a fine bicycle. In fact, you would be suprised how much surly's cost the dealer. There is a lower profit margin on surly's than other bicycle companies for dealers, so those who carry them believe in the bicycle. Anyone ever heard of an issue with a surly frame before? Me, never.

The fact is if you ever want to put a rack on your bike and you are looking at vintage you'll be mostly looking at chromo bikes aside from the odd 531 sport tourer, so really a new steel bike is a good option and the quality of the steel will in most cases be superior to that of a vintage sports tourer.

I once walked into a shop that was the type that you'd expect to sell surly. I asked for surly and they said they didn't have them anymore because they had low quality tubing. What a load of crap. Just because they are not using a name brand tubing to keep costs down it's suddenly crap. I don't buy it. Surly's are utilitarian bicycles, built to last. You cannot by a better bike for the price of the surly completes in their respective categories.

I dont know where you're getting your tubing information from but 4130 tubing is 4130 tubing no matter when it was made. BTW, to me the bikes made in the 1980s are late model modern bikes. I don't consider my Fisher mountain bike that I bought new in 1987 to be a vintage bike. I dont personally think of bicycles made after 1979 as vintage. But that's just my warped way of thinking.

ok, surly it is.

I hate to admit it, but I do agree you would be better off buying a Surly LHT than getiing an old Italian racer and putting brifters and a rack on it. However, there are plenty of old sport tourers out there that would fit your purposes. Look for a Trek 720, a Miyata 1000 or even a Bridgestone RB-1. In other words, what OFG said.