Hi there, our subject is a 1990-ish steel road bike in chrome plate. The level of polish appears that it was intended to be seen that way, rather than painted over except for the stays. There are no decals remaining. I obtained it years ago by way of its original owner's coke problem so I know little about its provenance. (He really should've just gone for a ride instead of scratching the itch).

Here's the basics - ST 60cm, TT 58. Dropouts are Campy. Seatpost is 26.8. Cinelli BB, fork and the winged C on the HT-DT lug. I'd think it was a Cinelli except for the seat post cluster that is unlike anything I've seen them do. It also has a B-O front der mount, and a chain hanger on the seat stay.

The group was all 7s Shimano 105 (1055 specifically) except for Ultegra hubs on Open 4CD rims. In the photo it's got Sora shifters, ergo bars and fat tires from its three race cyclocross career. Original bars were (of course) Giro d' Italia with a Cinelli stem. Sorry for the crap photo's - crummy camera and chrome is hard to shoot.

Since I have a real race bike for racing now, I'll be restoring it to original trim or as close as can given that white brake hoods don't exist anymore.

Thanks for any wisdom and infos you can supply.

What no love of Campy dropouts and Cinelli lugs on a mystery frame?!?!

Not sure what you've got. If it were a Cinelli, I'd expect it would have the sleeve in the seat tube, and take a 26.2 post.

The tires, bars and crank arms all look a tad large for the rest of the bike, but fit trumps looks.

my bet is that it's one of the "budget" Cinellis that were contract-built by somebody else (maybe Billato, maybe not) and were mainly sold in Europe. The seatpost points to an Aelle tube set. I've never seen one all chrome-plated before.

The tires, bars and levers are not original. I squeezed 32mm cross tires in there for a couple of races. Original bars were Cinelli Giros on a Cinelli stem.

Thanks unworthy, that's what I'd been thinking but don't have enough historical knowledge to know who built such bikes. That seat cluster just doesn't go with the rest of the Cinelli program.

Wasn't that just the 60s Cinellis that used the shim? This frame is much newer than that; the BB shell is early 80s at the earliest.

Sorry, but I can assure you nothing like your frame every came out of the Proteus shop.

I believe the sleeved seattube and requisite smaller seatpost size persisted into the early 80's.

I do think that the OP's guess as to the era of the frame is probably not far off the mark. Normally, when I see Cinelli frame components, I'm inclined to believe that the person trying to ID the bike is jumping to conclusions based merely on fact that Cinelli frame parts were used. In this case, though, I'm strongly inclined to think that the presence of the "Flying C" stamped in the lower headlug means that the frame is in fact a Cinelli. (Or some type of show special intended to flaunt it's Cinelli connection.) The steatstay cluster, while not classic Cinelli, is a pretty common one for bikes "of a certain age."

Hi Picchio, from "squadcar" a former principal at Proteus we found out this bike was done by them. There isn't nearly enough information about the Proteus bikes, but they were huge in creating the modern era of artisan framebuilding in the US.

Those are very definitely Cinelli lugs and I'd gone with the Cinelli theory for awhile (particularly for insurance purposes) but it'd be like the one bike in 40 years that didn't have the trademark fastback seat cluster. The steerer tube is stamped "REYNOLDS 531 BUTTED 16/13" which would certainly rule out Cinelli origins.

I'm sorry to have not updated this thread, but it had been ignored enough I forgot it too.

What got me curious about it is the need to overhaul and refinish it. If it remained a mystery bike I would probably have done it up rat rod style in red primer but now it's got a provenance and needs to be done proper like. Anyway, I'm blogging the rebuild if you care to look.