Well, finally I have a legitimate excuse to post in the classic and vintage section. I was talking to our neighbour in LA a couple of weeks ago and he mentioned that he had an old racing bike after we got talking about cycling. He ventured that it probably needed some attention and I offered to take a look - thought it would make a good holiday project.

Not sure what we were going to find as we wrestled to extract the old bike from a dimly lit garage, at first it appeared to be a rather dusty unspectacular early 70's 10 speed with flaky tires. The frame was made in Italy by "Cycles Lygie", chrome finished, but had seen better days. Then I began to notice things, a faded Reynolds 531 badge, A faded Campagnolo badge, Campy hubs, Nuovo Record derailleurs. In fact it has full NR equipment, except for Weinman centre-pull caliper brakes and appears to be in original condition. I am not able to post any pictures at the moment, but this is one lovely bike, despite the surface rust on the frame.

A little research showed that these bikes were imported into the USA by I Martin Imports in LA - A store I happened to frequent already when I'm over there. I talked to them about it and they have the Campy tools for some of the jobs (freewheel, bb etc.) that I would not be able to tackle with my kit.

So far I had time only to replace the old cables, tyres and give her a quick clean and lube to ease the stiff chain back to life. A more extensive strip-down will follow when I next have time, followed by a ride.

There may be a chance that I can "adopt" the bike in the future, but I don't want to build up too many hopes. In that case I would be sorely tempted to do a complete restoration, have the frame re-plated and restore the finish on the parts. This does beg the question about how far one should take a restoration...

Cheers,

Ed