Hi there. I just picked this up at the flea and I am pretty sure it's a Cinelli. BUT! I'm not sure so I was thinking someone out there might know for sure. I can't find any serial numbers but it is a repaint so they might be there some where. Not sure where though. Certainly not the bottom bracket but it does say Cinelli made in Italy. It has a dura ace group with an Omas HS. I'll let the pictures do the talking. If anyone needs a particular picture to help identify this beauty, just ask. Thanks!

I don't think it's a Cinelli - at least I have never seen a Cinelli with that kind of seat stay attachment or those kind of lugs. This is certainly not definitive, however.

Lots of builders use Cinelli BB shells, so that doesn't help.

Whatever it is, it looks nice. Someone spent some time filing those lugs down, and it is rare to find that kind of detail on a crappy frame.

ciocc?

Probably more obscure. The BB is like any other Cinelli bb sold to many makers. It's not a Cilo, and it's not French. I certainly would jump on it for the group.

I've got a Greg Diamond with that seatstay arrangement.

Apparently, that seatstay style was popularized by Eisentraut, so the frame might be his or that of one of his 'students.'

Greg Diamond:

That's a neat detail on the fork blades. Could it be a Colnago? Did other makers commonly use the playing card graphics?

Not sure but I think Colnago used the Club or clover. I'm no expert though. Please correct me if I'm wrong.

That is a beauty. Makes me want to see the rest of the bike.

The seat stay looks similar but the points on the lugs are different. The ones on my mystery bike are longer and the bottom point even longer. Also the seat clamp braze-ons are different. I'm sure each bike builder uses slightly different techniques for that detail.

IMHO I don't think this was done by an apprentice. This yells master builder based on my 15+ yrs. of high end metal working experience.

It also has vertical drop outs if that help with anything........

I just measured the BB and it's 68.6mm wide and it has a 27.2mm seat tube. Was 70mm the standard for Italian BB's?

Oh, I didn't mean an apprentice per se, I meant the master framebuilders who were taught by or otherwise influenced by Eisentraut, like Bruce Gordon and Mark Nobilette.

Here's the Greg Diamond frame, still unbuilt, but I'm close to starting!



In another thread, a few people speculated it was built with a Takahashi BB. The lugs are unknown (to me at least), but the tubes and dropouts are Columbus. If you pull the fork, you can look for the Columbus dove stamp, and you can also look in the steerer tube for rifling - if there are five helical ridges, it's likely Columbus. Also, what are the dropouts? A pic of front and rear may help some identify the builder.

more people trying to ID frames have been tripped up by the fact that Cinelli sold framebuilding parts with their name on them.

I'm pretty sure that the playing card fork crown tang was a standard part.

The use of "suits" seems to have been a motif (turning into a cliché) adopted by and peculiar to the Italian framebuilder's "club." Along with signatures.

very likely an American builder, and one who did very high quality work: the details like the modified fastback seat cluster shows that he was very skilled. The rest of the frame bits don't tell us anything, except that it is an earlier Cinelli IC BB shell with the tangs on top/bottom (known as the "can opener") which was replaced by the later version where they are rotated 90º. Pretty sure that Richard Sachs has made fork reinforcing tangs with that suit-of-cards motif, and they are for sale to any other builder so no reason to think it's a Sachs (but would be great if it were) and perhaps those are Henry James lugs. Somebody else can ID them for sure. What brand are the vertical DOs?

I don't know nuthin' tubing wise, but doesn't Miyata tubing also have the "rifled" inner profile? A product of drawing and butting the tubing?

They did, but it may have been straight rather than helical. I'm not sure. At any rate, this frame isn't a Miyata.

I now know exponentially more than I did at the top of the thread. Many thanks from me.

I wish I had some catalogs from the late '70s. I'm pretty sure you could get fork tangs with either round holes or the playing card suits from multiple suppliers. I used to get Hayden crowns from a couple of bike parts distributors. I got Cinelli and Columbus from Gus Betat, and I think the U.K. parts mostly came through Mel Pinto.

You guys have to quit calling that bottom bracket the "can opener" model. I built at least 3 bikes with it, one of which I sold to a big hefty strong guy who got the frame chromed against my recommendation. Have no idea how that ended up.

HAH! I only repeat the scuttlebutt I hear.
BTW, I had a frame with one of those very fine Cinelli BBs and never had any problem with it...but since I no longer own it I also don't know how it ended up.

I checked the drop outs and the rear vert. dropouts read SHIMANO and what I think is SFX. Hard to say on the SFX but.... I had to do a little scraping of paint to see it. The front drop outs say SHIMANO SE (not sure about the SE again but it looks to be that. Can anyone chime in here and say they have seen these drop outs before??

How long has Henry James been around making lugs?

My '76 fuji track bike has SHIMANO SE dropouts. Not much else in common though.

on second look I don't think they are Henry James, but the mix of Shimano ends with the rest Cinelli, and the thinned lug edges and fastback seat cluster could only be an American custom builder (IMHO)...which one I sure can't say. A serial number might be your next best clue, if you have one.

So I checked with some LBS's and one said that the forks crown with the suit of cards stiffeners was cinelli but none had any idea as to the maker. I brought it by Paul Sadoff's shop and he couldn't tell me who made it either. I can't find a serial number any where. Are there unusual places for serial numbers? Would that give clues to a custom frame builder? I spent hours scouring the internet for lug details to see if I could narrow down a builders "style" but I'm pulling at straws. The search goes on........

While it has a Cinelli BB shell, does it use Italian threading? or 1.370 x 24?

The playing card suits stamped into the fork leg reinforcements are from Italy...Richard Sachs uses them, but this is not a Sachs, they were available to all, Nova Cycle Supply or others have them even now.

My guess is also American builder, a smaller guy, so if it breaks and breaks you, you don't know who to sue. That was for Richard Sachs.

I think JunkYardBike probably gave you your best lead--Eisentraut. Check into frames built by the guys who learned from him, guys like Bruce Gordon, Bill Stevenson, and Mark Nobilette.

stan