Benotto - help me ID and complete
 

What did I just buy?
Trying to figure out what year my new Benotto was made, and what COUNTRY it was made in, what model it is, what it's worth, and what components (if any) I should be looking for to get it back to original.

Frame has NO stickers describing the steel or origin...on the bottom of the frame, there are only (3) digits: 877

Has:

• Modolo Corsa brake levers and brakes
• ITM 'made in italy' bars
• Benotto 'made in italy' 700c wheels
• Campagnolo shifters
• Campagnolo front derailleur
• Suntour rear derailleur
• Lyotard pedals
• Icaselle 'made in italy' seat
• No designation seat post 'made in japan'
• REG 'made in italy' water bottle holder
• AFA 1 'made in france' pump holder
• Suntour 'procompe' cassette
• SR 'made in japan' cranks with Benotto stickers
• SR chainrings
• SR Sakae bottom bracket
• No designation on headset or stem

Photos attached. Would love your thoughts!

Attachment 173114Attachment 173115Attachment 173116Attachment 173117

It appears to be a mid-1980s Benotto 800 Dilettante with some trimmed and removed decals. These bicycles were made in Mexico. Original price was $250-$325 US, depending on the exact year. The only obvious changes are the shift levers and front derailleur. They should match the SunTour rear derailleur.

Thanks for the input.
One thing that seems strange is that the seatpost size is 26.0mm...which seems a little out-of-sync with the 'mid-80's' and specs on the Mexican 800's I've read about?
Other weirdness: headtube graphics are in an "italic" font I haven't seen on any other Benotto photos.
Also, that the wheels are branded "Benotto- Made in Italy" instead of the "Ambrosio" spec...I wonder who really made them?

I don't see anything out-of-sync. Hi-tensile tubes cover quite a range of wall thickness. Some of the high carbon versions did use 26.0mm posts. The next model up, the 850, used a tubeset that required a 26.6mm post. The italic font on the down tube is correct, and was used in conjunction with the standard logo on the seat tube, though as stated previously, they appear to have been trimmed. Other Benotto models from this period used Ambrosio and Nisi rims, so they're probably one or the other.

Aha! Thanks T-Mar
So is 'higher carbon steel' better, or worse?
What year bike is that logo photo you attached from?

Increased carbon content makes steel stonger and stiffer, so the tubes can made thinner, resulting in a lighter frame. However, there's a limit as to how far you can go with bicycle tubes as the steel gets harder to work and the ductility decreases which, in conjunction with the thinner tubes, makes the frames more susceptible to damage in a crash.

The pictured Benotto was dated to 1986, though this scheme was used in other years around this period, hence my mid-1980s assessment.

Since we talking about Benottos, I've never figured out much about my Modolo 3000 except that it was pretty high up in the hierarchy. The tubing sticker just says Columbus. Any idea of the year?

Thanks!

http://velospace.org/files/Ben9.jpg

It's obviously a rebuild, but I quite confident it is a 1987. The 3000 was Benotto's top model through the late 1970s and early 1980s. However, Columbus introduced SLX in the mid-1980s and I have seen maybe a handful of SLX frames with that livery, so there's a good chance it was 2nd in line at the time.