sop

There seems to be a lot of interest in modestly-priced, fully-lugged, quality steel track frames on this site lately. I've been looking for such a frame for a while so I always read the threads discussing all the available fully-lugged, steel, track frames on the market. The choices seem rather limited these days; most of the reasonably-priced steel track frames ($400-$600) are tig welded, mass-produced frames (mostly Asian production) with little or no indiividuality or personality. But I keep looking anyway. I'd really love to get a new Cinelli Supercorsa Pista, but I'd rather not pay that much right now.

I was in a local bike shop here in Gainesville, Florida, a few days ago (Bikes and More), looking for a few odds and ends. It's a nice little, hardcore shop and they have a lot of ss/fixed stuff on hand. I'm always looking for interesting frames and I noticed about half a dozen steel track frames hanging from the rafters, so I immediately took one down to inspect it.

Turns out they were Villin Cycles 1% Track Frames, beautifully-lugged steel track frames, with matching lugged forks, in some very interesting colors, made with Dedacciai tubing throughout. I believe the selling price for the frame and fork was $500. Unfortunately, they were all too small for me. I was looking for a 58-60cm frame, and all these frames were only in 55cm size (if I remember correctly...I don't have any info on geometry, etc.).

The builder happened to be in the shop and I asked if he had any others in my size. He said he didn't and he was not making any more of these 1% frames till sometime next year; these frames were all that were left from the last run and they were for sale in the shop. He showed me some other examples of his custom work (a beautifully-executed, fully-lugged steel, SS MTB frame with rigid fork he'd just finished) and I was pretty impressed. Nice guy, and you could tell he was passionate about the art of frame building. Had one of these remaining available 1% track frames been in my size I likely would have taken one home that day.

If any of you are in the market for such a frame, in the 55cm size available, you might give the shop or the builder a call. It looked like a very nice frame at a good price. Let me state that I am in no way associated with this shop, nor do I have any interest in the sale of any frames. I thought I'd just pass along the information for anyone interested in a hand-built, fully-lugged steel frame that doesn't look like everything else out there. You might want to look at the Villin site to read about the 1% frames.

doofo

shill

lolol

delicious

the builder is a fun guy, and supported some gainesville races too. He gave away a frame to the winner of one of the alleycats.

and the metallic orange paint he uses is AWESOME. it reminded me of my dad's old schwinn super sport

4doorhoor

Sweet. 55 small is.

wearyourtruth

nice colors. i'd rock one. nice drop-outs and i always like the bottle opener.







i dig the bent seatstays on most of their other frames

Zombie Carl

hmmm, yes indeed. I may have to look into one of this guy's frames. probably too expensive for me though.

kemmer

thread locked for shillage.