Newbie with a Hobbs of Barbican

blutto

Retro Newbie
Hi guys, been steered in this direction by a work colleague.
I was given the Hobbs by my Uncle when I was about twelve or thirteen and like all kids of that age abused the thing from the word go.
When I started work I joined Lancaster Cycling Club and of course by that time had become aware of what I had but unfortunately most of the original equipment (which I may go into at a later date) had gone including the front forks.
I used the Hobbs as my day to day bike and bought a Flying Scot from Wilf Crowther at Central Cycles in Morecambe and fit some fairly decent gear at the time.
The Scot had to go back to Ratray Bros in Glasgow for a rebuild after piling into the back of a paper van early one Sunday morn at Caton doing a 25 mile tt.
As the years went by I gave the Scot to my nephew but not before fitting all my racing stuff onto the Hobbs, and apart from the odd run out every now and then thats been pretty much it.
About ten years ago I stripped the old girl down with the intention of getting it back on the road but that was as far as it got, untill now, I've got the urge again and will do it this time.
So where do we start, need forks and painting, my wheels have Campag hubs with Fiamme rims, I had them respoked when I stripped it down but they came back with Shimano spindles :cry: .

The bike is registered with the Hobbs owners club(?) and was built in 1947 so its as old as me, I was told its not one of the more sought after models and the e-mails I got back said they churned quite a few of these out, it is lugless with braised joints.

Gear....... Stronglight chainset with TA ring, Campag Record derailleur,
Weinmann 777 centre pull with Universal levers, GB stem and bars, Brooks sadle with copper rivets.

Sorry for the epic post would love to speak to other Hobbs owners.
 
blutto":ji6qkrz7 said:
my wheels have Campag hubs with Fiamme rims, I had them respoked when I stripped it down but they came back with Shimano spindles
I shouldn't worry about the Shimano spindles ! After all i bet the originals had become worn out and the original stuff is unavailable so who ever had the bike got the next best thing.

When the wheels are together you can't see that they are Shimano anyway unless you really want to go down that lane and find some originals.

Would be nice to see some really old bikes on this forum being brought back to life ;)
 
Hobbs of Barbican.

blutto":l4shgluh said:
Hi guys, been steered in this direction by a work colleague.
I was given the Hobbs by my Uncle when I was about twelve or thirteen and like all kids of that age abused the thing from the word go.
When I started work I joined Lancaster Cycling Club and of course by that time had become aware of what I had but unfortunately most of the original equipment (which I may go into at a later date) had gone including the front forks.
I used the Hobbs as my day to day bike and bought a Flying Scot from Wilf Crowther at Central Cycles in Morecambe and fit some fairly decent gear at the time.
The Scot had to go back to Ratray Bros in Glasgow for a rebuild after piling into the back of a paper van early one Sunday morn at Caton doing a 25 mile tt.
As the years went by I gave the Scot to my nephew but not before fitting all my racing stuff onto the Hobbs, and apart from the odd run out every now and then thats been pretty much it.
About ten years ago I stripped the old girl down with the intention of getting it back on the road but that was as far as it got, untill now, I've got the urge again and will do it this time.
So where do we start, need forks and painting, my wheels have Campag hubs with Fiamme rims, I had them respoked when I stripped it down but they came back with Shimano spindles :cry: .

The bike is registered with the Hobbs owners club(?) and was built in 1947 so its as old as me, I was told its not one of the more sought after models and the e-mails I got back said they churned quite a few of these out, it is lugless with braised joints.

Gear....... Stronglight chainset with TA ring, Campag Record derailleur,
Weinmann 777 centre pull with Universal levers, GB stem and bars, Brooks sadle with copper rivets.

Sorry for the epic post would love to speak to other Hobbs owners.

I have a number of Hobbs of Barbican, one bought new by my Wife's Dad for a tour of the Loire valley in 1953.

Hobbs did not actually make many frames at all, and stopped making frames altogether in 1953.

I have two fillet brazed (lugless) frames and they ride superbly and are actually quite rare - the snobs might tell you otherwise.

There is no Hobbs Owner's Club as such, if you let me have the frame number I'll happily confirm the date for you - this number is on the rear dropout and a matching one should be on the steerer.

Your frame is probably a"Clubweight", although without photos I'm guessing.

Roadking.
 
The guy who said he had put it on the Hobbs register was Mervyn Cook (the now ex-Hobbs expert of the VCC), I sent him some pics of the rear drop out and he confirmed the date of manufacture.
Unfortunately my old laptop crashed and is now dead so I lost all my old e-mails from him but I will take some more pics and then could do with sorting out some forks.
 
To be honest it died with a little help from me, I was that sick of it being so slow I threw the bloody thing across the room and when I took it in to see if anything could be done the hard drive was rattling and was told that it would be very expensive to extract anything from it.
 
Probably dead, but if you felt it was worth the postage to find out you are welcome to send it to me. There would be no cost involved.
I hope you don't kick your bike for being too slow.
Keith
 
blutto":3ipef7yw said:
When I started work I joined Lancaster Cycling Club and of course by
I have a 1936 Hobbs which belonged to Bert Berry who was President of Lancaster Cycling club at one point and involved with them most of his life. I've had it about 25 years and had it re-enamelled by Joe Waugh at M Steel. I enquired recently about getting it refinished again but at the moment it's still at the back of the garage feeling neglected. It's a thing of beauty though with amazing lugwork. I'll post a pic when I can get far enough into the garage to get near it.

Ian.
 
I would be in Lancaster Cycling Club about 1963 but I can't remember any names, would need a prompt.
Got two medals somewhere one for 25m t/t and one for evening tens.
 
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