Hi, I'm Phil from Oxford. I've got a new project starting so thought I would get introduced and share it as I'm sure I'll need some help along the way.
I cycle a lot and tinker even more and retro road bikes are just great fun. Last weekend I picked up a Claud Butler Criterium for very modest money, expecting to do a lot of work on it.
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I guess its around 1994 so pretty young in this company, and at 12 and a bit kilos its no lightweight. It has a frame number sticker on the downtube that reads H91543? - its a bit scuffed so the last digit is gone.
On getting it home, the tyres held pressure, the seat tube released (oh joy, have suffered there on past bikes) and it rode surprisingly well. Brakes were shocking, but it just barrelled along and even gave me a Strava PR on one segment which was a bit of a bonus.
The big restoration might just become a fettling job whilst I make up my mind where to take it. First jobs will involve lots of cleaning and polishing of what's there, swapping the chainset for something a bit more compact to get me up some of the bigger local hills and doing something about the brakes, the tyres and that awful bar tape.
As a bit of history, I had a Dawes Galaxy that eventually went single speed when I lived in London (until it was nicked!), then a Raleigh Veloce that survives today as my son's ride with a 1x9 Shimano 105 setup. I also have a couple of modern bikes, but tinkering with them gets expensive so I stick to the older stuff for fun and learning new skills. I'll try to share what happens next and look forward to getting to know some of you better.