Lemond Cromor

Sorry for the poor pics, but the frame is a bit top heavy at the mo since I fitted the saddle, couldnt risk it falling over and marking the beautiful paint.

Landed in from the states with only a £40 customs charge so not too bad. Also as described off ebay so virtually unmarked and was NOS - not bad for a 16 year old frame, managed to touch in the odd nick with a red and white generic touch up stick from Halfords, which was an exact colour match and once polished has blended in perfectly. Brian Rourkes have also fitted the Chorus headset and Veloce bottom bracket as I wanted to make sure I had bought the correct parts.

Ignore the saddle height jus not set up at the mo as didnt want to mark the Chorus seatpost. Think the Alessandro Ballan saddle compliments the livery though i know not period correct. Managed to get a new Cinelli stem at the weekend off ebay so the build has upgraded from an NOS XA stem to a rare Cinelli Grammo Titanium NOS in the correct length and also period correct.

Next job is to get the Campagnolo rims built up so it can sit correctly in storage, will post some more pics when it has moved on

Beautiful frame - looking forward to see some more

Anyway, which length is your Grammo? Because i hardly see the Grammo as being that rare - not in the longer lenghts at least (120-130mm), but in 90-110mm it is indeed quite rare. What is your length and which price did you pay, if i may ask.

Best regards
CW

That frame is beautiful, will be a fab build!

Thanks for the nice comments

The Grammo is 110 on a 26.4 not the later 26.0 version, suppose my term in rare is that you dont find many NOS these days incomparison to an XA. I really cringe when I say the price as I paid £80 for a NOS one on ebay. A couple of used have been going cheaply on ebay over the past week £20 -£30 but I really wanted a new one so had to pay the price.

Another reason I went for new was because the Cinelli logo is only a sticker which can get easily damaged and marked and I am very fussy when it comes to condition.

I like the look and finish of the XA but the early Grammos are also around the 1993/4 period (Chris Boardman had one on his Lemond 1994 tour bike) so it is also in keeping with the build and era. It is also very light.

Handsome looking frame, is it about 89/90? What will you be building it with? Athena? Victory? Or Chorus as per the seatpost?

For what it's worth I reckon a black saddle would look even better as I think pretty frames wear conservatively coloured components really well.

Regardless, it's going to be a very sweet bike.

Unsure really as its got transitional labels. By this I mean its got pre 1991 labels on the seat tube & head tube and 1991 - 1994 labels on the downward sloping tube. the rear brake cable routing is also external which is different to the coal black Z which is internal, would say 89 -91 is a rough guess, you knowledge is very good.

I managed to pick up some Lemond brochures from 1991 & 1994 off ebay usa I have never seen before. Again paid a bit for them but never seen any pre trek brochures before.

Will be built in 06 Veloce to give the alloy retro look with ergo control as I like my creature comforts.

Agree on the saddle as it was due to have a San Marco Regal in black but found the SLR on ebay which is very rare in world champion colours as they were only ever made for Alessandro Ballan. I also run an SLR on my other bike so I swung to this as I wanted both bikes to be set up the same so I wouldnt notice much difference if swapping from one to another

Hoping that it is a sunny day for the retro bike road ride so at least 1 bike will make an appearance

Hope everyone had a good Xmas and many bike related presents. Heres some more bits picked up over the festive period, the lovely Grammo bougth before Xmasand a pair of Michelin retro tyres NOS that will need a clean but hopefully are not cracked.