Does anyone know much about Harry Hall bikes?

[DrewSavage]

Of course, I know who he was and his pedigree as a race mechanic and frame builder, and I've wanted one of his bikes for ages...

Now I've finally got one, it'd be great to find out more about it - what it actually is and what's on it. I will be taking it to the Harry Hall shop in Manchester and asking them, when I get time, but I know so many people on here know so many things and thought it might be nice to share the photos anyway. Any as ever, any advice will be accepted gratefully.



The frame number stamped on the bottom bracket is 920. I did a bit of research on the Reynolds sticker on the frame which suggests it might have been made between 1973 and 1977.



Front and rear derailleurs are Campagnolo, rear is a Nuovo Record (is that a long reach one, or at least longer than standard? Sorry about blurry photo)



Cranks and chainset are TA - were they later taken over by Stronglight?



Front hub is Campag Record, rim is Mavic, spokes are a bit rusty... Rear hub and rim unbranded and in better condition, looks like a later and cheaper replacement. Does anyone know what the Huret branded thing attached to the front hub is? I've never seen anything like that before. Could it be something to do with an odometer?


Gear levers are Simplex, which to my mind are rather beautiful. They're just silver, the colour is a reflection of the red t-shirt I'm wearing...


Saddle is a Brooks B17
Brakes are Weinmann - I always assume Weinmann brakes are rubbish because you always got their standard models on Bicycle Shaped Objects in the 80s, but are they?

 

[DrewSavage]

Ran out of attachments on the first post, so here are the brakes. They do look a bit better than bog-standard Weinmanns to me, but I'm no expert...


The Stem is SR, handlebars are SR Road Champion - again, these seemed to come as standard equipment on your average Raleigh so I'm wondering about an upgrade. Are they any good? And does anyone recognise the headset and know what tool you need to adjust it?


And the six million dollar question - does the frame look too rusty to be successfully renovated and restored? If I stripped it and sold the parts I think I'd still be slightly up on the purchase price (£137) but I bought it to ride it, not to make money.

 

[Robbied196]

Re:

There were some beautifully built frames that came out of Harry Halls in the 70s and 80s but Harry never actually built the frames. He used a few different outside builders including Bob Jackson at one time and I think a couple of Birmingham based builders. I did a bit of research a few years ago about my HH but for such a well known shop there's not a great deal of information out there.



Unfortunately, the current shop doesn't seem to have any interest in their heritage at all.

 

[Old Ned]

The frame looks rather nice although I'm a bit puzzled about the braze-on fork lamp bracket. Not the sort of thing you would normally expect on a frame of this calibre. The rear mech is the 'tourist' long cage version of a Nuovo Gran Sport, the front mech looks like a Nuovo Record model. The brakes are 'bog standard' Weinmann but nothing wrong with that. They should work well with the correct adjustment and some decent blocks. TA wasn't and isn't anything to do with Stronglight. TA rings were often used with Stronglight 49D cranks, they shared the same dimensions of 5-pin spider. Gear levers are the excellent pre-index 'Retrofriction' model, used by many people in the 80's before indexing came on the scene.

All in all a slightly broad spectrum of fittings datewise but nowt wrong with that! Doubt if you'll get much info from the shop as Robbie says.

 

[DrewSavage]

The frame looks rather nice although I'm a bit puzzled about the braze-on fork lamp bracket. Not the sort of thing you would normally expect on a frame of this calibre. The rear mech is the 'tourist' long cage version of a Nuovo Gran Sport, the front mech looks like a Nuovo Record model. The brakes are 'bog standard' Weinmann but nothing wrong with that. They should work well with the correct adjustment and some decent blocks. TA wasn't and isn't anything to do with Stronglight. TA rings were often used with Stronglight 49D cranks, they shared the same dimensions of 5-pin spider. Gear levers are the excellent pre-index 'Retrofriction' model, used by many people in the 80's before indexing came on the scene.

All in all a slightly broad spectrum of fittings datewise but nowt wrong with that! Doubt if you'll get much info from the shop as Robbie says.

Thanks - the fork had been puzzling me too. If it wasn't for the Harry Hall stamp at the top of them, I'd have assumed the original fork would have been removed and this was a cheap replacement.

Might it be because the bike was bought as more of a long distance Audax kind of bike rather than an out and out racer? I still don't know enough about frame geometry and rake of forks etc to be able to tell... but I'll have another look and see if there are eyelets for mudguards. The dropouts are Campagnolo, by the way. So it must have been a reasonably decent bike.

 

[DrewSavage]

Re: Re:

There were some beautifully built frames that came out of Harry Halls in the 70s and 80s but Harry never actually built the frames. He used a few different outside builders including Bob Jackson at one time and I think a couple of Birmingham based builders. I did a bit of research a few years ago about my HH but for such a well known shop there's not a great deal of information out there.



Unfortunately, the current shop doesn't seem to have any interest in their heritage at all.

That's a lovely bike!

 

[mdvineng]

Harry Halls made quite a few tourers as there was a what do you want in a frame order form. I bought a brand new set of forks with the H H panto on with canti braze ons, still have the forks and they remain unused to this day.

 

[t47b]

Re:

Weinmann brakes are fine (well it doesn't rain much here) I notice you have the centre pull brake 'bridge' at the back so I'm guessing those aren't the original brakes?

 

[DrewSavage]

Re:

Aha! This is the kind of thing that I usually wouldn't notice. What would have been the usual centrepull brakes at the time? Weinmann Vainqeurs? Did Mafac do a centrepull brake?

I know Weinmann sidepulls work ok, I just find them really fiddly and annoying to set up right.

 

[mj3200]

Re:

They used to sponsor Robert Millar

https://www.facebook.com/harry.cycles