1984 Mercian King of Mercia

davkt

Dirt Disciple
KoM1_zps915qph8q.jpg


Well my 13yo daughter sort of fell in love with Mercian bikes at the Eroica Britannia a couple of weeks ago, first a rather stunning lugless pro with a space and stars paint job on their stand, then by the end of the weekend she had decided almost any Mercian was nicer than almost any bike made by anyone else! But talking to to the Mercian chaps they told her they hadn't made many her sized bikes over the years so she might have to grow some more if she wanted a vintage one for next years Eroica.
But don't you just love internet ads? Browsing online and up pops this little 50cm frame King of Mercia. I know the shifters are wrong for the Eroica but think I'm going to leave them as from the paperwork that came with it I can see they are only 5 years too new, they are from 92, some of the very first batch of first generation campag ergopowers Mercian got hold of. To my mind a bit of cycling history worth preserving!
And the best bit, well I just don't get the second-hand bike market sometimes, this fantastic bike only cost me £80 more than I sold her grown out of nice but mass produced and fairly basic 4 year old Decathlon Triban 3 Junior for!
 
Yup, did sneak a quick ride on it, too small for me by 6 or 8 cm but still an absolute dream in terms of handling and ride quality.
It's actually cost me less than it would have done to get her a her sized Triban 500 (cheapest they do in XS) and Decathlon bike or Mercian bike? I know which I'd rather have!
 
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And now has a much more fitting Brooks B17 saddle on it. Though I hope there is a special place in hell waiting for anyone who puts a bike together without using grease on things like seatposts!
 
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I saw a thread on a forum sometime ago advising people not to put grease on seatpost, BB tapers etc. :facepalm:
 
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Well in fairness to whoever last put the post in I had got a couple of levels of brute force and ignorance to go had the huge mole grips round the clamp and big hammer not freed it.
As far as I'm concerned if it is metal on metal (particularly if two different metals) that aren't meant to be permanently fixed to each other it gets grease on it.
 
As mentioned before on the fb group I think it was, that is a very lovely King of Mercia and they always look great in small sizes.
Then again I may be slightly biased ;)
I'm sure it will give your daughter some great and happy miles for many a year.
Happy travels to you both.

Jamie
 
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Jamiedyer":1jk90jjv said:
As mentioned before on the fb group I think it was, that is a very lovely King of Mercia and they always look great in small sizes.
Then again I may be slightly biased ;)
I'm sure it will give your daughter some great and happy miles for many a year.
Happy travels to you both.

Jamie

Yep Chloe is already planning some big tours on it and is hunting ebay for some suitably retro panniers like say some Super Cs for it. The one remaining job is to free the rear dropout adjusters, but I think I'll give the GT85 a few days to work its magic before I try and move them!
 
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