Keep or Donate this Coventry Eagle frame?

[JackLedin]

The other week I picked up this "Coventry Eagle" 100 years mtb because everything on it was Deore LX and I wanted the bits for my Marin build. Then the more I looked at it I thought the forks/stem looked awfully like my Marin parts. It's a double butted Spinner fork and the roller stem is cromo. Headset was really really nice. Then I found a picture of a Marin eldridge online and the stem and fork basically are identical even in colour.

I guess these were just put together for British Eagle with bits and bobs leftover in factories? Which leads me to question is the frame worth keeping, like is it something better than it is or is it generic off the line tat. Keep or give it away? Seatpost is lugged if that helps. Its pretty light and cromo. I dont really understand why they'd bother to adorn a bike like this with decent bits. I only paid £20 for it so I've gotten my moneys worth out of the bits I needed already. More than happy to donate it or give it away if its not gonna be useful.

 

[CassidyAce]

If it's a decent frameset, it's a decent frameset regardless of brand. I'd say that it deserves a new lease of life as a drop bar gravel bike or a cruiser or a single speed or whatever — something different. Perhaps something like this: https://www.retrobike.co.uk/threads/british-eagle-80s-dadwagon.416495/. Whether the new lease of life should be at your hands or someone else's really depends on you and what you might enjoy. If you can't find a use for it, perhaps karma it on here to someone who can. It would be a shame if it ended up as a scruffy station bike slowly rusting away.