Wheeler (?) Titanium 1996 – Build Thread 🦾✌️

[lukash]

After a long sleep, these titanium tubes are waking back to life.

The frame belongs to a friend who used to race in the Czech MTB Cup for a local club in the nineties, riding GT bikes.
The Wheeler came to him later. He barely used it, and it sat in his basement for ages. Three years ago, he decided to hand it over to me – so I could bring it back to life for him.

But then he dropped the idea and went completely silent. The frame stayed in my workshop under the table. Once I built it up with my own parts just out of curiosity, once I stripped it back down to the bare frame, twice I almost returned it, three times I unsuccessfully tried to buy it off him.

My friend alternated between silence and promises, until yesterday we finally reached an agreement. The frame stays in his ownership, but he’ll leave it in my long-term custody, and I’m free to build it up and ride it. I’m happy.

According to the serial number it’s a 1996 model, but the exact type is unknown. Can you help me? Wheeler catalogs are nowhere to be found.

 

[joglo]

Nice frame and a nice story or background! Thanks for sharing this.

According to the serial number it’s a 1996 model, but the exact type is unknown. Can you help me? Wheeler catalogs are nowhere to be found.

We've done a good job and found quite some old suff
https://www.retrobike.co.uk/archive/categories/wheeler.347/
but indeed second half of nineties is still pretty missing.

My understanding was so far that Wheeler has offered Titanium bikes only fro a few years up to 1994.
In the dutch 95 catalog there is still a Titanium frame shown on page 2+3, but this wasn't offered that year any longer.

Yours looks also in terms of cnc dropouts or the s-bend stays a bit younger than the other, known Wheeler Titanium bikes.
Still it has the noodel for the rear canti brake, so it must have been before v-brake break through in 1997.

Maybe a frame set outside of typical portfolio and catalogs only for selected riders?