Asortablog
http://homepage.mac.com/rsmith85/blogwavestudio/
|
|
| An Almost New Italian Bike | | Date Created: 28 Jan, 2006, 04:39 PM |
 After my rear mech decided to shear off at the rear gear hanger on my bike whilst going to the pub one night I had to do some serious repairs to get my bike to go again. Not only was my rear mech destroyed, my rear wheel was no longer healthy, my front wheel needed truing (but this has been the case for a while) and my gear shifters had given up also.
I weighed up the options for replacements but because my shifters had died and were not fixable (shimano, great stuff but not good to repair), my rear mech also needed replacing as did my wheels and cassette I thought it was about time to start again.
I purchased a new Campagnolo Mirage Compact groupset with a 13-26 rear cassette and a 48/34 175mm crankset. I also purchased some 2005 Campag Vento wheels to replace the hand built ones which had given up the ghost. All in black and very nice looking. |
| I took the bike to "Albert Butterworths" bike shop to get it all fitted. He seemed like a nice bloke over the phone, his shop was small and he turned out to be a fantastic mechanic. I would rather spend my money for repairs on a small company with good service than a large company that doesn't really need my money. The bike went in on Monday and was finished by Friday, working perfectly and this was when he was extremely busy. Fantastic service especially as he had to realign the rear mech hanger as it had been twisted when the rear mech sheared (great to have a steel bike). |
 The bike is almost all an Italian bike now. The Frame (lugged steel) is made by OLAGNERO who is a small bike maker in Italy. The groupset/wheels are Campagnolo. Even the tyres are Vittoria (It). All I have to do is replace the bottle cages (have some italian ones for my new bike so may get carbon for that and put the italian ones on my winter steed). Finishing kit is old ITM and TTT which may get replaced (especially the bars as I like shallow ergo drops as I find them comfier).
Anyway I have refitted my bike speedo today and went out on my training loop (short but lots of hills to sprint up) and got a ridiculously slow time for the ride due to not cycling enough and brake cable stretch which meant that my rear wheel barely was turning up one of the hills. A quick fix of that and I was away again.
| Time | Distance | Average Speed | Max Speed |
0hr45min11sec dtd | 10.9miles | 14.9mph | 39.8 |
|
 The bike itself performed really well and was much much quicker than before (with the old parts). The cable stretch mentioned above really slowed me down, but this should stop in a few miles and is easy to fix.
The wheels seem very nice, great rolling and not too heavy, but by no means as light or great for climbing as a light weight set. Mind you I am a heavy bloke and do not enjoy blowing through spokes so these should do me well. I have a pair of 32spoke DN6 (MA3 esque)/105 coming for my new bike so I will have something decent to compare them too soon.
I will post a full review of the parts after I have actually put some miles on it. |
|
|
|
|
