1995 Vario No Limit downhill prototype

[44Racing]

Wheels all sorted...

Front wheel is a silver 32h Hope Tech titanium suspension hub on a Mavic 117 SUP CD rim with first generation silver Hope titanium QR.

Rear wheel is a silver 32h prototype Hope Tech titanium screw-on hub with bolt through rear axle on a Mavic 117 SUP CD rim. I have an 8 speed Sachs small block screw-on cassette to fit, however I am just waiting for a tool to arrive in order to remove the original Suntour 7 speed screw-on cassette currently fitted.











I have also made a start on refurbishing the SPRING forks

 

[44Racing]

Sourced X2 sets of NOS Hope brake pads for the rear prototype Hope disc…more importantly they come with original Hope decals

 

[44Racing]

NOS Michelin WildGripper DH Mud tyres fitted using the bikes original 1995 Michelin tubes

 

[44Racing]

Finally got time to strip down and service the prototype Hope rear disc caliper that came on the bike. Due to it being a prototype it has a few subtle differences and fixtures from the production version, so I wanted to retain all of the original fixtures to keep the provenance of it...however I did fit NOS brake pads as the original ones were heavily contaminated.

 

[44Racing]

Not many updates recently due to having not much spare time.

Removed the original headset today in order replace it with an XTR M900 headset and noticed that the strange looking headtube is a one piece machined bit of aluminium, but it also has machined strengthening rings / inserts in the top and bottom cups. Being a 1 of 1 prototype I am not sure if this labour intensive process made it onto the production bikes

 

[44Racing]

Couldn’t resist a bit of euro NOS anodised retro bling so have fitted these TEC Products (made in Italy) collars to the NOS M737 SPD pedals for that added factory look.

Of note they were an utter pig to fit and I almost sacked off the idea mid switch, but they look cool / different and I also have a matching TEC Products rear mech hanger bolt for XTR rear mech

 

[44Racing]

XTR M900 headset fitted

 

[44Racing]

After searching for original period correct Vario frame decals with no luck at all and all enquiries exhausted I had the ever so talented @gil_m at Retro Decals re-draw the original frame decals from photos of Francois Dolas Vario / MTB Diffusion team bike. Gil also re-drew the MTB Diffusion logo (Grenoble, France based importer / distributor / shop of Vario, Hope, Marin). Gil also produced period correct Power Bar decals for the build.




I also managed to source a number of original sponsor decals for the build

 

[mk one]

Great attention to detail as usual

 

[44Racing]

Great attention to detail as usual

Cheers mate