Help identifying - mid/late 80s double u brake bike

Mike_

Dirt Disciple
I've bought another mystery bike for under £20 from facebook marketplace, advertised as a 'cheap bike' for the princely sum of £18 I could see it had a front U Brake so obviously had to have it.

Although it looks like it's spent several years at the bottom of a canal at one stage in its life it was clearly cherished and has the same kind of upgrades I was doing as a 15/16 year old in 87/88.

Component wise there is a mix of MT60 and MT62 Deore, 7spd thumbshifters mounted under the bars and the original biopace replaced with round 28/38/52 rings, XT pedals, theres a 105 headset and the wheels are, suprisingly true and smooth rolling Mavic Oxygen M6CD rims on deore hubs, and of course double MT60 U brakes.

There are no decals on the frame, from a distance it looks like it could be fairly good - fastback stays, neat tig welds etc but it's got a 21.1mm stem and 26.2 seatpost which I associate with more 'gas-pipe' tubng. Blue paint looks original, there are plenty of scuffs and missing bits and I can't see evidence of previous colours underneath.

The closest match I've managed to find on google is the Emmelle Dolomite, but I've only found images of them in white and red - I believe the pre 90s Emmelles' were far better than the BSOs they became associated with and possibly bought frames in from other manufacturers, could this be another supplier of the same basic bike or just a different colourway.

Most importantly though this one is actually my size so I'm inclined to give it some love and ride it.

So, what do the good people of Retrobike think it is?

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I've bought another mystery bike for under £20 from facebook marketplace, advertised as a 'cheap bike' for the princely sum of £18 I could see it had a front U Brake so obviously had to have it.

Although it looks like it's spent several years at the bottom of a canal at one stage in its life it was clearly cherished and has the same kind of upgrades I was doing as a 15/16 year old in 87/88.

Component wise there is a mix of MT60 and MT62 Deore, 7spd thumbshifters mounted under the bars and the original biopace replaced with round 28/38/52 rings, XT pedals, theres a 105 headset and the wheels are, suprisingly true and smooth rolling Mavic Oxygen M6CD rims on deore hubs, and of course double MT60 U brakes.

There are no decals on the frame, from a distance it looks like it could be fairly good - fastback stays, neat tig welds etc but it's got a 21.1mm stem and 26.2 seatpost which I associate with more 'gas-pipe' tubng. Blue paint looks original, there are plenty of scuffs and missing bits and I can't see evidence of previous colours underneath.

The closest match I've managed to find on google is the Emmelle Dolomite, but I've only found images of them in white and red - I believe the pre 90s Emmelles' were far better than the BSOs they became associated with and possibly bought frames in from other manufacturers, could this be another supplier of the same basic bike or just a different colourway.

Most importantly though this one is actually my size so I'm inclined to give it some love and ride it.

So, what do the good people of Retrobike think it is?

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No idea but it's lovely @27motorhead @Imlach @Ingola @KayOs @benjabbi @Woz hopefully help will be along shortly.
 
That’s one of the pics I found and is why I thought it could be an Emmelle, but all the pics I can find of the double u brake models have alloy suntour style stems and risers, if this one has been upgraded to the current spec then why would the bars, stem and bar ends be ‘upgraded’ to heavy steel generic stuff.
 
well that was quite the rabbit hole I've spent most of the day following...

I think the Fuji/Toyo frames are probably better quality than this one, from what I have seen all the fastback frames have a shorter lug, a 'nicer' shape to the top of the stays/clamp and vertical dropouts, this one is a chunk more agricultural.

I have found something very similar in design in the 1987 Ross Mt Hood, the only slight difference I can see is the gear cable guides don't look slotted on the Ross.
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I'm not sure what the rules are on linking to other sites but there is an extract of Bicycling magazine's 1987 Buyers' Guide on bikefourms where it was reviewed, they mention that it's got a 21.1 stem rather than the more usual 22.2 so I'd say that both Emmelle and Ross used the same frames. If it is the same then it's likely to be Tange plain gauge tubing.

I'll try to strip, inspect and clean mine at the weekend and see what the date codes on components are.

Providing the rust is only surface and I can pull the BB then I can see a miami vice inspired colour scheme and some wide silver risers in its future.
 
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