His bikes

[non-fixie]

Never seen a 531 decal like that before.

Style and material are somewhat reminiscent of the "R.C." tubing decals that were used by Superia. Same supplier perhaps?

Which, appropriately, brings me to the bike that sports this decal, my Halfords Sport touring bike.

As it came to me many moons ago, probably all original:

Last winter I had bought a pair of cheap 650B wheels. For €55 a set I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. I dug out the Halfords from storage
as it was both my size and had enough room to accommodate those wheels with the 42mm Panaracer Pacenti tyres I had bought for them.

I threw whatever parts at it that I had that fitted the look I was after, resulting in this:

Rather pleased with myself I decided to bring it along on a cycling vacation in France mrs non-fixie had planned. I did exchange the gorgeous Lohmann saddle, which is rock-hard, with an Idéale 76. Much more comfortable, although it creaks like an old mattress.

It rode rather well, not in the least because of the plush tyres. Unfortunately that lasted less than a day. Apparently I hadn't been paying attention, and one of the brake pads had scoured the rear tyre. Booomphsssss ...

I managed to limp home, after fitting a new inner tube and a €10 bill:

It happened on a Sunday, and the only thing I could find on Monday morning were a pair of cheap BTWIN Cityprotect tyres at a local Decathlon outlet, for which I was very thankful, as they enabled me to resume my vacation as planned:

On the way back we stopped at Oudenaarde in Belgium for the RetroRonde van Vlaanderen. There I found another pair of 650B tyres in the classic brick red colour.

The bike rack on the car works well as an impromptu work stand:

Those Chinese Hutchinson copies ride a bit nicer than the BTWIN items, and I really like the looks:

 

[Guinessisgoodforyou]

Style and material are somewhat reminiscent of the "R.C." tubing decals that were used by Superia. Same supplier perhaps?

Which, appropriately, brings me to the bike that sports this decal, my Halfords Sport touring bike.

As it came to me many moons ago, probably all original:

Last winter I had bought a pair of cheap 650B wheels. For €55 a set I wanted to see what all the fuss was about. I dug out the Halfords from storage
as it was both my size and had enough room to accommodate those wheels with the 42mm Panaracer Pacenti tyres I had bought for them.

I threw whatever parts at it that I had that fitted the look I was after, resulting in this:

Rather pleased with myself I decided to bring it along on a cycling vacation in France mrs non-fixie had planned. I did exchange the gorgeous Lohmann saddle, which is rock-hard, with an Idéale 76. Much more comfortable, although it creaks like an old mattress.

It rode rather well, not in the least because of the plush tyres. Unfortunately that lasted less than a day. Apparently I hadn't been paying attention, and one of the brake pads had scoured the rear tyre. Booomphsssss ...

I managed to limp home, after fitting a new inner tube and a €10 bill:

It happened on a Sunday, and the only thing I could find on Monday morning were a pair of cheap BTWIN Cityprotect tyres at a local Decathlon outlet, for which I was very thankful, as they enabled me to resume my vacation as planned:

On the way back we stopped at Oudenaarde in Belgium for the RetroRonde van Vlaanderen. There I found another pair of 650B tyres in the classic brick red colour.

The bike rack on the car works well as an impromptu work stand:

Those Chinese Hutchinson copies ride a bit nicer than the BTWIN items, and I really like the looks:

View attachment 903405

Blur your eyes and it's an RH. Very nice. Edit have you altered the fork rake for the 650b conversion?

 

[non-fixie]

@non-fixie you have great taste in bikes. They all look great - classic and functional.

Thank you. I think so too.

On a more serious note: besides wanting to have 'a few' classic racing bikes to take to events like L'Eroica, I am on a permanent quest for The Perfect Sports Touring Bike.

Speaking of which, one of the first builds that made me think I was getting somewhere was this Austro-Daimler Inter-10.

I had read about those Austro-Daimlers on Bikeforums C&V and knew they were much loved by their owners. However, they were never sold in Europe. So when I found an imported Inter-10 in my size I jumped at it.

Seller's picture:

It had been stored in a damp shed and the cleaning and lubing took quite some time. With new grease, cables and bar tape:

Before making any further changes I took it for a long ride to see whether it was as nice as I was led to believe. It was. I believe the geometry and tubing were specified by the American importer and they did a good job.

After that I added a pair of Bluemels Club Special mudguards and changed the saddle to a 'vegan leather' San Marco. The mudguards were fine, the plastic saddle wasn't.

After some interesting reading about the 'Shimagnolo' concept and finding a pair of suitable Ergo shifters I decided to use the Austro-Daimler as a guinea pig:

I liked the result, both in how it looked and how it worked, so I took on a cycling vacation to Italy:

That went well, so it came along on our next trip, this time to France:

Lovely! So later that year, when back in Italy:

One of my favourite bikes, but I suppose you got that by now.

 

[non-fixie]

Blur your eyes and it's an RH. Very nice. Edit have you altered the fork rake for the 650b conversion?

Thank you. No, I have not made any changes to either the frame or the forks.

 

[Guinessisgoodforyou]

The AD is gorgeous, I too have been looking for one.