Holdsworth Frame Numbers

[wolber]

Thank you Doug, great information

I am attempting to add photos

http://s1324.photobucket.com/user/bruce ... Holdsworth



Wolber

 

[CBguy]

Wolber,

I believe frame 7331 is a 1973 WF Holdsworth, Putney Shop Italia model. Italias were often built by outside contract builders and often for shop stock. ( http://retroride.blogspot.com/2007/05/h ... _1672.html ) Yours may very well be original paint as has usual shop seat stay cap lining. Dave Scrimshaw and I have discussed this style of dating serial in the past at length as well as in other threads and it appears from his data that quite probably outside "Shop" contractors were, as a general rule, using a 2 digit dating code in early 70's where as Roy Thame's main buider Tommy Quick appears to be still using (in 1973) numbers prefixed by 69 and placed along BB edge. Two possible outside builders described by Kilgariff are well respected builders for the "trade" Charlie Roberts and Alec Bird.

If you have an Excel reader and search Dave's data you will see besides factory builds, examples of other shop builds for this period, as well as graphs and prediction table. "Shop" builds are much less common.

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/ ... TNKZkN4TmM

Doug

 

[dwscrimshaw]

Doug

Yes, the site is back up and running unfortunately the links to the "shop range" are not working I wonder if anyone made any copies of what the information was. I am in work at the moment but will take some photos this evening and see if i can upload them. So the first two digits are the year, 1973 thanks.

added a link to photos
http://s1324.photobucket.com/user/bruce ... Holdsworth


Wolber

I have had a look at the link on the site around 1973, all looks ok. I can access the links to the pictures Doug has added. Which links were you trying?

 

[wolber]

Sorry my mistake, I thought the highlighted red "shop range" was a link. I can access all the links, fantastic information

 

[dwscrimshaw]

Thanks, that good to hear.

 

[torqueless]

Re:

I respectfully disagree with Doug on this one.

I'm not so sure wolber's frame is a shop model- I'd expect at least an allen key binder bolt housing if it was?

The only thing I can see preventing that frame from being a factory Super Mistral is the lack of chrome, which is not enough to convince me it's not a Super Mistral..

 

[Wileyone]

Re: Re:

I respectfully disagree with Doug on this one.

I'm not so sure wolber's frame is a shop model- I'd expect at least an allen key binder bolt housing if it was?

The only thing I can see preventing that frame from being a factory Super Mistral is the lack of chrome, which is not enough to convince me it's not a Super Mistral..

I was wondering the same thing. At one time did the shop change from using screws for the Headbadge? This one seem to be held on with rivets.

 

[Eric_Luttrell]

I purchased this La Quelda from Hilary Stone and had it shipped across the pond. It's a 53cm which will be much better for my trike project than the 61cm frame I recently purchased. The serial number on the BB is 7870 and has an H just below the number. This would put it smack into 1947. The fork is not the original fork, but it will do nicely once I get the frame, fork and trike conversion unit repainted. The frame will require a trip to my nearby frame builder Bernie Mikkelsen so he can take the dent out of the top of the head tube and make sure the rear dropouts are straight and aligned.

All in all I'm very pleased. That it's 71 years old leaves me gob smacked to be sure.

 

[dwscrimshaw]

Thanks, logged the frame number. Do the forks look like genuine Holdsworth? if so I could use the number, can you confirm as I can't read it from the picture.

Thanks

 

[Eric_Luttrell]

The forks look enough like Holdsworth forks that I've got no qualms about using them. They probably aren't Holdsworth forks. I can barely read the numbers myself even in a good light. It looks like there's a 22 with a space, then maybe 427? Someone wrote over the top of the stamped numbers with a felt tip pen which doesn't help.

The attached photo is a pretty 1948 La Quelda currently for sale at Hilary Stone. The fork crown is quite different.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/39323768@N04/5387381473

There's a 1947 La Quelda in this flickr photo that has an altogether different style of fork crown.

Given these two examples, I suspect the fork I got is quite a bit newer than the frame.

Cheers,

- Eric