I recently bought this bike, which on first glance looks like any old mid 1980's frame with some nice components on, but on closer inspection the frame looks like it might have some interesting history to it.
The most obvious identification mark on the frame is the rear brake hanger / cable stop, which is identical to the ones on the “first generation” Saracen and F.W.Evans bikes. I've not found anything else like it on any internet searches (and I've been doing a lot of searches) , and it appears the Saracens soon went to a single piece hanger (which would make sense given the additional production steps for the 3 piece hanger compared to a single piece). Therefore I'm 99.9% certain that this is a Saracen frame, or at least was made late '83 / early '84 in the “Saracen factory”.
I've stripped off the paint under the bottom bracket and the only numbers are a post code.
The components that aren't obvious early '90s replacements are date coded 1983:
Suntour sealed hubs are May '83
Suntour Mountech front mech is July '83
Diacompe 980 canti arms are October '83
The outer chain ring is a Sugino and looks like an '82/'83 AT (the inner rings are Ritchey, not sure how to date these. The cranks are Shimano DX so part of the early '90s upgrade/refurb)
The crazy SR MTE-100 seat post has a “D 84” code so appears to be a bit later, April 84? A bit of a curve ball but could have been swapped in a shop or something.
Now it gets interesting. There are a number of features on the frame that don't fit with the 3-piece brake hanger bikes that I've seen on here (e.g Breezerboy's Evans and UncleJack's Saracens, among others)
1. The frame has bosses for a portage strap and pump brackets behind the seat post. These may be optional extras or part of a higher specification model? (I have seen a later ('85 ?) single piece brake hangar frame with portage strap mounts http://deadrats.co.uk/gallery-1980s-sar ... m-cruiser/ )
2. There are cable guides on each side of the head tube for the gear cables. (a similar, but simple tubular, guide is on the later Kili Flyers, but they don't have lugged head tubes and have a single piece rear canti-hanger.) Again this could be to differentiate a higher spec model , however...
3. The gear cables are routed above the bottom bracket with Campagnolo braze on cable guides. All the early Saracen/Evans bikes I've seen have the cables go under the bottom bracket.
4. The seat stays do not have braze ons below the canti hanger for a pannier rack.
5. The chamfered end tops of the seat stays are concave like UncleJack's bikes but do not have any brand name stamped in them.
Now, the Saracen advert that appeared in June 1984 (http://www.retrobike.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=16983 ) shows a bike with no pannier braze ons and the rear gear cable appears to run along the top of the chain stay, so it looks like it has the cable guides on top of the bottom bracket. I don't know what the lead time for a magazine advert would have been in 1984, so how long before June they would have had to photograph a bike. Did the very first Evans/Saracen bikes have cables routed over the top of the bottom bracket and have no pannier mounts ? Is the advert bike (and perhaps mine) a “pre-production” one, before they settled on a design for series production ? Did Saracen make a few bikes before the Evans “partnership” sold through other outlets? Did Saracen (or Brian Staples's company that went on to become Saracen) make mountain bike frames for other outlets that weren't branded as Saracen/Evans ? (bit if supplementary info here about the birth of Saracen:http://www.classiclightweights.co.uk/bu ... lders.html . It mentions Staples re-badged some Japanese bikes early on, but I've looked at various '83 Japanese bikes/catalogues and none have the distinctive brake hanger. An '83 Shogun is a very similar bike though)
The final bit of the mystery is the paint. The frame has been painted with what looks like Dulux gloss at some point, but under this is a “proper” coat of “egg yolk” yellow. There is yellow over-spray inside the head tube. There are no decals anywhere. It is said that the first Saracens were either black or red, and the Evans bikes silver. It's quite possible that someone has stripped it and resprayed it yellow perhaps when it had it's early '90s "upgrades". If so how likely is it that all traces of the original paint would have been removed ? When factory sprayed how much over spray would end up in the head tube/bottom bracket etc, and would survive sand blasting when repainted ? I'm still in the process of stripping off the old paint to see what I can find, (and waiting to get a tool to knock the head set cups out and an old-fangled bottom bracket spanner) but so far there is no evidence of anything other than yellow.
I'm probably going to go with a black respray unless a good reason it was originally yellow turns up. I'm not too sure what to do about decals, it's most probable it's a Saracen so I'll probably go with that (UncleJack, if you're watching where did you get the decals for yours? Gil ?) I'll then replace the obvious non-original parts and ride it.
So there you have it. Feel free to add any information or suggestions you might have, hopefully we might learn more about the dawn of UK MTB manufacturing
If you think it's something other than a Saracen can you “show your working”, as I said previously I've looked at a lot of '80s mountain bike pictures and while some frame details are common on lots of other bikes of the period the 3 piece brake hanger seems to be unique to the Saracen built bikes. (I'm aware of the Dave Yates Vulcan, that is slightly different, I'm pretty sure this isn't a Dave Yates ).
Oh, and has anyone contacted the modern Saracen company to see of they have any archive information that might fill in the gaps around this very early period, GrahamJohnWallace perhaps?
Photos:
Rear brake hanger:
Head tube cable guides:
Above bottom bracket cable guides:
The most obvious identification mark on the frame is the rear brake hanger / cable stop, which is identical to the ones on the “first generation” Saracen and F.W.Evans bikes. I've not found anything else like it on any internet searches (and I've been doing a lot of searches) , and it appears the Saracens soon went to a single piece hanger (which would make sense given the additional production steps for the 3 piece hanger compared to a single piece). Therefore I'm 99.9% certain that this is a Saracen frame, or at least was made late '83 / early '84 in the “Saracen factory”.
I've stripped off the paint under the bottom bracket and the only numbers are a post code.
The components that aren't obvious early '90s replacements are date coded 1983:
Suntour sealed hubs are May '83
Suntour Mountech front mech is July '83
Diacompe 980 canti arms are October '83
The outer chain ring is a Sugino and looks like an '82/'83 AT (the inner rings are Ritchey, not sure how to date these. The cranks are Shimano DX so part of the early '90s upgrade/refurb)
The crazy SR MTE-100 seat post has a “D 84” code so appears to be a bit later, April 84? A bit of a curve ball but could have been swapped in a shop or something.
Now it gets interesting. There are a number of features on the frame that don't fit with the 3-piece brake hanger bikes that I've seen on here (e.g Breezerboy's Evans and UncleJack's Saracens, among others)
1. The frame has bosses for a portage strap and pump brackets behind the seat post. These may be optional extras or part of a higher specification model? (I have seen a later ('85 ?) single piece brake hangar frame with portage strap mounts http://deadrats.co.uk/gallery-1980s-sar ... m-cruiser/ )
2. There are cable guides on each side of the head tube for the gear cables. (a similar, but simple tubular, guide is on the later Kili Flyers, but they don't have lugged head tubes and have a single piece rear canti-hanger.) Again this could be to differentiate a higher spec model , however...
3. The gear cables are routed above the bottom bracket with Campagnolo braze on cable guides. All the early Saracen/Evans bikes I've seen have the cables go under the bottom bracket.
4. The seat stays do not have braze ons below the canti hanger for a pannier rack.
5. The chamfered end tops of the seat stays are concave like UncleJack's bikes but do not have any brand name stamped in them.
Now, the Saracen advert that appeared in June 1984 (http://www.retrobike.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?t=16983 ) shows a bike with no pannier braze ons and the rear gear cable appears to run along the top of the chain stay, so it looks like it has the cable guides on top of the bottom bracket. I don't know what the lead time for a magazine advert would have been in 1984, so how long before June they would have had to photograph a bike. Did the very first Evans/Saracen bikes have cables routed over the top of the bottom bracket and have no pannier mounts ? Is the advert bike (and perhaps mine) a “pre-production” one, before they settled on a design for series production ? Did Saracen make a few bikes before the Evans “partnership” sold through other outlets? Did Saracen (or Brian Staples's company that went on to become Saracen) make mountain bike frames for other outlets that weren't branded as Saracen/Evans ? (bit if supplementary info here about the birth of Saracen:http://www.classiclightweights.co.uk/bu ... lders.html . It mentions Staples re-badged some Japanese bikes early on, but I've looked at various '83 Japanese bikes/catalogues and none have the distinctive brake hanger. An '83 Shogun is a very similar bike though)
The final bit of the mystery is the paint. The frame has been painted with what looks like Dulux gloss at some point, but under this is a “proper” coat of “egg yolk” yellow. There is yellow over-spray inside the head tube. There are no decals anywhere. It is said that the first Saracens were either black or red, and the Evans bikes silver. It's quite possible that someone has stripped it and resprayed it yellow perhaps when it had it's early '90s "upgrades". If so how likely is it that all traces of the original paint would have been removed ? When factory sprayed how much over spray would end up in the head tube/bottom bracket etc, and would survive sand blasting when repainted ? I'm still in the process of stripping off the old paint to see what I can find, (and waiting to get a tool to knock the head set cups out and an old-fangled bottom bracket spanner) but so far there is no evidence of anything other than yellow.
I'm probably going to go with a black respray unless a good reason it was originally yellow turns up. I'm not too sure what to do about decals, it's most probable it's a Saracen so I'll probably go with that (UncleJack, if you're watching where did you get the decals for yours? Gil ?) I'll then replace the obvious non-original parts and ride it.
So there you have it. Feel free to add any information or suggestions you might have, hopefully we might learn more about the dawn of UK MTB manufacturing
If you think it's something other than a Saracen can you “show your working”, as I said previously I've looked at a lot of '80s mountain bike pictures and while some frame details are common on lots of other bikes of the period the 3 piece brake hanger seems to be unique to the Saracen built bikes. (I'm aware of the Dave Yates Vulcan, that is slightly different, I'm pretty sure this isn't a Dave Yates ).Oh, and has anyone contacted the modern Saracen company to see of they have any archive information that might fill in the gaps around this very early period, GrahamJohnWallace perhaps?
Photos:
Rear brake hanger:
Head tube cable guides:
Above bottom bracket cable guides:
