Practically Classics Forum

Picked up my mother in laws old bike ! 1958 Philips Manhattan.. do i strip it respray it or oily rag it ? If i strip it ,i'll lose the decals Whats the Engish forums for old bikes called ? This bike is kinda famous... !! It's in many historic village photos,outside the Post Office where she worked.. Hence its a bit sun bleached on one side.

The classic bike scene isn't like the classic car scene and much of it would be aimed at the sporting end of the market (And even then new spares are not easy to get). To do a proper job, it needs blast cleaning and re enamelling. Someone like http://www.hlloydcycles.com/ should be able to take care of the decals.

One of the main cycling forums is http://www.bikeradar.com/forums/, though there is also http://www.bikeforums.net/forumdisplay. ... mp-Vintage. This link may be of interest - http://www.cyclemuseum.org.uk/index.php?page=1.

No! preserve/conserve it as it is - you'll never get back patina like that, I love the fact that one side is sun-bleached from being parked outside the Post Office

As you say, a bit of an oily rag and some chrome cleaning etc. should see it well protected, after all it's not like bikes suffer from structural rust like cars do.

Lovely!

after all it's not like bikes suffer from structural rust like cars do.

Perhaps less so these days, with steel no longer so common but they can and do rust through. Perhaps this example, being of heavier gauge tubing, would take longer to rust through, than a lightweight model but I've seen frames needing new tubes, due to rust from both inside and outside (Sweat falling on the top tube is a killer). If the frame rattles, when shaken (You need to take the bits off to do this), it's a bad sign; the loose bits inside are probably loose rust.

At the end of the day, it depends on what you want (Is it to be ridden?) and at what point you view patina as decay. If you want it to look right, it needs re enamelling etc but it will never be worth what you spend on it. In that respect, it's not unlike some restored cars

Maybe i could flog it to the village Post Office It rides great! All tight ,no rattles. Its a proper bike.. man, pedal hard ..you go faster, not waste energy compressing springs and power sapping fat tyres .. Bet i could whip any Halfords Apollo's on it , an i'm 52 and 20 a day !!
Just realised the bikes older than me , and it WILL probably out live me Oily rag it is.. the chrome is coming up ok too

Full suspension bikes have their place but too often, people buy them, who don't need them. Amongst the "Seated pedestrian" types, who will buy a full suspension bike for £199, they assume it will be comfortable (They overlook the 12 tons it weighs). There are also the boy racer types, who might give a couple of thousands or more, in order to impress their cycling buddies. In most cases, a hardtail (Suspension forks, esp lockable forks and rigid back) end is a good compromise for general cross country riding.

My commute to work is a mix of unsurfaced, in places rough, roads and tarmac, so I use a bike, with off road capabilities for that. However to cut down on the maintenance, it has rigid forks and an eleven speed hub gear. It runs 2.25 inch tyres and these provide a degree of cushioning, plus by standing off the saddle, my legs and arms provide the rest on the rougher dissents. Yes I can go faster, on such dissents, on a full suspension bike but you lose out on the climbs.

For road cycling, a road bike (What the layman calls a "Racer") is best, though with the state of the roads, in some places, maybe a 25mm tyre would be more likely to resist pinch flats, than a 20mm tyre (A customer recently pinch flatted a low profile car tyre, on a pot hole). A good few years ago, I did a ride, on a mountain bike, with locked out suspension forks and low drag off road tyres. I was interested to see how they compared with my road bike. I averaged just under 19mph, was a shade quicker on a fairly heavy road bike, with lights, tools, full mudguards, pannier rack and 25mm tyres (An "Audacs" bike; ideal for road riding in "British" weather). Then on another road bike (On which I have put 25 miles into one hour), I did the same ride, in similar conditions, at over 23 mph average.

As to longevity, aside from the rust issue (That Waxoyl can address), steel will outlast aluminium and carbon fibre. However, due to fashion, most serious cyclists are not interested in keeping a frame for forty years (Those days are gone). Thirty years ago the back pages of Cycling weekly was full of enamellers, who tended to be busy during the Winter months, when cyclists would get their steel frame re enamelled (Sometimes they wouldn't collect and pay for them until March ). There are not many left now, though http://www.argoscycles.com/ still do it (And they pre date the catalogue shop).

Think I'll stick to my 1970s Triumph Traffic Master The advice I heard when buying a new bike "Light, Strong, Cheap, choose two"

a few years ago i collected up the scrap from a job & there was a lovely old 50s ladies bike amongst it with a flat tyre... it sat in my shed for a few more years until i needed a cycle chain.. went to a repair shop & the chap restored old bikes, so i gave it to him.. he was well chuffed although not quite sure why i didnt want money for it...

A good few years ago, I did a ride, on a mountain bike, with locked out suspension forks and low drag off road tyres. I was interested to see how they compared with my road bike. I averaged just under 19mph

.....that was hardcore! I think the fork lockout on my off road bike is the most underused thing I've ever had...I really thought it would come in handy for road stretches but it just proved too harsh riding with a rigid straight fork with no spring in it, gruesome! I found the best option, for me anyway, is to wind the spring preload up to the max if I'm in for a long stretch of tarmac, much easier on the wrists!

My road bike has a carbon fork, now that is worth having, makes it very compliant over the rather ropey road surfaces we have on our quieter roads these days, although I do wonder about the durability of the thing hitting a pothole in the dark, given the occasional scaremongering around them!

The lockout is a hydraulic lockout, so it simply cuts out the bobbing when climbing; the fork isn't actually rigid (And will settle about 1cm). Preload isn't meant to alter spring rate as such; it's there to compensate for the rider's weight (You set it so that the forks sag a given amount, when you sit on it). As to rigid forks, the bend is there to give it flexibility. Having said that, my work bike has straight rigid forks (There is an offset) but the 2.25 inch tyres provide some cushioning. With the state of some local roads, if you ride a close clearance road bike, with 120 PSI in the tyres, you are just hitting the high spots