A Pinarello Party!

   Because I will soon have five bicycles of the legendary Italian brand in my home, including my own FP2, someone is going to think I am a Pinarello dealer. As I always point out, more Tours de France have been won on bikes built by Giovanni Pinarello’s company than those made by any other. Sure, Pedro Delgado, Miguel Indurain, Brad Wiggins and Chris Froome would be outstanding cyclists on ANY bike, but their choice of machine certainly stands out!

   As expected, with my recent run of luck, the cracked carbon frame appears more serious than just a paint flaw. It was suggested that I take the frame to a Pinarello dealer to see if the company might have some type of second owner replacement policy, which some manufacturers have started to honor in order to claim life-long customers for their products. Luckily, Tailwind Bicycles in Schwenksville, just a 15-minute drive away, sells Pinarellos, but I was quickly informed that they don’t have such a program in place.

   Another option was to have the shop contact Pinarello about “crash replacement”, which the clerk informed me doesn’t actually have to involve some type of accident. Well, unfortunately the company didn’t come through, as far as any type of replacement for the cracked carbon frame, since they have a 3-year window in which such problems to be taken care of. With this being a 2010 frame and since I had no proof of original purchase to aid in establishing timeline, I can’t really blame them.

   In order to recover as much of the financial deficit as possible, I’m attempting to sell the frameset on eBay, with hope that there is someone out there willing to take on the repair. Perhaps he/she has the carbon skills to do so or might want to pay to have the work done. The price I’ve seen for the repair/paint, not to mention shipping back and forth to the West Coast (where the most reputable outfits all seem to be), will just put me deeper into a hole.

   I’m also planning to use the components, which are in fantastic condition, to build up another Pinarello, since the majority of the parts are MOst (correct typography), the company’s in-house brand. I found a fantastic 2003 Prince SL frame (photo above) on eBay at an incredible price, considering its original MSRP was $2700! I don’t know if the owner was impatient or desperate for cash, but I seriously hope there is a chance I can make back all of the money I’ve spent on this FP2 disaster, just with this Prince build.

   Bruce did an amazing job matching up the look of the paint on the ‘70s Gran Turismo. The top tube had looked like someone got into the very bad habit of leaning the bike or perhaps locking it up to something, and the paint was scraped away badly the length of the tube. You can see a bit of the damage in the top left of the photo below.

   I didn’t want to totally repaint the frame, mainly because I didn’t want to sink a lot of money into the original cash/trade transaction for the dark blue Treviso I had built, but also because this Treviso’s paint had such a cool aged look. The bike had an undercoat of gold with a transparent red, perhaps a tinted clearcoat, on top. Over time, some of the red faded or wore off in spots, giving the bike a really unique patina, particularly around the lugs, which almost appeared to have a gold outlining.

   Before I started to work on the bike, I had consulted with Bruce, and we came up with the idea of spot-sanding the top tube only, down to the bare metal. He was going to experiment a bit with gold and red to come up with the best effect before final painting. He intended to blend in the color as he worked towards the lugs, and he did some fantastic work (see photo above)!

   My last attempt to figure out what was wrong with the shifting on the Vuelta was to install the SRAM rear derailleur from the damaged FP2, just to make sure the right-hand shifter wasn’t the problem. After a few small adjustments to align the 10-speed derailleur to the 9-speed cassette, it shifted perfectly up and down through all cogs! I was convinced that it had to be the Athena derailleur’s awkward cable routing causing a pinch spot and just enough tension to mess up the shifts.

   When I was finally fed up trying to find a cable solution, I took the bike over to Bikesport for a second opinion. After they had no better luck with the Athena derailleur, I took their advice and I decided to buy a different Campagnolo derailleur that was 9-speed-specific. The Campagnolo Record derailleur works very well, and I will include the Athena derailleur in the sale, just to keep the complete group together. The part performs perfectly with friction shifters, so maybe it can be used somewhere else.

   Finally, here are some photos of the completed Vuelta build: