It has happened for the second time this year - I've been nearly cleared out of all finished bicycles! I started with seven bikes hanging in my shop rafters this spring, and all but two were gone before the summer set in. I eventually built up five more bicycles, and even had a couple custom jobs thrown in, and now only one is left...and I'm just saying, that one bike, the Patelli, is absolutely gorgeous - I think you need to see it in person, as photos just don't do the shiny chrome justice!
Anyhow, I'm stocking up again, and I also helped find bicycles for a couple new customers who have visited the blog to see my work and wanted me to find a special vintage machine for them. Knowing that, particularly in the current global bicycle shortage, the Colnagos and Pinarellos out there were going to be costly, I suggested a couple of lesser-known, yet just as high-quality brands.
Battaglin (pronounced baht-tahl-YEEN) was a name that came up, and strangely two bicycles became available in quick succession. I actually took a drive to the Baltimore suburbs to pick up the one craigslist bike on behalf of my customer, Paul. This Battaglin had an Italian tre-colori paint job similar to my Pinarello Asolo, only the color change goes side to side, instead of top to bottom like mine.
The bike will receive some new tires and different bar tape, but Paul decided he liked the retro to modern build the previous owner had done. The polished aluminum Campagnolo Potenza components do look rather nice, but I think the Mavic Ksyrium wheels are a little too modern, particularly because they have bladed spokes. Paul suggests this is something he might change in the future, but it's his bike, after all!
The other Battaglin bicycle has some of that cool '80s smoke paint treatment that I just can't figure out how was done. I had worked on a Guerciotti bicycle a few years ago with a similar treatment. My customer Steve and I have worked out a deal where I would purchase his Battaglin from eBay, and he would give me his Francesco Moser Leader AX (frameset shown below) plus the parts from the Battaglin. I would then swap out the parts from his Moser onto his newly-acquired frameset.
I'm still on the lookout for a vintage pair of Campagnolo toeclip-style pedals, but it is otherwise complete. Steve had a really nice Chorus group that looks perfect with this early '90s frameset:
Italian #4 is a Fondriest X Status frame from the mid-‘90s, purchased from a neighbor who worked at a local shop. He had seen some of my bikes when packaging them for shipping - I hate to pack bikes, especially since I have to partially disassemble them, and I already had them fine-tuned and ready to ride!
Former pro Maurizio Fondriest started designing frames shortly after his retirement following the 1998 season. I’ve mentioned his surprise 1988 World Championship here before, but the talented Italian was a consistent presence on the podium during the following decade, winning classics like Fleche-Wallonne and Milan-San Remo, and shorter stage races, such as Tirreno-Adriatico and the Tour of Poland.
This frameset is made of welded Dedacciai steel tubes which have aero-profiled shapes, and it includes an elite-quality Time carbon fork. I don’t have a plan in place for this, but it will definitely have Campagnolo involved, along with appropriate Cinelli or 3T accessories.
I don’t browse craigslist very regularly, as it is flooded by so much garage-type quality stuff made by the major American brands, and it is quite time consuming to sift through it all. I will occasionally throw Colnago or Pinarello into the search engine and come up with something, and in this case, I netted a very nice 1980s Treviso frameset. It even came with a few extra parts that I’ve resold to shave some bucks off of the build budget, but I have a Campagnolo Athena 7-speed group set aside, and a pair of the company’s Omega wheels that will compliment this project nicely.
The last Italian is a bit of a repeat, as I found another Bianchi Alloro. I’ve talked before about being particular about the graphics on the Bianchi frames I purchase, and I dig the maroon with gold outline font on the Alloro more than most. My inspiration for this project is kinda funny – I have a bunch of British-threaded Campagnolo bottom brackets that need a home, and Bianchi is the only Italian brand that consistently uses a 68mm bottom bracket shell!
The Battaglin bought for Steve had a really nice Shimano 600/Dura-Ace component mix, and a Fuji “Finest” frameset given to me by a tall friend was to be the perfect destination for those Japanese parts! I’m not a big fan of Fuji bicycles, but this frame had a wonderful candy red paint job and silver decals that really caught the eye. Shortly after I received this frame, I was contacted by someone who’d seen a few of my past craigslist-ings, and the bike was essentially sold before even being built!
Just a final comment before signing off, I am greatly enjoying the Tour de France this year, if only because it won't be the same Team Sky/Ineos victory result in the end. I watch the Eurosport coverage, and it becomes tiring hearing about how great the British team is during every single Grand Tour! I imagine anyone not from the U.S. felt the same about watching Lance and company during his seven-year run. I especially like the thought that Ineos may come away from the Tour with absolutely nothing, not even a single stage win.
Surely, I can't be the only one who enjoys seeing big-budget teams have their plans crumble!
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