Whacky Hungarian ebay Descriptions

I recently bought a Campy Chorus derailleur on ebay. Apparently some guy, who refers to himself as norbike2009 has access to a butt load of Campy parts. What sets him apart is he operates out of Budapest. After purchasing the derailleur ebay showed me some of his other parts for sale and opened a treasure trove of English as a second language descriptors . In some cases I have no idea what he is trying to say.


Campagnolo Super Record cranksets (PART!!)

MADE IN ITALY

170 STRADA (7)
53 - 42
9/16" x 20

USED (State: was useful strongly, worn, scratched. The left side pedal crank taking the procession of a screw wrong)




Speciality from Campagnolo factory.

In original packaging 30 pieces of component not cultivated yet. (mat)

MADE IN ITALY


Campagnolo Titanium Record 8 Speed Rear Derailleur Part!!!!

USED (The ingot cracked, one of the cogwheels it is necessary to exchange a trundle for smaller one because the one with a suitable size is not in him.)


Misc Italian Frames
#1(On the frame on more place paint flaking, mainly on the lower pipe. Injury, dent, correction, I did not find it)

#2( On the frame on more place the paint is crackling.. There are not a correction, a dent, injury on him)



Campagnolo SYNCRO 2 NOS shifters, friction mode

NEW (The cogwheel, and the bowdenek they are missing. The box is visible on the pictures in a state)

MADE IN ITALY

FixGear Silliness

I do miss Bike Snob NYC when he used to cruise FixGear Gallery or Craig’s list and find some of those bikes that don't just rise to the top of the milk. So occasionally I entertain myself by writing one. The bicycle of this post was on FixGear Gallery; Sampson and his unknown brand fixie.

“ unknown road frame: paint stripped, with a touch of surface rust and sealed with a 'look through' paint. other parts found cheap on taobao handlebars: c-unit plus cheap hacksaw Built by Karl Ke (housed by Austin)”

rides like a dream, thanks









It amazing how much nonsensical information can be put into such few words, but first lets look at the bike. It’s tig wielded steel frame that has been almost stripped to bare metal. I say Almost, because for some aesthetic reason, or maybe the lack of a wire brush, the person who stripped the frame decided to leave a good quantity of the old white paint on the fork crown, bottom bracket and fork dropouts. This might not have been a big deal, except the “builder” decided to clear coat the frame, or “look through paint.” I’m not sure if there is a difference between clear coating and “look through paint,” but apparently it has something to do with a “touch of surface rust”. The next thing you notice is the artistic use of contrast by mounting a white painted front wheel, on a frame with "look through paint". Very nice.

Next we have the handlebars described as: "c-unit plus cheap hacksaw." One is left with a conundrum here; was there some aesthetic purpose to using a cheap hacksaw, or his he trying to mitigate a poor hack job, aka flop and chop minus the flop. I mean looking at the handlebars, how much could he have chopped anyway? 2 inches? There is also the issue with the length of the crank arms being used with this build. Traditionally one uses short crank arms to stop one from striking the ground with your pedals, but not this builder. Not only would these cranks necessitate the riding in one direction at a time without ever turning, it also can be used as a kickstand when the need arises. The owner says the bike “rides like a dream”, but he really doesn’t say what kind of dream. I would guess he dreams of walking besides his fixie trying to stop the pedals from putting divots in the asphalt. Finally one has to wonder about all the people involved with this bike. This bike is owned by Sampson, built by Karl Ke and housed by Austin. Wow! It took all these people to make a bike that looks and works like this does. I does make one wonder.

Identifying My Campagnolo Components

As I explained in an earlier post 3Rensho Specialized Allez, about ten years ago I bought an older Cannondale bike on ebay for about $500. The bike was originally a gift for my brother, but the old style Campy components (why the bike got my attention) proved too much for him. The bike hung around in his garage for a number of years, until I came across the beautiful Specialized frame at my LBS. I didn't have any components for the frame, so I traded the Cannondale back for another bike and swapped the parts. The only parts I needed to buy was a front derailleur, seatpost and brake levers. I ride the bike around from time to time, but have never sat back and really identified what parts are on the bike. Vintage Campagnolo is renown for not labeling their components with identifying markings other than "Campagnolo." There is really no way to know what vintage parts you have without doing some detective work. Most of the info I got was from Velobase.com and Campyonly.com. What I discovered was the Cannondale was obviously someone's project bike and they just draped it with some of the best parts they could find.

The first photo is the Crankset which I have identified as Super Record. There is also an "11" on the crank arm which I have read means it was manufactured in 1985.


Next are the hubs, which are Nuovo Record

The brakes are Nuovo Record

I can't photograph the bottom bracket but I'm fairly sure it looks like this; Nuovo Record

The headset is also Nuovo Record

The shifters are C-Record Syncro II (7 speed)

The original rear derailleur I later identified as Athena. One person who saw the bike said they believed it didn't fit with the rest of the parts; further my mechanic told me the derailleur seemed a little tweaked and might have been in an accident, even though it seemed to shift fine to me (as well as Syncros shift). Based on all this I bought a Chorus of the same vintage to work with the Syncro II shifters. I later discovered the Athena derailleur was indeed the right period derailleur for the shifters.

Here is the upgraded Chorus derailleur

This is the original Athena derailleur

The pedals are Record Supperleggeri; I added the toe clips and straps.

As I mentioned before, I bought three components. The first was a Victory front derailleur, which is probably the lowest part of the Campy food chain on this bike. I upgraded that derailleur to the Chorus you see below.

Here is the original Victory front derailleur

The next was a budget buster but worth it; the seatpost is a NOS Nuovo Super Record

And finally the brake levers, which are famous Super Record made out of drillelium.
So there it is, a fun lesson in Campagnolo components. I may be wrong about a part or two but I doubt it.