Pre 1950s rides of LFGSS: old bikes, vintage rats, classic lightweights

I seem to remember that Chater crank I mentioned had broken in a similar place to your BSA - it wasn't on the pedal thread, which seems more common with ali cranks.

I've got an ancient BSA fluted crank in use - I will give it a very careful examination.

Very few old steel cranks are getting any serious use these days, so it's hard to know whether breakages would be frequent if they had more use. My policy will be to trust to luck - and careful inspection !

Leader Cycles

The brand name of Ted Woodall, a south London builder of high reputation.

I'm quite surprised to find that the V-CC has no marque enthusiast, but there's a fair amount of information on the internet.

It's been suggested that Woodall built the 'Hercules' frames used by Hercules pros in the fifties (Ken Joy, Eileen Sheridan etc.) and this certainly seems likely because they were managed by Frank Southall who was a Norwood Paragon man.

He also built for Jensen, which supplied prestigious frames to top south London riders.

Jensen was run by John Barclay, a Pedal Club member, now in his tenth decade, who had a very long career as a coach, and has only recently stopped taking young hopeful 'coureurs' to Belgium. So doubtless Woodall's frames saw plenty of action in Belgian kermesses

You are welcome, first time I've been able to help someone identify a frame!

Funnily enough I moved the Clubweight on when I got hold of the other two - which are both Criteriums. If you don't know already the Criterium had a 1 1/8" oversized top-tube, I think from 1948 onwards. I got one that had been overpainted and then another in original paint I had oggled on the interweb for a while showed up on Ebay. Both for something like £150 with delivery and no useful / sellable components.

I feel like the original paint one was a bargain, the other about right. Hard to know though as the original paint Blue Ribband track model on Ebay still hasn't sold for £550, nor the other original paint lugged model for £400.

I think it's quite hard to tell the models apart, as far as I know you could get any model with lugs or lugless. So without lugs, an identifying feature like the oversized top tube or a special paint scheme there's not loads to go on. I wasn't sure on my Clubweight, so checked with Peter Lowry and he was sure :) I think I bought it for < £200 a few years ago but it had a Lytaloy headset and seatpost clamp and that nice badge. Think I sold it for ~ £80 without the headset and clamp, which are both pretty ratty but hard to come by. Sooo I don't think your frame is worth much I'm afraid, but probably good to ride. Worth building up to see if you like it before spending money / time refinishing as you will spend more on it than you'll get back! I liked that a standard colour in the 1952 catalogue was a magenta flam - that's what I had planned :)

I guess the oiler port in the back of the head tube is an after market addition. Don't think I've seen that on any Hobbs in all my oggling.

Bruce's Bike's has an original paint Superbe barn find http://brucesbikes.blogspot.com/2015/09/1948-hobbs-barn-find.html

Here's another lugless thread https://www.retrobike.co.uk/threads/1948-hobbs-super-course.341552/

Peter Lowry's original paint Super Course is possibly the nicest bike on the internet, if you haven't seen it http://www.hetchins.org/hobbs-01.htm

I'm not sure how long the special paint schemes lasted, I think they were dropped by 1950.

I'll start a build thread on my Criteriums at some point, I've gathered quite a lot of material! Attached are a couple of pics of the one in original paint.

2 Attachments

Forgot this one! Loads of great Hobbs info https://www.lfgss.com/conversations/229926/?offset=700

Hi again. Yes I've seen pics of this one whilst searching for Hobbs info. Looks nice, are you planning on refurbishing?
Any suggestions about where to get components chrome plated? I've just got a quote back for a chainset from Ashford plating of £144! Seems unreal.
Happy Hobbing!
C

Not refurbishing that one. The other that has already been repainted is at Argos at the moment - they’ve used my original paint one as a template to recreate the paint scheme 🤩

With rechroming the polishing is really important. Even then I’ve found it really hard to get an end result I’m happy with / doesn’t look too rechromed. But the best I’ve used is a local guy to me in Bristol. I can go in and talk to him and explain exactly what I want.

Andrew Gardner
AG Metal Services, Avondale Works, Woodland Way, Kingswood, Bristol,
BS15 1PA
0117 904 6359 0777 432 2285 agmetal.bristol@gmail.com

Thanks for the chroming tip.
C

£330 in the end.

You know I thought it would go for more ... I doubt there's another nos set out there.

Yes I thought it would get closer to £500 in the end

Dursley Pedersen

A friend has a genuine edwardian Dursley for disposal. He's owned it for years and used to ride it, but feels he should pass it on.

I know it's not typical of bikes in this thread, but I thought I'd mention it here before it gets advertised elsewhere.

It's a 'medium' sized frame, it has a single freewheel and coaster brake. The plated parts have been re-nickled and when I last saw it (a very long time ago) it looked well restored. I think it dates from about 1905. The owner knows it's valuable, but I don't think he's motivated by greed.

If anyone's interested I can get more exact details.

@Skülly

Oooh. Probably not for me, but I’d love to have a go on it. It really is too important a bike to ride daily, more of a bike cafe wall piece! @Lew_redd?

@clubman
I'm sure there are some, me included, who'd love to see a photo of the Dursley Pedersen, if it's not too much trouble.

I know it's a horrible place, unlike here, but eBay seems like the best forum to find the right buyer.

... After the VCC have had a look perhaps.

I expect Ebay would achieve a good price, but I think the V-CC should have the first claim.

I'm not expecting to get anything out of this myself - my friend, who is not in perfect health, mentioned that he wanted to pass the bike on - I'm not sure why he hasn't advertised it already.
I need to have another talk with him - where ever it's advertised a good photo will be necessary, so I'll try to put that on here.

I look forward to it. I did start a Pedersen thread but here is as good as anywhere.

Very nice Hobbs track/path frame original paint, lytaloy headset and brass head badge. Good size too. (As in my size)!

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/vintage-Hobbs-Of-Barbican-Track-bike-frame-/115150038823?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&_trksid=p2349624.m46890.l49286&mkrid=710-127635-2958-0

Can vouch for the seller of this-I've bought from him and sold to him before with no problems at all. If it was a half inch smaller I would already have bid...

Good to know.
Not that I'm in the market for another frame at the minute, just trying to maintain the bikes I have. Out of interest @jeff80 which bike are you bringing to the 'hard day in January ride'. If you can make it.?

Probably just my Pearson Touche. IT has mudguards etc and my Paragon is running Tubs at the moment and I don't fancy risking them on January country roads!

@clubman @jeff80 or anyone else ... all that talk of snapping cranks has kept turning over in my mind. Have you had any other components break?
The only one I've had so far is a 70s alloy stem (a good quality JPR), no injury luckily I had the saddle tightly clenched in my butt. It just sheered off at the top of the seattube, I guess maybe slightly the wrong size.
Anyone ever had any issue using period alloy bars? I few years ago I looked in to it more and found a lot of scare stories on the interweb but no first hand accounts of failures. I remember some post or another saying they would fail slowly and bend, but my seatpost snapping doesn't back that up.

nothing else really no, only ever cranks for me. Not sure why that should be, as I can't see they're likely to get more abuse than any other component. The only issue I've ever had with bars is them slipping if I've not done them up tight enough at the stem, and that's generally only happened when I've had an accident or had to put the brakes on suddenly and hard in an 'emergency' in heavy traffic/with pedestrians around etc..
The only other part that has failed for me is teeth on rear sprockets or a chainring breaking off or wearing down-but that was only ever on one bike, and that got a lot of use/abuse as a commuter that got locked up outside in all weather and had a very iffy chainlink, and the wear never caused any accidents etc, it was just annoying.

Just reread my post, I meant seatpost not stem. Ha. Makes more sense.

Ok thanks, I figured it didn't happen often. Guess like a lot of things you just need to trust your luck holds :)

Things that break

There are two categories of problems - the expected and the unexpected.

Any bike that's in use will suffer failures - transmission wear, punctures, broken spokes and
mudguards - the list of expected problems is long.

What falls into the unexpected class? It's things that don't often break like cranks and frames and which will probably cause you to call out the breakdown service (or an ambulance!)

I'm fairly lightweight and never was particularly strong, so personally I haven't suffered a great many breakages. Even so I've had two serious frame failures in the past few years: one broken down tube (see my Silver Sunbeam thread) and, more dangerously, a broken steering tube, an occasion when I was very lucky not to suffer serious injury.

For readers of this thread these failures are a serious difficulty. Apart from the main issue of personal safety, there is the problem that even if you only suffer minor injuries, people will point at you and say 'Well, I told him using that old stuff was dangerous'. Also it's only too possible that you may buy something for a high price only to have it break.

That's enough for tonight, I'll continue tomorrow with some examples.