The Art of Looking

Over the years I have owned various Look frames all picked up on eBay second hand.

It started ten or so years ago with a KG221 that I built up with 10 speed Campagnolo Record and Neutron wheels. I rode it an awful lot but then, for some reason that escapes me now, I sold it and there followed five or six lookless years as I larked around on a Basso Loto SLX and a Serotta Colorado.

The Basso I sold, the Serotta I kept. Though dormant, my desire for another Look didn’t diminish, and eighteen or so months ago I made up for lost time with a flurry of late night eBay purchases. It started with a KG381 Jalabert that for some reason I never built up; something to do with an unreasonable dislike for its red and black livery. Soon this was replaced by a 565, that I built up with Chorus 11 speed and some carbon wheels borrowed from the Serotta. Fun as it was, it always felt a shame that the frame was only emblazoned with Look a mere fifteen times, and so before I knew it, a more ostentatious and self-aggrandising 595 Ultra had made its way into my basket. This I built up with Super Record 11 speed and the same LB wheels as were on the 565.

I thought the itch was well and truly scratched at this point; in terms of ride quality the 595 was the best of the lot, but then, as it goes sometimes, I received a saved search notification alerting me to a brand new Look 785 Huez RS and before I knew it the die was cast and I was heading off to pick it up from a big man in a small village off a motorway in Oxfordshire.

This frame had the novelty of being able to accommodate electronic groupsets, and so I decided I’d build it up with EPS. And so began the arduous and frequently exasperating process of trying to track down the components necessary to put together a V3 Super Record groupset. After much tedious online browsing, I eventually found myself with all necessary parts to put it together. Just a case of feeding cables through a frame - easy peasy I thought. And easy peasy it was, until I came to the rear derailleur cable that was.

What first felt troublesome soon transpired as impossible. I’d been feeding the cables through with fine wire at first; much as I love Campagnolo I’d balked at the idea of spending forty pounds on their magnetic cable kit when some wire and patience would no doubt suffice. However, after an hour or so of frustrating jiggling getting nowhere fast and the rapidly depleting patience of my partner who was rotating the frame as I juggled seatpost, battery and cable I decided, much against my wishes and better judgement, to purchase the Campagnolo magnetic cable guide kit. A week later, the dismal magnet arrived in the post. A doddle thought I, however this too proved futile; the resistance in the frame meant that the EPS cable simply became disconnected from the magnet as it got stuck agonisingly close to the rear stay cable exit hole each. I tried electrical tape, I tried blessing it with holy water and I even tried reading the Campagnolo manual and still no luck. To give an idea of how much resistance there was, the rubberised cable of the magnetic guide snapped in two as I tried to get it through and out of the exit hole. Cue another fun twenty minutes trying to dislodge the severed end and rattle it out of the frame. Infuriatingly, the derailleur cable would pass through fine when threaded in reverse, running from the exit hole on the stay backwards towards the bottom bracket, but it would not go the other way, no matter what I tried.

If there was an award for generosity and altruism in the cycling industry there can’t be many better candidates than Graeme King of Velotech, the doyen of all things Campagnolo and someone who is always eager and willing to share his wisdom and experience. Over the phone he confirmed my suspicions that there was likely carbon residue in the frame, adding that it was probably acting as a barb allowing the cable to pass through unimpeded in one direction, but blocking it in the other. He suggested the rather esoteric approach of gluing builders’ sand to a brake cable outer and using that to slowly wear away at the inside of the stay but warned that though he has done this with success it can take hours and hours and hours to do.

Normally I am loathe to hand things over to bike shops, but at this point I was feeling somewhat defeated, and so off I trudged to my local friendly and good mechanic. He was optimistic he could solve it but two hours later he sent me a text message admitting defeat, saying he’d never seen so stubborn a frame before in all his years of wrenching. I was going to head in to speak to him today about it, and of course to pick up the frame at the same time, but when I called I was informed that he wasn't able to come in today - no doubt traumatised by the whole experience.

And so now I find myself posting a long and rambling opening post for a current project that may never get built. I am aware that I could port mechanical parts across or I could run di2 on it, but I do not want to, I want to run EPS. So help me God. I dearly hope that someone here might have the advice, guidance or knowhow, that offer an alternative to hours and hours and hours rubbing sand glued to a cable against the inside of a tube that I cannot even see...

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