BSA Golden Fifty

Some time ago I picked up a BSA Golden Fifty racer. Sadly it had been sprayed orange probably about 20 years ago and is a testament to the how useless a can of car spray paint can be. I was thinking of rebuilding it and spending some time and effort on creating a nice custom ride but now I'm not so sure.

My question is. Is this frame really worth the effort and if not what makes should I be looking for. I really like frames with fancy lugs etc but appreciate these older frames are typically quite heavy.

An put up some photos if of interest...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/16041188@N00/7172167991

Does it have BSA parts?

Not that I can see. It has an SR crank, Campag rear mech and Thurel? Gears. I suspect whoever sprayed it up tried giving it a face lift of sorts at the same time.

http://www.lfgss.com/thread57885.html

Looks like the golden fifty was a budget model
unless I'm wrong as usual

If you're going to spend money, rule no 1 is get something made from Reynolds 531 tubing
Old Reynolds frames are as light/lighter than any steel frame

Thanks Hilly Ben - that link is one of the few BSA links to be found on the net. Guess that says a lot really.

Have a look on the classic lightweights website
Vintage bike porn

My flatmate's got a Golden Fifty - as said, it's a fairly heavy low-end 60's frame. Fine for a beater/runabout, but not worth spending too much time or money on.

Thanks for the input all - been drooling on the classic lightweights website ;-)

I've got a BSA Courier that I'm building up atm, loving the way its turning out. The wheels were a bit battered and finding 26 x 1 1/4 rims was a bitch, one of the fork dropouts literally fell off, and the rear dropouts have been somewhat bent over the years before i bought it. Got the whole bike for £33

This is what I've done to the bike posted above.
Quite a bit rattier by now though..

That's alright.......functional etc...

Get a brighter lightbulb before photos though :0)

That is looking very good Bjorn - nice to see the original paint job still intact!