For Sale: Mystery Italian frame

This project has to pass into someone else's hands:

Mystery frame, looks great, rides better!

What is known:

• Frame/forks are made of high quality, very lightweight tubing, with campag dropouts and Campag (model?) headset.
  
• Rust in places - could definitely do with a respray, but no structural damage.
  

• Bottom Bracket - French threaded:

  • off-side thread is fine.
    
  • drive-side (fixed cup) thread: French thread is fine: a french bottom bracket is installed at the moment - no play - spins fine, but not buttery-smooth. At some point, somebody has installed a British (reverse threaded) fixed cup in there though! You screw one in nearly all the way by hand, but is just off-straight. ie. has been cross threaded. Does not seem to problematically impair the integrity of the French threads though; I was intending on having them chased at Condor or siomilar, but I now think this unecessary.
    
    

• A company called Abilita had something to do with the bike at some point - built, or perhaps more likely resprayed it - seemingly something to do with Paul's Cycle Services (Paul Wilkins(on) in Sturminster Newton).

• Dimensions: ST: 57cm c-t; TT: 56cm c-c; Dropouts: 126mm

• No dents, dings, cracks of any kind.

What is suspected:

• French or Italian-built frame.
  
• Columbus tubing: sticker says "speciali superbutted" which makes it either SLX, SPX, or TSX, though sticker could be a red-herring though.
  
• 'Abilita' - despite sounding Italian, is a company who did a respray at some point - see headtube badge (Abilita Dorset!).
  
  

More photos here: https://picasaweb.google.com/106925898112753957214/Abilita?authuser=0&feat=directlink

SOLD

Link not working for me.

Thanks.
Fixed!

a really nice frame here, and the fork crown is a give away on it being a superb frame- resprayed this could be fantastic for sure- thinking Legnano (ish).........

Hmmm....gonna get the old deerstalker out again...

Starting to have second thoughts about selling (sigh) - wondering what else I can sell instead....might have to put the sale on hold for a day or two...

pm

nice frame and although this doesn't directly answer your question as to who is the builder the Campagnolo Portacatena driveside dropout most likely dates it from '78 to '82 as this was the short lived period they were fitted on a lot of quality frames, the reason for the two holes....<< http://campagnolo.wikispaces.com/Portacatena >> also the frame/fork number should narrow the search. good luck!

Good knowledge, and really helpful, thanks for that...came across one of those - the portacatena - on another thread in this forum for the first time a couple of days ago - a bright orange something or other (porteur???) - I feel like the hunt is narrowing appreciably...

Sold

Additional: Under the BB, there are lots of numbers in varying states of readability... on the fork steer, there is stamped: 985CP

PS. Anyone know what the headset is?

Could be novo record if steel or super record if aluminium. Can you see any spiral butting down the steerer or seat tubes ?

Back for sale now. SOLD

Price drop bump

I can help with Abilita

After leaving Ridge Racing Paul Wilkin ran a workshop on the industrial estate in Sturminster Marshall trading as Pauls Cycle Services (PCS) - he used to build my wheels when I raced XC in the 90's - Nice guy and a good wheelbuilder. The custom frames he built back then were under the name of Abilita.

I assume he's still around (he's not particularly old) - you may be able to find out what he's up to these days from Prendas Cyclisme or Primera as they are the other offshoots from Ridge Racing

(Note: If he only did the refurbishment he may not have records of what the bike originally was but it may be worth a punt).

I've just had a look at the pictures - It looks a lot like some of the work Paul did back in the later 80's early 90's - I recall he used a lot of columbus - definitely worth trying to confirm whether your mystery italian is actually from Sturminster marshall!!!
It may be worth contacting Poole Wheelers - I vaguely recall that Paul was a pretty handy rider too, I think that was his club.

btw - did you get this on ebay back in feb/march as a fixed?

I think I bid it up to about £50 and then let it go - regretted it at the time as I recall it went for a very good price - though looking at the BB shell, I'm relieved I didn't go much further !!!

Good luck with whatever you do with it

Yeah, that was the one. Had to go a way to get it but thought it was worth it...obviously didn't know about the bb shell...ebay though, i guess...zero accountability. The bb rust isn't bad actually, looks worse in the pic, no structural damage..
Thanks for the info. I'll follow that up soon...

More info added.
I've been riding this fixed for the last couple of weeks now and it rides great, no problems at all...

How much are you selling this for now?

sold

Hi Theeb, I'm interested in taking this on as a project, but can't pm you yet as i'm noob on this site. how can we make this happen? can you pm me your email and we'll go from there?

Hi Dan.
I can't PM you (I guess cos you're new)...think you just have to post 4 or 5 times - do it on the 'trying things out' thread here: http://www.lfgss.com/thread46125-6.html - then you'll have full functionality!
I forgot to mention before though - I put it on ebay a couple of days ago and there's a bid on it already so am not sure about taking the listing down...seems a bit shady!
PM me in any case...would prefer it to go through the forum...maybe we can work something...
Tim