Paul Donohue Appreciation Society

This man seems to have given so much to the world of steel, thought it was time we had a thread in recognition.

I believe he built under his own name, as well as Dolan, Corrado, Cougar and more.

I've seen such a variety of tubesets and types, aero 853, non aero, some aero, columbus, aero 531... Seems he really had a thing for choosing some interesting tubesets.

I'm interested to hear more info on his history if anyone has any to share, as well as seeing more examples of his work.

Let's see yours!

Old pic of mine got lost when everything changed, so edited.

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From Hilary stone a while back.

TEAM BRITE MICRO LO-PRO TT FRAME Reynolds 853 c1998 built by Paul Donohue
Ex Chris Newton
Seat Tube (ctt): 44.5cm (17.5in)
Top Tube (ctc): 52cm (20.5in)
Rear dropout width: 130mm
Wheel size: 700C
Frame tubing: Reynolds 853
This frame is an ex Team Brite micro lo-pro frame that was ridden by Chris Newton around 1998 and is beautifully built from Reynolds 853 tubing. Paul Donohue’s works built all the Team Brite frames and they employed a tig welder who was truly superb - in my opinion he was just as good as the tig welders at Merlin who I had seen working back in 1994. Its a really gorgeous frame which would equate to about a conventional 21.5 in road frame and is designed for use with a long aero seatpost and aero bars of course. It comes complete as shown in the photos with its original bladed carbon fibre forks.

http://www.cyclingweekly.cc/forum/the-lounge-316/paul-donohue-15316

Paul did race, and built damn good frames. If you're on facebook, look up Peter Harrison, or contact him via the Northern Rock Cyclone or his bike shop in Newcastle - Cyclelogical I think (??) He is an oracle of all things cycling in the North East. (However I think he said he was on holiday a couple of days ago)
Campag Chris would have been able to help on that score, he's on FB too.

Apparently this is his new business, shut down his shop because halfords were stealing all his business. The shame.

http://www.cre8ivegraphics.co.uk/Default.aspx

This was mine when I picked it up..

Ended up replacing steel forks with Alpina carbons and currently like this...

Big fan of his work ha.

Some of you might remember my struggle with this case from the classifieds, it was a real headache and ended up just not meant to be. I got the frame eventually but I couldn't afford building it up so a friend of mine gave it some love. He's upgraded to 75's nowadays though.

I'd love to hear some more info on Paul Donohue, these track frames are lush as fuck but there's not much to go around online.

Woutchi on here has a red and chrome Donohue pretty similar to that one ^

reminiscing about my old donohue lo pro, shown here just before i packed her off 2 years ago on a slow boat to Australia to pastures new

http://www.lfgss.com/album.php?albumid=1052&pictureid=11420

saw some serious abuse and yes the seat post was stuck in by the time i was finished with her

That lopro is rad!

JD has a lovely Donohue road bike. When I went out for a ride with him on my Graham Weigh 853 road bike it quickly transpired that it was exactly the same, albeit a fair bit larger. Turns out it had actually been made by Paul as well, and had the exact same aero downtube and chunky stays. It came to me like this:

And now looks like this:

with added decal:

Probably would have got Donohue made up instead if I hadn't found out just a couple of days after Roboto made those for me.

I adore it.

My other 853 (apparently) Donohue (95% sure) is this one. I will always be jealous of TM's beautiful Donohue (first dibs) as it is the perfect equivalent of my road bike, but this one isn't too bad either.

Came to me like this (not my picture or build):

Currently like this, ish:

Two more things:

1.) On the lo-pro with a stuck seatpost, may be coincidence, but this seems to be a common theme with Donohues. When I picked up the road frame, the seller told me it had had a stuck seatpost when he got it, which he managed to remove. The track frame was well and truly seized in.

2.) If I remember right what JD told me, apparently Paul himself is much more into hot rods and car modding now (or maybe the other business listed above), and can't be contacted/won't engage with with discussion regarding his bike building. Such a shame for a builder of such great frames.

Looks very similar to my Graham Weigh.
853, areo stays, fade paint job.

http://www.fixedgeargallery.com/2006/feb/PETERRAVE_aol_2.htm#image_2

Peculiar frame - converted road, not track. Very slack seat angle - 71deg. Very long top tube - 63cm - for its height - 58cm. Still have it, but it's no longer built up.

my 731OS paul donohue built graham weigh, so i guess it belongs here...

custom made for grass track as i was lead to believe by the seller whos uncle had it built. 30mm rake but quite relaxed geo.
purple sparkle, and beat up paintwork which doesnt show on the picture.
da 7410/7710 throughout, love her to bits!

only addition will be a 100mm 26mm stem. i love the syntace stratos on it but would like a bit more drop.
im thinking the easiest and cheapest option would be to get an alu jag and have it bored out on a lathe to 26mm.

if anyone has one give me a shout.. no hurries on it though.

if you ever want to sell the syntaces, holla. Maybe some old school Mavics would work nicely?

^i hear that everytime i post a picture of them..;)

thing is, i now have space behind the rack for my hands because the bars curve backwards. airwings/mavic/same dont do that..

contemplated going full 25.4 with a jag and nitto bullhorn; rb002 or 001. their shape is inspired by the syntaces but lack the backward curving bit from the stem which i find so comfy..

otherwise getting deeper drop syntaces would be an option but seeing theyre rare as rocking horse shit (used) and im not forking out for a new pair

well, just had a search actually and getting the deeper drop ones may end up not being much more expensive then getting a jag.. downside will be though that the shoulder of the bars which i normally ride on wouldnt be as low as i would like.

it also seems that syntace stopped making the 26.0s; damn shame..

What about air wings?

It would be RB001 or RB010 with the jag as RB002 are 26.0.

Were Cinelli pista stems 25.4 or 26?

^same story applies with the backward bending bit.

cinellis come in 25.4/26/26.4mm, depending on the era it was produced. 3ttts come in 26mm.

i havent seen a cinelli pista (26.0) yet that was 100mm. for some reason i tend to think they only did them in 110mm plus because true trackies are boss.

oh, quick google tells otherwise.

tbh, the bike is a bit faux-njs with 32h da, 7410 seatpin, 7710 crank and chainring.. think i would like to continue the japanese theme and cheat a bit.

no idea if boring a stem is easily doable or anything. i reckon it is. i reckon i should know somebody who could help me with it..

On my first sweet fixie I un-carefully, heavy handedly splayed a pearl (25.4) to 26.4 without realising what I was doing, and it was fine, for about a year and a half, but cracked at a later date possibly when removing the bars...

I would guess that carefully, very gently, easing a 26 bar into a nitto 25.4 would possibly be alright.

Others will contradict me I'm sure, but I just speak from experience.

I don't get any toe over lap at all with my new donohue which I'm finding strange. So used to clipping my feet when slow turning at traffic lights. But yeah my frame is from 1998 I think.

Bargain example for sale here

http://www.lfgss.com/thread113374.html

Gonna stick mine partly finished in the appreciation thread

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Any ideas what this would be worth? Very tempted to place a bid!
http://item.mobileweb.ebay.co.uk/viewitem?itemId=111196649742