GT / yamaguchi pursuit?

This is the frame :http://i54.tinypic.com/2cdya6u.jpg

One of the owners has had it confirmed, supposedly over the phone, by mr yamaguchi himself, that it was made by him. I have not been able to get hold of the previous owner, I've only seen him post it on a danish forum. So perhaps I will write Yamaguchi or just let the boubt be in my own benefir

unfortunately, the seat tube was broken and the previous owner has had it re welded. This is the ugly result: http://i53.tinypic.com/2ni9s14.jpg

I don't know if I will keep it like this or fill the weld, sand it and have the whole frame repainted in wet black.

I have ordered a set of downtube decals like spotters and I will try to have my local sticker shop make a set of yamaguchi decals for the seat tube, with same stars and stripes filling and white outtline.

Nice looking frame. I would fixed the weld and make it look nice.

Hope this helps

As we discussed over PM I think this is one of the Yamaguchi built GTs. The other GT track frames don't have an integrated seatpost clamp whereas all the US Team ones I've seen do. However, I think most of the Yamaguchi ones didn't have the top tube stick out where it intersects the seat tube, more like this:

But I think those US Team ones changed from frame to frame, some of them have straight top tubes, some of them have more exaggerated pursuit geo etc.

Either way this is an awesome project, I'm well envious. I'd fix the weld if I were you and restore the OG paint!

Or maybe when the seat tube broke the bit with the clamp is part of the replacement, which would make it more likely a normal GT. Does it have anything stamped on the BB shell?

What material is the frame? looks like aluminium, in which case its not a Yamaguchi made one...

looks very much like a repainted one of these:

Its not ali

Its steel. but it is not fillet brazed like the red and blue one above.

this is well worth the hassle of smoothing that weld and repainting. well-fcking-jelly.

this is well worth the hassle of smoothing that weld and repainting. well-fcking-jelly.

Indeed! I would sell my left pinkie for a frame like that!
Hmm, I'd put some Dura 7600 all over it...

Droooool

Eek, that's such a shame.
Get Ryan to sort it out.

Oak Cycles

the only thing stamped on the BB is the make of the BB shell. I can not remember excactly what it says, and the frame is at my work at the moment. But it is three letters and it's supposed to be some sort of heat treated french made shell

edit: the stamp is placed on top of the bb and and the letters are surrounded by a circle

Whatever you do don't repaint it black, just restore that paint if you have to. It's literally the best paint job possible (trust me I studied it with charts and stuff).

Its steel. but it is not fillet brazed like the red and blue one above.

How do you mean? Not fillet brazed, or fillet brazed, just not quite like the other? If it isn't fillet brazed, then surely it is not a Yamaguchi?

previous build. the head tube is surely not fillet brazed. I guess the rest is just regular welds

http://img827.imageshack.us/img827/3125/singlespeed.jpg

I will be building it up with a few DA parts. Have still to decide what to do with the paint

I don't think Yamaguchi would ever weld anything (see second item: http://www.yamaguchibike.com/content/Accessories/Gift_Items) If what you have is welded, it almost certainly isn't a Yamaguchi, unless his work for GT was quite unlike everything he does. He can probably produce some of neatest, prettiest and tidiest fillets in the world, though. Head tube has lugs! Hadn't seen that before, needed to zoom to see them!

That seat tube repair is truly horrible. I'd get a proper frame builder to do a decent job on that,

Christ, I scrolled back up the page and squealed when I saw that fix. Ouch. fixed by a fucking farmer with a b&q stick welder?

I don't think it can be saved, you should definitely sell it to me to add to my museum......

Hope this helps

Dunno what a frame builder would do, but it looks to me like a decent fix here, thinking about it, is to take round file or dremel to that weld, depending how hard it is, and the try to build up a fillet with a tig welder. The undercut looks pretty brutal - there wont be very much material left around the edge of that weld, so what you have is essentially a large, stiff bit of steel that is under a lot of internal stress, presuming no post heat treatment (welds in thin material cool very quickly, which involves a rapid change in size and crystalline structure), immediately surrounded by some very thin and equally distempered steel, so stress will focus there in a big way. Your aim should be remove as much of that weld as possible so the fillet isn't too massive, and then build up a fillet with three or so runs of careful Tig weld that extends past the damaged area. After that you'll want to stress relieve the whole area around the joint by slowly heating it to maybe 400 ish degrees (blue, if you can see the naked frame) before letting it cool as slowly as you can be bothered to.
I'm definitely not a frame builder, just an engineering student and fixer of things