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Hammerite Smooth on CrMo frame

(3 posts)
  • Started 13 years ago by crowriver
  • Latest reply from chdot
  • This topic is not resolved
  • poll: Hammerite Smooth: good or bad?
    Bargain beauty : (2 votes)
    50 %
    Horror show : (1 votes)
    25 %
    Are you serious? : (1 votes)
    25 %
    Good for deterring thieves : (0 votes)
    Looks well cool : (0 votes)

    4 votes


  1. crowriver
    Member

    Once again I open the floodgates to potential critics.

    A project which I've been working on since the start of the year (before I got distracted by the wee folding bike project) is building an 'expedition tourer' based on an old Saracen MTB Tange CrMo frame I picked up for next to nothing. I dated the frame to 1991, judging by the geometry and the hideous early rave music style decals adorning the frame. Hand built in Coventry, apparently.

    The frame is quite nice (lovely 'ping' when you tap it) and very little corrosion, obviously stored quite well. It has some nice wee touches such as a beautiful pierced top tube. I did consider getting it sandblasted and powder coated, but instead decided to paint it by hand.

    Filled in big chips, treated the rust, sanded the original powdercoat back, primed, and applied several coats of Hammerite Smooth, wet sanding inbetween coats.
    It's taking a while, but gradually I'm getting a reasonable finish, in spite of the inevitable paint runs, etc.

    Once I've finished the fork and frames it's time to fit all the (new) components which I've acquired to make the bike complete. I'll spare you all the details but it's a 27-speed set up and I'm fitting cantilever brakes to use the original cable braze-ons and the cable hanger built in to the original quill stem.

    Thoughts? Advice?

    Am I mad to hand paint? Issues I should watch out for when fitting the components to this frame?

    Posted 13 years ago #

  2. kaputnik
    Moderator

    An interesting sounding project, crowriver.

    I'm very near completing a build of my own, of a '77 or '87 Raleigh 531 frame sourced through chdot into a singlespeed - except I chose to skip a few steps and have it blasted and sprayed by a man in a shed who knew what he was doing (I don't have access to a shed and didn't know what I was doing!) The only thing they didn't know what they were doing was they left the dropout axle adjustment screws in place when they sprayed it, resulting in them being painted solid and one of them snapping when I tried to unscrew it - it will need drilled out or similar, but is only a cosmetic problem just now. But it's a nice plain dark blue (in retrospect I thought it was going to be a bit darker, but they did make a lovely job and when he showed me the paint sample I just went "yeah, that'll do!", so only myself to blame)

    Once I had assembled all my components, the main issue I had was getting bits fitting with what the man in thebicycleworks described as "oh, that must have been one of those Raleigh frames that they knocked up from strange-sized bits they had lying around". Basically, the head-tube diameter and steerer diameter were slightly non-standard for modern components. I took their advice (previously also given by Smudge for a different problem) and made liberal use of beer-can shims to pack the gaps. I also ended up doing this to mate the Profile bullhorn bars (traded with Recombodna) to a Cinelli track stem that I found lying under a pile of dust in Veloecosse.

    I sourced Raleigh decals and a head badge from H Lloyd cycles and Reynolds 531 decals a nice man in Ukraine via eBay. I'll apply the Raleigh ones when I get it round to my folks place to make use of their garage and my old man's collection of varnishes.

    Basically I think what I'm saying is there's usually a way to get bits to fit!

    The other issue I had was somehow I managed to cut the cable housing for the front brake rather on the short side. I considered breaking the housing and inserting an intermediate section, but ended up getting away with peeling back the bar tape a bit so that the cable had a shorter routing to the caliper. So - measure before you cut!

    Oh and treat it to a nice polish once it's all done, and do post photos here when you're done.

    Posted 13 years ago #

  3. chdot
    Admin

    "Am I mad to hand paint?"

    I prefer spray.

    Have used Hammerite and also plasti-kote.

    Keep your hand moving (see video 4).

    Spray outside when wind is negligible.

    Posted 13 years ago #

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