Shuncle

The frame was made by John Stinsmen in the late 70s. Here’s what the seller (who found it at a swap meet) had to say:
When I bought the bike last year, it had a pretty random selection of parts - I kept some, but replaced everything else, so it’s now mostly mid 70s Dura Ace. As you can see from the photos, it’s a very nice frame - Tange frame tubing, Vitus forks, Haden lugs, Bocama bottom bracket. Original paint in good condition - at first I wasn’t crazy about the colours, but I now think they’re perfect for the bike. And to top it all off, it’s a great ride!

I’ve had some correspondence with John, he hasn’t built any frames for a few years, but still rides. He also paints, and writes about sports car racing for “The Aston Martin Quarterly”. A very nice fellow, and I know he would like to hear about any other Veloces out there.

Here's a link to more pics: Veloce

Zoku620

I have a very small (47cm) track bike I am building up for the wife, there also appears to be this one for sale on the Baltimore CL. - https://baltimore.craigslist.org/bik/3524735742.html

Shuncle

Got any pics of the track bike?

Hard to tell anything about the CL bike - 4 fuzzy photos don't tell much of a story...

Zoku620

Here's some of the track frame

Built around 1986 for young female track racer at T-Town.

Shuncle

Very nice! I particularly like the way the head tube lugs come together. Do you have the frame number?

Luggedhead

YES... I have a John Stinsmen VELOCE road Bike from the 70's. About 62 or 63cm built with the original Tange Champion Tubing (later called Tange 1). Medium deep metal flake blue with silver painted accents, lug detail and decals. I am sure this was set up for cruise riding or touring. Dura-Ace hubs and brakes, Huret JUY derailleur.
An interesting bit on the one I have is that it was owned and built for an engineer that knew John. This engineer owner wrote his Doctorate thesis on bicycle frame building and met John as one of the several frame builders he interviewed and spent time with as he put his research together. He was hands down impressed with Stinsmen, who seemed to stand out from the other frame builders he knew and met with. He told John when he got his profession going he would have John build him a Stinsmen bike. I have that bike and it is a very lightweight Veloce.

Shuncle

Sounds nice, and a good story to go with it - got any photos?

Welcome to the forum and the very exclusive Veloce Owners Club.

tomgb

I have one of these in my stable. Purchased from Jackie Simes III in pretty crappy condition in Spring of 2009. "Before" pics are attached. Top Tube cable guides were rusted off and right rear dropout was broken. Brian Chapman (then of Circle A Cycles in Providence RI) replaced the dropout. John Stinsmen answered the phone himself when I called and sent Decals. He remembered the bike and told me something of its history. It had no fork so I decided to take some liberties with setting it up. More on that later...

dparham

nice I have one of these will send pics today I just traded for a custom beach cruiser... the stinsmen is FAST but uses a melange of replaced parts like a long cage XT rear derailleur lol I have a replacement and I going to do a full restore to this bike moving to mustache and bar end shifters... should be nice!

dparham

Lascauxcaveman 

That wold be more of a "restomod," since restore actually means putting the bike back into its original condition, whatever that may have been. Paint looks great from this angle and I like the underslung routing of the rear brake cable; cool bike!

dparham

haha yeah well restomods I like! lol I'm going to put period correct parts ( rear derailleur and moustache bars, still road like just no drops ... ) on so it could still be kind of a restore lol ill put correct parts back on but just set it up with different bars so I can commute ride it! lol

motogeek 

I have one, too. I had John build this bike for me sometime in the mid '80s ('86 I think) and built it with a hodgepodge of, then, state of the art parts. The tubing is Reynolds 531, not sure what he used for the fork. I spec'd it with Sun Tour vertical dropouts with double eyelets and low rider front rack braze-ons. I wanted a Nervex-style lug, so he found (or made) some with his signature cut outs. John had one of the best fade paint jobs out there. Mine was done in Dark Rose Metallic, fading to Light Rose Metallic. I built it with as follows:

Crank: Sugino AT triple 26-44-48 with Phil Wood bottom bracket
Pedals: Phil Wood platform
Brakes: Modolo Professional side pulls
Front Derailleur: Huret Duopar
Rear Derailleur: Hutet Titanium Duopar
Shifters: Sun Tour bar ends
Handlebar & Stem: Cinelli
Seatpost: Campy Super Record
Wheels: Ambrosio 19 Extra, Phil Wood hubs, Campy QR skewers
Freewheel: Regina Oro
Chain: Regina Oro drilled.

It still is in great shape, rides wonderfully, and has most of the original equipment on it. If I were to have another made for me today I might go 2-4 cm smaller as I spec'd it a little large.

I've tried to put some pics from my computer picture files of it on this thread but I cannot get them to download. I've never had such difficulty negotiating a forum as I have on BF. While I love reading it, it is the most user unfriendly, convoluted forum I've come across. HELP, MODERATORS!

dparham

a beauty! I was just at my local bike shop and they talked me out of too many mods lol I really just want make it sort of back to original maybe a little better equipment... make it a bread n butter bike for running around flats here in south Florida .. but not a touring bike.. my work is 7 miles away so easy sprint to work on this thing its fast! It feels faster than my 1989 cannonade /105 racing bike I rode back in the day training for hotter than hell 100 in Dallas Texas to Ft worth and back! I was 165 then and now 220 ( soon to be lighter) lol hmmm

exmechanic89

I've never heard of those before this thread but I definitely like them, great looking old racers..

Velocivixen

@motogeek - stunning bike! I'd ride it even though it's too big for me. Really lovely.

motogeek 

Thanks Vix! In the next few days when I can spare the time I'm going post some more pics of it, but I've got to convert them all to a smaller size to be able to upload them (grrrrrr).

They had unique seat clusters and the seat stay caps had the name Veloce embossed in them.

dparham

I just cleaned up this orange to yellow fade... ordered replacement bullhorns to try on it... its going to be my bread n butter bike and slowly replace the components with period correct dura ace or something... I took off back lever and brake which was not working ( bad cable ordered replacements ) but without it, the bike weighs in at 19lbs

dparham

Bullhorn pics! so far its turning out to be a nice refreshed ride! I changed to a treadless stem just because I had one that fit these new bullhorns... kind of nice setup for now... I wrapped and shellacked one side with the harlequin design cotton tape... only 3 coats.. may add one more...

Bill in VA

I had John Stinsman do a repaint job on a Fuji bicycle I had in college. The frame was a worn red that the first owner had heavily 'distressed' and removed all logos except the head tube badge to deter bike theft. After I graduated and was at home near Allentown, PA, a friend told me about a person who built race cars that also built racing bikes so I called John up him up and he repainted the frame in gloss black Dupont Imron and then replaced the original head tube badge. He also fixed the slightly compressed rear brake bridge. The mirror finish black paint with no labels except a tiny Stinsman Racing sticker under the rear seat stays, coupled with the chrome fork blades and rear stays was very eye catching. The only other black production frames I remember seeing from that time were Raleigh Competitions, a Paramount, and a few japanese bikes.

I rode that bicycle from 1974 through 2015 with long periods of heavy use and long intervals of non-use. Its final use period was after I retired and started riding again. I found it had grown a bit (I was less tall), plus finding 27" tan sidewall tires for non-hook bead rims was fairly hard. I bought a new bike after a long search for a modern steel bicycle.

The paint still looked new (a few touched up chips) when I sold that Fuji, and it always generated a lot of looks from people since there were no parts on it newer than 1978.

His Veloce bikes (he also did some tandems) always had beautiful paint that was very very durable.

Luggedhead

Pictures of the Veloce I have with the original paint will be posted when I get it back together after some sprucing up. These don’t show up too often on the used market. The craft and detail on these are of a high order, much cleaner than many marquee Italian thoroughbreds IMO.

motogeek 

Here's another pic of my Veloce I had John build for me in 1986.

Unca_Sam

Stinsman track frame

On the small side

Track end and tubular wheels

I had posted this to the C&V Craigslist and Ebay finds last year, but no interest. It's still for sale in Bangor, PA because it was too small for me...

https://www.bikeforums.net/21233714-post53066.html

motogeek 

John built a lot of track bikes due to his home town, Allentown, PA having a velodrome.
Wish it was a road bike and my size. (see post above for pic of my bike)