SurferRosa

Wow. Nice score.

merziac

They do look like chain, they might be "888" that was a trademark/ identifier of some sort seen on their freewheels and plenty other.

Drillium Dude 

I installed them tonight; they look HUGE on the bike

Still, they're fun and not too much bigger, so I will let them stay. I'm sure I'll get used to the new size in no time.

If I could find a really nice pair of Superb brake levers I'd be all set. I am going to leave the BB and HS alone, and the wheelset, too, for now. But I am going to end up with the Phil Wood hubs from the Bianchi's original wheelset as the centers of a pair of wheels planned for this build.

DD

crank_addict

Dig the levers.

Have a slight different version installed on a Viscount Aerospace Pro. I think of the embellishments as a bike chain, but also see the Suntour 8.8.8.

Drillium Dude 

I did not know that (spoken in the manner of Johnny Carson)

I will have to take a closer look at my freewheels for this mark. I see 8s now in addition to chain links. Cool!

DD

merziac

Yep, what I said, post #102

smontanaro 

I see a few of those levers listed on eBay (none for $3 though!). I didn't see them immediately in Velobase. Looks like SunTour DLW, which mostly appears in Velobase with the covers, p/n LD-1000.

Drillium Dude 

I took the bike out for about 40 miles today with the intention of doing some gravel trail riding. Now, this is fairly fine gravel, understand - nothing crazy, but I wanted to see how things went on a different surface. This ride introduced the Suntour DLW LD-1000 levers (thanks to smontanaro for the ID). Because my $3 only got me the levers, I've mounted them with Campy hardware. The shifting is not currently as crisp as the old setup with Campy levers/Suntour derailleurs. Actually, the front is fine. But I need to play a bit with the tightness of the D-ring adjusters because right now they are too tight but adjusting them is funny. I'm sure I'll get it soon enough. Kinda wish I had those soft rubber covers, though - you can really feel that chain-line ridge when shifting!

A couple pics from my Christmas Day ride:





DD

smontanaro 

Sacrifices must be made for beauty.

Drillium Dude 

More Suntour goodness arrived in the mail today:







One of the clamps didn't match the other, and it was a bit twisted, too. No matter - I'm sure Campy clamps will work fine. I hope so, because they're underneath shellacked bar tape and I was already planning on leaving them in place and simply replacing the body/lever combination only. Looks like I'll re-purpose the the clamp fixing nuts, too, because these arrived with funky, non-matching Allen key sockets. IIRC, bitd my Superbe levers had nutted fittings to attach the body to the bar clamp. Can anyone shed any light on the correct hardware?

Got them for a nice price (and I have another, almost-NOS pair on the way for spares), so not too worried. I have to make a slight mod to the bodies for my application, so it will be a week or so before they go on the bike (plus I'm waiting for hoods to arrive). But they sure look good

DD

Drillium Dude 

Since the weather doesn't look like it will be ride-friendly anytime soon, I decided to photograph the newest bits. In fact, with the addition of these last two components, the transformation of the Casati is complete.

First off, thanks to merziac for re-threading the Sugino Mighty crankarms from M-14 to 9/16ths. Once they landed back in my hot little hands I added pedals; the Barelli Supremes threaded on almost all the way by hand, so that proves the re-thread job was done right - thanks, Van! Now I have lots of options in future should I decide to set the Barellis aside once again.

I did some half-hearted searching on Ebay for Superbe brake lever hoods, but already knew it would pretty much be searching for the proverbial needle - and an expensive needle at that. I ended up buying two complete sets of levers; one pair came with bent/incorrect clamps (no worries as the Campy clamps under the shellacked tape worked fine) and a few light scratches along with some ratty, melting hoods. The other pair (currently on the bike) were to all intents and purposes NOS, but again, the hoods had turned to "oatmeal" and were about to slide off the bodies. Rustines to the rescue! At about $27 shipped, that was a decent deal. Unfortunately, I tore one (don't ask - but I won't make that mistake again), so I decided the second go-around to get two pair. The next pair went on fine. So, I have a full set of levers with clamps and Rustines hoods for a spare. I am the kind of guy who likes having a few plug-and-play spares hanging about.

Hopefully I can get out soon and give some more feedback on the braking as I now have Suntour at both ends, and I was able to get the Campy housing/ferrule combination to slot into the top of the brake lever, so I don't expect much different in the way of braking, but who knows?

Some pics:









DD

mechanicmatt

Looks fantastic. Love the crankset, but I'm a sucker for the Sugino stuff, especially with the crown.

SurferRosa

Do you ever route the front cable ahead of the rear, so the two touch and meet around the stem?

Drillium Dude 

Thanks! I agree about the crankset. I favor a particular "look" and this Sugino Mighty fills the bill perfectly, and yeah, I love the crown too!

DD

Drillium Dude 

No, this is the way I always route them. They seem to naturally fall this way, to be honest.

DD

mechanicmatt

Maybe I missed this earlier, is this like an Eroica or Cino build? I am building up something that meets their criteria myself soon is why I ask.

Cycle Tourist

Boy! You said a mouthful. I must say I'm guilty of adding ferrules whenever I can for convenience while realizing that they're unneeded. I'd rather someone with less experience easily set up their bike than take it to a bike shop for adjustment. But for a nice Peugeot or Motto that I intended keeping, that's another story. A deft hand can get SIS stuff to work but would you sell that bike to a inexperienced new member of the cycling world? Your right! Friction shifting technology is easily adjustable without ferrules, but would you expect a perfectionist to be satisfied with, "good enough"? Now, in my world, either something works or it doesn't so I'm in agreement.
Once in awhile I've added indexing to ol' Suntour or Shimano derailleurs and had to add ferrules somewhere but that's another issue.

merziac

Drillium Dude

You're welcome, happy to help, looks great especially with the SR ring.

No way to go wrong with The "Mighty" Sugino Super/Mighty Competition, every bit as beautiful, strong and tough as any other.

Drillium Dude 

When it comes to braking performance, "good enough" isn't

Y'all have your ways of doing things, I have mine - it's all good

DD

Drillium Dude 

No, I just wanted to try something different. I looked for alternative high-performance parts suggested by various C&V members, then made final choices based upon aesthetics. Performance-wise, there isn't much difference, honestly.

DD

masi61

That Casati frame is beautiful! My LBS down the road (International Pro Bike Shop, Bellbrook Ohio) is a Casati dealer and I’m always excited to see new Casati steel framesets (Espresso with Columbus Spirit steel tubing?) built up for customers.

i was just curious about your decision to leave the frame nude. I have seen a trend towards stripping paint on handcrafted steel road frames and having them clear coated or wiped down with linseed oil. I’ll just speak for myself: I couldn’t bring myself to do this. I live in a high humidity area and any bare steel or cast iron I have around here corrodes extensively in no time. Sometimes deeper corrosion really eats away at the steel. Those thinned lugs, the solder at the transitions is definitely gorgeous to look at. How humid is it where you live?

I wish somebody (like Wheels Manufacturing) would make a stepped ferrule kit containing a variety of stepped ferrules in stainless steel, brass and aluminum so that when we recable our vintage derailleur cable sets, we are not tempted to shove a housing into a frame stop where it isn’t a perfect fit.

I read some some of the SunTour pdf file about setting up cable housing on Accushift derailleur systems. There was a discussion of compressionless housing. They said that compressionless was too stiff for the loop to the rear derailleur and that wound housing was still recommended there as it can achieve a tighter bend. I’m surprised they said this because this loop at the RD is very critical that it be stiff. This benefits not only index but friction shifting. I have some old Deore XT compressionless housing that I want to say is 5.5mm thick that I am using on my Veritas titanium bike with Dura Ace 7800. It is chunky and does need to be a bit longer for gradual radii with the stiff inner wires (compressionless). Shimano provided their own ferrules in the package with instructions given to use the Shimano cable cutter’s hexagonal crimper for the ferrule to keep the ends tidy when they are bent to their final shape. I have these same Deore XT mtb compressionless housings on one other bike with a 3x7 Retroshift Audax indexed drivetrain and the crispness of shifts is noticeably improved.

SJX426 

masi61 I live in Virginia, near the Potomac. It is typically very humid here. I run a dehumidifier in the garage to keep things from turning reddish brown. Before I did that I was in a place without the dehumidifier. I have two frames that don't have paint. Both get wiped down with WD 40 periodically. I have not seen any corrosion on them. Any spots that look like corrosion are what is left after stripping.

118_PaTrek on Flickr

Drillium Dude 

Thanks for your comments and questions. I left the frame "bare" for purely aesthetic reasons. It is temporary; one day I will put a more permanent finish on it, but for now I'm enjoying this look. I live near Seattle, so we have some water around here, but it's never really humid. I store my bikes indoors. I don't ride them in the rain. The only oxidation is from my sweat, and I still wipe down the bike as best I can after most rides. A few splotches here and there, in my opinion, is just me leaving my "signature" on the frame after a ride

As far as the ferrule thing, my approach has nothing to do with modern cable packages, but the old school housing. Many brake lever bodies and caliper adjusters have beveled seats. Campy uses ferrules with beveled ends - these make a perfect fit, and result in a more direct feel. Putting a flat-ended, un-ferruled housing in an alloy brake lever body or adjuster with a beveled seat is sloppy mechanic work and over time will damage the lever body socket and affect braking. Maybe I'm too detail-oriented, but you know what? I don't have mechanicals as a result

DD

dddd

Good point masi61 about the rear housing loop, I always realize a big improvement in shifting when I switch to compressionless housing out back.
I usually use the newer 4mm housing as it is so much more flexible in bending, though sometimes the old 5mm compressionless housing just happens to be a perfect, tight fit in the housing stop of say a Huret dropout or a Simplex plastic derailer, so I might just stuff it in there (I shift lightly at all times going against the lo-limit screw stop, so this can actually be a surprisingly reliable setup even though perhaps not nearly to the standards of using modern ferrules).

SurferRosa mentioned swapping the front and rear cable's position where they would actually cross and touch, which on my recent(!) Miyata Nine-Twelve build instantly gave the cable loops perfect symmetry, so highly recommended from an aesthetic perspective! This also has the side-benefit of stopping the rear brake housing loop from slapping noisily on the handlebar, which I seem to recall was why I first tried swapping their positions so many years ago.

This Casati is almost certainly one of those bikes whose presence has to be seen in person, versus any photo images. But still it is cool to see it here.

natterberry 

Is the derailleur cable going through the cable stop bare on front Drillium Dude ?