pcb 

[SOLD] Price Drop: '90 Fuquay-Serotta Custom Frame/Fork: $400 shipped conti USA; paypal G&S; will include headset, front cantis and vintage Brodie stabilizer for an extra $75

No dents/dings/odious damage, but lotsa small scattered paint scratches, scrapes, wear. Figure cosmetically a 7.5/10.

Snagged this a few years back, very cool steed but needs to find a new home to make some room around here.

Very cool Serotta Custom race cross frameset built by Greg Fuquay, Brit expat Serotta builder, as his own personal cross race bike. Nearest I can figure, Greg is now wrenching US Air Force helicopters.

The ser# is Greg's initials + the build date, and there's an "F" engraved in two canti bosses, one each front/rear. The fork has a standard Serotta CX ser# stamped and then all X'd out. Maybe that means Greg used an already-built stock fork, or if it somehow got serialed first? Why take the time to X out the ser#, but not stamp his own initials/ser, unless he didn't build it himself? But then why engrave the "F" in the canti boss? Ah, sweet mysteries of life.

This is a 1990 cross race frame, meaning high bb/short bb drop, comfy clearance for 32mm tires max, funky cable routing to keep the inner triangle clear for portaging, and no bottle cage, fender, rack or pump bosses. Serious stuff here.

Other weirdness is the front canti boss spacing is '90-narrow at 57mm, while the rear is a pretty modern 81mm. Vintage wide-profile cantis only up front, or maybe CX50/CX70 with the narrowest of spacers. Paul cantis and minimotos worked fine in the rear. The seatstay caps are cut flat/square across the tops, a treatment I've never seen anywhere else. Oh, yeah, and it's got a teeny-tiny kinda pain-in-the-keyster cable stop for the rear brake brazed onto the seat lug.

The frame is also pretty durn light at about 4.2lbs frame/fork, and the chainstays are thinwall and flex outwards like crazy when braking. I put a stabilizer on the rear to stiffen things up.

This is a one-of-a-kind, versatile handbuilt cross frame from a relatively unknown builder of a well-known brand. Being what it is, it won't be as planted/plush as a modern gravel frame on trails/gravel, and even with plush/supple/light 32mm tires it won't be as smooth/plush on asphalt as a road frame with wider tire clearance and 80mm of bb drop. This isn't a cross frame you can easily throw racks and bags on to go touring. It is versatile, but it makes no compromises that interfere with it's original purpose and time.

If you want something you can rack/fender, if you're going to worry about how to handle bottle cages, if you want to hit the heavy gravel with a frame that is forgiving of inattention or casual technique, this ain't the cat for you.

With all that outta the way, here's some specs; dims and mistakes all mine:

Frame: 4.56lb/2.07kg; Fork: 1.6lb/.730kg; F/F: 6.17lb/2.8kg
Built: 21.36lbs/9.8kg (w/dual hbar bottle cages)
ST: 72.0-deg; HT: 73.0-deg
ST: 57.5cm c-c
TT: 59cm c-c
Chainstays: 42cm
WB: 104.0cm/41"
BB Drop: 55mm
HT:180mm
Standover: 85.7cm/33.8"
Tire Clearance: 32mm actual width fits wth 4-5mm at chainstays; 35mm very tight at chstays; 38mm rubs both sides. Minor dimpling would get you 35mm easy, maybe 38mm?
Brakes: canti boss c-c 57mmF/81mmR

I built it 2x, then 1x, went fine both ways. I rigged up a dual bar-mount bottle cage with some Wolf Hound bits, 'cause I f'in hate bottle cage clamps, I need a rear bag for tools and stuff, and I gotta drink my H2O.

I didn't shoot any frame-only pix, so you'll have to pick out details from the built pix, spanning a few different builds. Oddsaabs original pix are at the end of my flickr album:
https://flic.kr/s/aHsk2QKywg

TenGrainBread 

The "F" on the canti boss was not engraved by Fuquay. It's marked like that from the factory to indicate that it is a front canti (often on off-the-shelf brake bosses, the manufacturer has a different miter radius on the front than the back to match fork blades vs. seatstays). Not sure the maker but see an example here:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/254107713290

pcb 

Son of a gun, tks for that. I've never seen that on another frame, would a builder normally fill that in or file it down so the F didn't show?

If the "F" is for front, I wonder why he'd use one on the back, too. Maybe just to have a couple Fs showing?

bwilli88 

This is such a nice looking bike, glad it is not my size.

xiaoman1 

Now that's what I would call "nice"!
GLWTS

pcb 

Happy New Year! Price drop to $400 shipped conti USA.