bikemig 

I picked up a 1958 Claud Butler Jubilee earlier this year and its time to build it up. I plan on doing a resto-mod as I'm not going to try to find period correct wheels. I have a set of 27 inch wheels with Campagnolo tipo hi flange hubs and Ambrosio rims. Other than that, I'll try to keep things at least in the spirit of a bike from 1958.

The Jubilee was a "club" model made from Reynolds 531 straight gauge tubing or Accles & Pollock Kromo tubing. It was fillet brazed as lugs were expensive in post war England even in the late 50s and labor was not. So it made sense economically to build the bike this way.

The bike has a bit of rust but it is in great shape with beautiful decals. Thanks to hwheel72 for the bike.

bikemig 

I have a picture of the bike as it was originally built and a catalog page from '53 for the Jubilee model:

Murray Missile 

Ooh, I like THAT!

Senrab62 

Do you know what headset that is? Beautiful frame! Cannot wait to see it built up! I have a 55 I'm hoarding parts for now

bikemig 

The headset is not period correct. It is a suntour headset. The bottom bracket is much newer than the bike as well.

I think I can piece together a stronglight competition in which case I'll likely use that. A stronglight competition is not quite period correct but I'm just trying to get this close to being right while still being functional for long rides.

merziac

H**Y CRAP!!!

That's Freakin Awesome!!!

You lucky bastid!

bikemig 

It's time to get this bike built. @nlerner got me movitated with his Hetchins build thread; plus he got me the chainring I needed for the build,

There are a lot of cool adverts for the Claud Butler Jubilee on the web.

bikemig 

The frame is likely Reynolds 531 straight gauge. No tubing decal on the bike but the original decals are in terrific shape. The paint is in very good shape but it had a bit of rust on the top tube. I sanded it out and use flat black rustoleum. You have to love how easy it is to touch up black paint.

bikemig 

The bike is a resto mod. I'm keeping the Sakae seatpost and suntour headset that came on the bike. The other parts are all I think more or less in keeping with an old British bike. I want to be able to ride this on the local "hills." There aren't a lot of hills in central Iowa but my favorite path has a bunch of rollers and a few 10 percent grades. So I'm going with 46/34 rings on the Stronglight 49 crank. I have the right spindle but I'll need to track down some stronglight cups. The ones in the bag are french threaded. Plus I'll have to track down the right nuts and bolts for the rings. The pedals are Atom square cage. The saddle is a B17 champion narrow. The brakes are GB sports. The stem is a CB; the bars are Nitto 105s. The derailleurs are campagnolo nuovo record. The freewheel is a suntour 13-26. The wheels are campy tipo hi flange laced to 27 inch ambrosio clincher rims.

scarlson 

What a beautiful bike!

58 was an interesting year for Claud. Holdsworth bought up the trademark in July, but he'd already sold his tooling and his works in '57 according to this site. But Holdsworth didn't put out a Claud catalog until '59. So, is this a Claud Claud or a Holdsworth Claud? And how do you know it's from '58? The catalogs on that website appear to only show the Jubilee made from '53 to '55. But certainly not for a while after the Holdsworth takeover, so that points to it being a Claud Claud.

habes78023 

Very cool bike! I'd probably be doing an even less thoughtful job just so I could get it out for a ride asap, then I'd start considering what the right build is,

bikemig 

It might be earlier than '58 but no later. I know that because the BF member I bought the bike from bought the bike from the original owner who bought it in 1958. Post #2 has a picture of the bike as it was originally built when the original owner purchased it in 1958. Given the decals on the bike, I'm reasonably confident it's a Claud Claud. But you may be right and this bike could have been built before 1958 even if that was the year it was sold.

bikemig 

I appreciate scarlson 's question about the year as it forced me to look for a serial number.

Claud Butler Claud Butlers in the 50s had two sets of 4 digits: one was for the year and month, the other for the frame count that year.

https://www.retrobike.co.uk/threads/...cation.392124/

This has a 4 digit set for the frame count (either 1131 or 7131) but no four digit set for the year and month. So the exact year will remain a mystery.

The workmanship on this bike is outstanding. Very, very neat fillet brazed bike and an excellent paint job. That is a lot of value for an "entry" level Claud Butler.

scarlson 

Wow, neat that you know the whole provenance complete with previous owners! When you posted that picture, I didn't realize that it was of your _actual_ bike back in the day. That's a rare thing. With the serial number, it's just like my Herse. I've got the frame number but he didn't put the year. Great bike makers think alike, I guess? Certainly the greats were more concerned with making a good product than they were with bookkeeping!

It makes sense that Claud would have saved old inventory after the whole tax mess and going into receivership, maybe selling frames and bits under the table to avoid creditors. I would've too! It sounds like he got a raw deal. Maybe plausible deniability was a good reason to stop including a date in the serial.