76SLT 

Just picked this up. No decals at all, one hole for a head badge. Campy shifters, front derailleur and cable guide. Shimano Crane GS rd, Nervar cottered crankset with Chair? Japanese pedals. Ideale 42 saddle and internal cabling for the rear brakes. 27" steel wheels, no markings on the hubs. No quick release.

Any idea what make this is? Everywhere the paint is chipped, it looks like it's chrome underneath.

The frame is inexpensive I'm sure, but with internal cables and nice lugs? That's what's confusing to me. Here's some pics.

mechanicmatt

Looks like low end Japanese to me.

Drillium Dude 

Pretty sure the distressed paint at the head lugs and below the fork crown serves to warn that this find has had a front-end impact at some point in its life. Not to matter, I would think, as this bad boy looks built like a tank!

I agree, low-end, but unsure of country of origin, although I have seen that style of crimped, rolled and rounded treatment to the seat stay ends on low-end Italian frames.

Still a neat find Can you disassemble the BB to find out what the original color might have been?

DD

thumpism 

Looks Puch-ish to me, as in Free Spirit era, with changes.

markwesti

Wild seat stays . This is going to be interesting , internal cable routing does not fit with everything else , for me . Also extra fancy lugs , but stamped dropouts ?

thumpism 

Puch-ish, as I said.

https://oldtenspeedgallery.com/owner-...s-sport-racer/

This is one of the more unique 10 speeds I’ve ever seen, let alone owned. The bike is made in Austria from lightweight tubing. It has Campy Record deraileurs and shifters. The rims are alloy Weimann with high flange hubs. The bike was sold in SEARS stores as a Ted Williams signature Sport Racer. It has chrome front lugs and internal brake cable routing. I’ve only ridden it once but plan for it to be may regular vintage rider.





Damn, I'm good.

76SLT 

You are! I think that's it. I'm going to remove the paint from the lugs. It will be my winter project. Thank you very much.

thumpism 

You'll probably find it's built from Reynolds 531 tubing. Pretty rare find. Neato!

Drillium Dude 

In pristine, original condition it does look pretty nifty from 10 feet away

Okay, 5 feet!



DD

Gary Fountain

I'll have a stab at it being French.

76SLT 

The rims are Samir Saminox, 27×1 1/4. Very nice looking rims.

noobinsf 

Yep, it’s Austrian — lotsa details match my Puch Bergmeister, like the unthreaded eyelets, internal routing, seat stay caps, lugs, etc. It’s heavy, but the 42.5” wheelbase makes for a smooooth ride. I loved mine, but had no room to keep it.

If under the paint you find copper plating, it’s the Bergie, otherwise likely the Sears-by-Puch.

76SLT 

Apparently the Campy fd is the type with the cable stop built in. Is that what I'm seeing?

dddd

Yeah, the un-slotted cable housing stop indicates a very early Record derailer, so early 1960's it seems.

These bike's frames ride really well, so hopefully it's your size.

The stem looks to be raised a bit higher than what i would consider safe for this particular version or "death" stem.
Upgrading to one of the Origin-8 (Kalloy, Hsin Lung) stems will allow a greater safe height and you can choose from 8cm or 10cm extension length.
These bikes have 22mm inside diameter steer tube so only the brands I listed will likely fit unless you use an old French stem.
I would switch to an aluminum handlebar at the same time, and perhaps also keep my eyes open for an aluminum wheelset.

@thumpism, how did you attach the bottle cage to the downtube?

thumpism 

Not my bike. Google provided that photo in response to my search on "Puch Free Spirit bicycle," because I recalled some of those features from having seen them on the bikes before; long seatstay flutes and internal cable routing, but mostly the bend in the round fork tubes, the crown and the lugs. I was not certain. I had to scroll down a ways to find a suitable example.

Since that bike predates braze-ons for such mounts I'd suspect nutserts or the like and I don't think the article mentions that detail.

unworthy1

Definitely concur that it's a Puch-Steyr-AD made Bergmeister-ish frame and likely re-badged for Sears Roebuck, would have guessed NOT any 531 in those tubes, but possibly it could if it's a Ted Williams model.

76SLT 

Where there are chips or scratches, it looks like chrome. I don't see any copper. Is there another way to tell? I don't see a serial number anywhere.

noobinsf 

On mine, the copper layer was right under the paint, so it looks unlikely to be the case with yours.

John E

That is evidently a 1960s Austrian thing.

My high-end Capo Siegers have fancy stamped dropouts with U-shaped outer surface braze-ons to give them the look and functionality of forged dropouts. My mid-grade Capo has the same stamped dropouts, absent the braze-ons. Lugs are arguably "extra fancy."

76SLT 

I don't think I'll find any copper under the paint. Looking at pics of these bikes, I'm wondering why mine has the lugs painted rather than chrome. They are chrome under the paint. I don't think the bike has been repainted. If it has been, it was a long time ago.

According to what I've read, they came with Campy derailleurs, but mine has a Shimano Crane. I've also read that others also have a Crane so did they come with either, or was it common to replace Campy with a Crane?

My plans are to polish the paint, but remove paint on the rear stays and the lugs so it looks correct and better. Replace the handlebars with an alloy Pivo I have, and replace the wheels with some Weinmann alloy rims with Normandy HF hubs. I don't know what hubs these are since there are no markings on them. I'm hoping someone will tell me what they are since they have a pretty unique hole pattern in the flange. Someone set it up with the nds brake operating the rear and the ds operating the front so I'll rework all that when I replace the cables. Everything else works well. The saddle is shot though so I'll be replacing it with one of my Brooks. Stay tuned for updates.

Hudson308 

Interesting you say that. I looked at the fork and thought the same thing.
Tubing type may be narrowed down by measuring the seat post diameter. Any idea what the BB threading is?

noobinsf 

Steerer should be French 22.0, while bb is likely British standard. Headset thread is uniquely Austrian and difficult to replace/source, so keep tabs on the locknut!

Drillium Dude 

Of course it's been repainted, as evidenced by the orange paint on the upper and lower cups of the headset and the cups of the BB.

DD

noobinsf 

So, it looks to me like this is the Sears as pictured in the example above with chrome lugs. Agree that it looks repainted, no doubt. As for the Crane, it easily could have been replaced somewhere along the way and the Campy mech put to use elsewhere. Either way, looks like a fun project that will ride really well.

repechage

While the front derailleur is not the "big Money" version (those had the screw retention of the mechanism arms), I do not think this one does, it probably is equal to the purchase price of the bike or more.
Yes, repaint for sure.

Pretty wild that these were sold through Sears at one point.
(Even May Co Department Stores sold high dollar bikes in 1972- they had ONE on display, you custom ordered it from France- the display bike had full Campagnolo less brakes)