A Pig in a Poke

I got the flu over winter. It seems to happen more now I've got small kids. And it hangs around for longer.

I got out of condition and didn't find the 52-16/18 two speed dingle bike so easy to ride anymore.

So I started thinking about a bike with gears... and I found this on ebay.

From the pictures the seller had posted I could see it was a big frame. You can see the head tube is enormous compared to tubing diameter. I liked the horizontal drop outs which could fit a single speed or hub gear option. And I liked the $9.50 I paid for it.

Obviously it needed a bit of work. Which was part of the attraction.

The expression a pig in a poke, is a warning about buying goods you can't inspect properly beforehand... clearly there was no ebay in medieval europe. I didn't really pay much attention to it, and I didn't really take a proper look at the bike till I got it back from Burpengary where I'd picked it up.

What did I find?

The stickers say Graecross Capri (with Pro-Bike apparently added later).

It was "manufactured for" Graecross Industries (Aust P/L) Bayswater Victoria 3153.

And sold by Kev OLSEN Cycles Toowoomba.

Coincidently, I grew up in Toowoomba. I don't remember Kev Olsen cycles but I do remember 6 digit phone numbers. I'm pretty sure that makes this bike nearly 20 years old at least.

The Internet doesn't know a lot about Graecross cycles. It was one of the brands acquired by Pacific Dunlop when it took over Malvern Star around 1992. There's a  blogger in Melbourne with a bit of a fetish for taking pictures of a particular step-through model. The collectors on this bike forum posted this magazine article from 1984 (I think).

Some times the groovy 70's type face is misread as Sraecross.

After looking at the various Graecrosses for sale on line, my guess is that they made low end to fairly decent road bikes in the 70's and 80's....

 (This one on flickr is probably not quite as old as mine.) 

... before the brand ended up on a range of basic mountain bikes and kids bikes in the 90's. 

 Maybe after the original company was bought out?

Mine is a "Ten-Speed Racer", I guess from the 70's or early 80's, of basic to mid-range quality. I think the "Pro-Bike" sticker is marketing, not a real sign of quality. I rode something like it in primary school but it was white, a fair bit smaller and branded "Toyosha - made by the Toyota Auto Body Company". I suspect this one was also made in Japan, the frame at least. That's what "manufactured for Graecross" probably means. The gears are Shimano Tourney, which the net says was a mid level group. The brakes say "Star Brand". The hubs are Joytech (Taiwanese) and the shifters say "Product of Singapore"(under the rust).  Sheldon Brown's articles on cable installation, freewheels, frame spacing, brake extension levers and stem shifters gave me some clues about the age of the bike. 

Look at these features.

Rear derailleur hanging from the axel not the frame.

5-speed freewheel on a threaded hub, not a multispeed cassette on a freehub.

120mm rear frame spacing. That's narrow by today's standards.

Cables above the bottom bracket. Pre-mid-80's style.

Stem shifters, late 70's early 80's. Threaded headset. (Rust.)

"Suicide" brake lever extensions. Another 70's feature for riding a "racing" bike in an upright position. These days you can get interrupters which have the advantage of actually working to apply the brakes.

"27 inch" steel wheels (rusty), with axle nuts not quick release.

The spokes are broken but the tyre is still holding air!

Straight seat post with a clamp. Vinyl covered plastic saddle.

Brakes (basic single pivot side pull callipers with cable adjusters but not quick release) and reflectors and rust.

Cotterless cranks with a "pie plate"chain guard (and lots of rust).

Cup and cone bottom bracket not a cartridge (with even more rust).

The frame was OK but most of the gear looked like it would have to be replaced... if I could get it off! And I wasn't really sure if I could get new parts that would work, especially with the narrow rear drop out spacing. Maybe I had bitten off more than I could chew.

So I got out the angle grinder!

I needed that to cut the chain and get the old kick stand off... which I managed to do without cutting the frame. But then everything else came apart fairly easily with some basic tools and a bit of muscle. Maybe a sign that the components weren't too poor quality, some of them at least. The head set races came out with a few taps from a hammer and steel bar. And the frame was stripped ready to be painted.

In the mean time I started planning how I was going to rebuild it.

More later.