It must be a few months since I finished building my TI-Raleigh Team Pro, so it’s time to move onto frame number 2.
I’ve had this for a year and have thought about what to do with it for ages. At one point, I was nearly convinced to sell it but eventually, I’ve decided to keep it. It will go for a renovation either in the winter months of this year or early next year, but for now, I’ll just build and ride it in what is hopefully going to be a lovely hot, dry, wind free summer!
Unlike my Team Pro, which is built with Reynolds 753, this frame is built using Reynolds 531 Professional tubing. The range of Reynolds tubing at the time can be seen in this Reynolds brochure.
So, what to build it with… I thought I would use DURA-ACE 7400, Shimano’s top of the range groupset of 1985, the same year as the frame. However, that could be expensive (and I have almost gone bankrupt building the 753 with NOS Campagnolo Super Record), so I’ve gone for the next best thing, Shimano 600EX (Shimano Ultegra as it is now called). I’ll keep the plan for DURA-ACE for when the frame is renovated, and I’ve hopefully had a Lottery win!
Shimano 600EX
This is an excellent group with a very good heritage dating back to the mid 70’s. Shimano made various changes to the lineup, all under the name of 600EX, across the 70’s and 80’s which can be classified using the model numbers. Later variations of Shimano 600 were more popularly known as Shimano 600 ‘Tri Colour‘ (named after the 3 bands of colour shown on each component). This is when the ‘Ultegra’ name first made an appearance (but wasn’t actually written on any component – that came later) – confused yet?.
I have a mixture of 6207, 6208 and 6400 components in my groupset.
Finishing kit will be:
- Cinelli 1A stem
- Cinelli 65-44 Criterium bars
- Mavic MA40 rims
- Selle Italia Turbo saddle
- White Ambrosio bar tape
- Tyres… don’t know. Will have to see what is available
And that’s it for now. I’ll probably write a few posts on the build itself in the next few days/weeks and hopefully get a bit more technical and document as much as I can on the frame and components including dimensions and standards.