Clive Arrives

I am very pleased to announce that Clive—my randonneur frame by Dan Polito—has finally arrived on Canadian soil. His arrival was pushed back by many months due to a series of delays. But he is now with Noah at Velocolour. Since I myself am still living in Hungary, my friend Olivier has kindly sent me a whole bunch of photos of the frame and stem. (The custom rod-operated FD accidentally got left behind. It will arrive soon.)

Based on what I've heard from Olivier and seen in these pictures, Clive seems like he's in good shape. As some of you may remember, I sent Dan an extremely detailed order sheet. I'm a very picky customer, so Dan had a tall order. All the basics are right: the brazing is good, the finish is nice, and the clearances are all within a 1/4" and seem right. He also added a number of nice, original touches: nice dropout treatments, an interesting seatlug/sleeve. As a pleasant surprise, he built my fork from Jack Taylor Special Reynolds 531 imperial-oval blades and an old sand-cast crown.

Photos and commentaries follow.

Headtube, fillet-brazed joints, and single shift lever. Also note the very nice loop-and-stop treatment for the brake cables, as I did on my own bike Niles.


"Hellenic" (Dan calls them "continental") stays, seat lug/sleeve, and "where did it come from?" rear brake cable stop. A bit further down, that's the mount for my generator-powered taillight.


Rear brake cable hanger. Might be prone to flexing (thus mushiness), and it's brazed to the thin butt at the top of the seat tube. Pump pegs on the outside of the seatstay might cause the pump to block a bit of light from the taillight.


Fillet brazed bottom bracket area, fender mount braze-on, and thoughtfully indented seatstay for big ring clearance.


Very interesting dropout treatment and slapguard braze-on. Seatstay doesn't follow the angle of the dropout.


A better look at the seat lug/sleeve, which follows the contour of the fillet.


Fender mounting point and rear Mafac braze-ons.


The front dropouts also have interesting attachments. And the big dropouts are striking—and appropriately "English-looking," given the heritage of the fork blades.


A look at the bend of the fork blades. Also English-looking to my eye.


The lovely fork crown, onto which the Mafac bosses are attached. I sent Dan a front rack made by Mike Barry of Mariposa. It looks like I'll need to use a fairly large spacer to have it sit level. I might try making another rack myself...


Big loops for the generator wires on the left fork blade.


Dan's lovely custom quill stem. I still need to add a bell mount and put a cable stop for the front brake. I think I'd like the stop right in the extension, so that the brake cable passes through the stem. Not a very popular design for some reason—maybe because raising/lowering the stem affects the brake action, though that's not a big issue for me; and might even come in handy if I needed to drastically loosen the front brake for some reason...


A look at Dan's unique flush mount of the quill bolt.