Restor or Re- interpret - that is the question!

[europa]

If you can't get modern brakes to reach Steve, the old girls will I'm running the original Diacompes on the Europa ... with 700c wheels, with plenty of room in the brake pad hangers. New cables, Aero brake levers (surprisingly cheap, even new) and good quality pads do a very good job even if they do feel a tad wooden. Although I haven't tried the Tektros on my bike, they look very very promising and if she wasn't fixed gear, she'd be wearing them.

Brakes? They're the least of your worries. The big concern is whether you go for Ambrosio or Velocity rims on your fixed gear wheel set

Richard

sorry, is my bias showing?

[GaryF]

Hi uMP2k,

It's good to see your project is still on the go.

It sounds as if you are taking the Campy. route. It should look great. Now you must be deciding on the actual group set. Super or Nuovo Record, Triomphe or Victory, C-Record, Croce D'Aune or Chorus, or even the newer ergo groups of Record or Chorus.

I read that you have a Chorus headset. It could be from the C-Record era or perhaps the ergo era. I used to have a bike with the Chorus gruppo from the C-Record era. It worked really well and looked fantastic. I especially liked the shape of the crank arms and the brake callipers which were quite compact yet seemed to fit the tyres nicely and had a strong and solid profile.

Whether you go for a single gruppo or mix and match it doesn't really matter.

About the internal cabling. The Benotto has a Campy. (I think) braze-on fitting that was available at the time. You come across this fitting on other brands of bike, such as Colnago, if they were going to produce a frame with internal gear cables. It sat on top of the down tube and had a provision for the cable to enter the tube as part of it's design.

I see your frame's method of routing the cable into the frame through a separate brazed on fitting and still utilising the standard gear lever braze-on bosses. Very smart. I've never seen that before.

By the way, the Nishiki badge is very nice and would make a classy touch to the frame if you can't get the Repco decals. Perhaps Nishiki Decals will be easier to source. I cannot recall Repco as having a headbadge. (I had a very fancy Repco 3 speed from the late 60's and its headbadge was a decal.)

Great to keep in touch,

Gary.