Roadster evolution

This post is a retrospective one on the buildup of my roadster.  It all began at the nunnery (a Sydney bicycle community workship) where I found this nice old roadster frame with bolt on seatstays and Williams cranks.  I took it home and began to dream up plans of having a nice old roadster with a full chaincase and a Sturmey 3 speed on the back.

However to my dismay, I found that the frame was bent.  The rear triangle looked like it had taken a good whack and so had the forks.  I left it out in my back alley so it could find a new home and it was gone within a few hours.  I sort of regret this now in hindsight because I could have just put on another set of forks and bent back the rear triangle, however it was about an inch or so out.

Anyway, seeing as that I had a spare frame - Mr Ramen's original frame I decided to use this as the basis for my roadster project.  All I had to do was fit some north roads and a Sturmey Archer 3 speed wheel and I was done.  I kept the williams cranks from the roadster above and put them on.   Boy after only ever working on cottered cranks since my Raleigh Twenty and now this bike I know why they are such a pain in the arse...

Sturmey Archer AW built up to a 700c Araya rim.  You can make out the brass washers if you squint a bit, they look pretty cool.

Now the important part is the wheel build, as this is the heart of a roadster.  The Sturmey Archer AW has a steel hubshell and flange so from what I have read you really should use brass spoke washers if you are using modern spokes.  This is because modern spokes are radiused at the elbow for thicker alloy flanges not thin steel ones.  The washer allows the spoke to brace against the flange which builds a stronger wheel.  After this I built up the front wheel using a Shimano dynamo hub and I bought the same B+M dynamo headlight as on the Twenty and a mudguard mounted tail light. These are the many iterations of it over the months:

First iteration has Sugino Super mighty track cranks that I literally found on the back of a truck going to the tip.  The north roads are flipped to give the Pashley Guvnor look.  Riding around Centennial park a guy actually asked if it was one hehe. 

Second iteration with bars flipped back

Third iteration now with Brooks B67, chainguard and Carradice Nelson Longflap and Carradice Duxback cape.

Final iteration with tyres switched to Vittoria Randonneurs which were previously on Mr Ramen

I rode it around the country over christmas in this setup which was great, the width of the Randonneur tyres was perfect for gravelly hardpacked country lanes.  I've now abandoned the bag as I found it too much of a hassle and I fitted an old fruit box.  This was great as I could fit a lot more stuff in it with the help of an elastic cargo net.  No pics yet.  This mini-project as well as the Twenty sparked my interest in roadsters generally, personally I think the are the epitome of a good city bike.  Not particularly fast or light but durable, simple, comfortable and low maintenance.