CSi Reworking and Paint

[dbrk]

Some here will remember my white with red headtube and seat tube paneled custom CSi with TdF lugs from this past year. It fits like a glove and the quality of the build is fantastic (and recently noted by a renowned builder who did the most current work on it).

Anyway, I made a mistake when I ordered it and that is that I relented in my discussions with the dealer (WHAT was I thinking????) and left on the 1.5cm headtube extension. This clearly didn't need to be there. I am not keen on the look with these paticular minimalist lugs. I wanted a threaded steel fork and a bike this size for me needs no spacers and no ht extension. But somehow I let the ht extension go forward and that is how the bike was built. My bad, my fault because I _knew_ that it would drive me to a mental breakdown. Yes, that is obsessive but nearly true.

When I look at the TdF lugs they need to be even on the top and the bottom for the bike to have perfect proportions. The ht ext detracts from that perfect proportionality. These are very gentle, simple, swoopy lugs that need to be even...So I had the ht extension shaved off.

I also had a new fork built that uses the new RS crown. Serotta neither shaved the ht extension nor built the fork. I am responsible for what is certainly a voided warranty but that's okay. I got what I really wanted after having made a few poor decisions in the first place. You may ask why I got a new fork. The answer is simply that I wanted a different fork crown. Mine was originally built with the ultra-simple HJ crown, nice enough but again my obsessive eye thought it a poor match for the TdF lugs.

Now I need new paint. I admire the quality of Serotta's paint but I am going to a different painter (not a cheaper one just a different one). I've decided not to keep the white/red Faema-inspired (Dario re-inspired) paint job but still think that an offset headtube would look particularly good.

My current idea is to paint it like an old Raleigh International: a soft, metallic blue with a silver headtube and silver seat tube panel and then white decals. Or to go with one color, but I can't decide which. Everything is possible. Ideas?

dbrk

[Smiley]

Hack saw it off ? I guess the head tube was not butted? I was wondering how I could get Serotta to build me a CSI with TDF lugs BUT I would need a Head tube extension or a sloping TT due to the need to minimize spacers, yes I would go with the flow..ahead system. So my dream of lugs must stay a dream. Have you considered CycleArt for the re-paint ?

[Bill Bove]

North East Custom Paint Works did a great job repainting my old Colorado Al the year before last. They are in Glenns Falls I think, you could drop it off and show them exactly what you want. My suggestion, match it to your wife's beutiful new bike. And if anybody runs across some NOS pink Cinelli cork, buy it and I'll buy from you.

[dbrk]

I'm not sure how the head tube extension was removed except to say that the builder who did it is among the very best on this faire planet. Head tubes, btw, Smilely, are never butted. If I were going to use a threadless steerer I would get a CIII. Alas there must be a way to fit you properly without ht extension or even slope. You would have to size up but that's been done since forever.

As for paint, it's going to JB because the best is the best. Others do a fine, fine job but this fella is one of a kind.

I still can't decide on the color(s). It seems a shame not to offset the headtube but I lean to mono colors if they are bright (uhh....no pink for me, that's for the lady upstairs...) and subtle combinations for the offset look. This Faema was too peloton-ish for me, it screamed and I generally prefer not to yell unless the box at the door has some very cool bike in it.

dbrk

[djg]

But if you want simpler, it's hard to beat pearl white. One color, the whole thing.

How about blue with contrasting white head lugs (a la Moon)?

[TimB]

I had a Bob Jackson that was a kind of butterscotch yellow perl with red decals, and the lugs were outlined in the same red. It was beautiful, simple and showed the lines of the lugs.

[OldDog]

dbrk,

Consider Tom K at Spectrum for your repaint, his work is among the best. :banana:

[Ken Robb]

you want teal blue/green of the Riv you may get yet even with the "wrong" brake mounting. House of Kolor KBC-15 over (Grant wrote BC-25) but that is a black base. The sample in the Hof K book that looked most like the gorgeous frame that I saw at Riv HQ looked like it was sprayed over the white base which you will find in the book next to BC-25. Joe Bell said he had "messed with" the stock color a little but probably had his notes. I love that paint job and so will you.

[PaulE]

should be cut out to mirror and complement the lines of the TdF lug it sits on top of, imho. I would think this could be done, for a price, as it appears to me that the headtube extension is accomplished by using a longer head tube which then has a sleeve brazed onto it on top of the lug, so that the exterior diameter of the the head tube at the extension is the same as the lug. My CSI has a 2 cm headtube extension on top of its TdF lug so I know exactly what DBRK means. I wanted the HT extension, but didn't think to ask how it would be done on top of the TdF lug. If anyone out there is considering TdF lugs and a HT extension, it might be useful to inquire if the HT extension can be cut out to mirror and complement the lines of the TdF lug.

[Tom]

So now I start on you guys... I gotta get the CSi repainted because I've scratched the hell out of it. OK, I admit, I want to also.

I assume the carbon fork can't be repainted. So now I'm down to a couple of ideas. Of course, that's until I see the pipes in person.

Stay platinum, paint the lugs quicksilver, maybe outline them with a black line and put one probably red/black decal on the downtube. Optimal decal would be titanium with black outline. Understated or unnoticeable... that's the question.

Copper tubes, platinum lugs and front fork. Sort of begs some kind of platinum treatment on the seat stays but I don't know. Gotta look at decal choices on this scheme, but just the one on the down tube. Not a classic look. It depends on what the copper looks like in person.

[Serotta PETE]

Douglas, we are dating ourselves with the Raleigh Pro and the blue.... That was a great color and really brings back memories. It would be very understated and beautiful

Have a happy holiday. PETE

ps- JB paints are top notch...................

[djg]

Kinda miss the old tree structure.

So why can you not get the carbon fork repainted? When I had my CSi painted recently, they painted a new Reynolds fork to match--this involved hand sanding the clear on the fork. I don't see why this couldn't be done with a previously painted fork (and if you are not using a lighter color over dark, they don't even have to remove all the old paint).

I've no particular expertise with the (re)painting of carbon forks--I just don't see the problem and am wondering if you were given a particular reason.

[Tom]

Could be random neural firings. I don't remember where I read it, but the Serotta site doesn't say it. It probably wasn't there. If the fork can be repainted then that's cool. I probably shouldn't write down my assumptions because then somebody like me remembers it later on but forgets it was an assumption and bad info gets into the stream.

[Smiley]

It just costs a bit more to get the old paint off. Sometimes if your thinking up-grade to a better fork now maybe its the time. When I repaint my Hors I'll paint the fork. Now you can think about more options.

[rwl]

Should repaint just fine. Can't clearcoat once its painted, though, as I recall.

Rick