70s/80s Argos - After and Before!

[ninety]

Hello
Since I've posted my MTB, I figured I should probably put up a pic of my recent build. It's an Argos 531 frame and forks I got off ebay for GBP35 with arrowhead lugs and Campag dropouts. The plan was for a cheap/rat bike I could leave locked in town and not worry about. Thing is, I'm not very good at doing the rat look...the paintwork was a mess, but the frame was in good order, so I took it to Bob Jackson in Leeds to get resprayed. The bloke I bought it off sent me an old Dura Ace seatpost a couple of days after the frame arrived ("I thought you might find this useful..." - top bloke!), picked up some old single speed wheels (Sachs-Maillard rear, Shimano 105 front, both on Mavic CX10s), found a NOS 3ttt stem, some super-cheap Campag cranks, some Nitto bullhorns etc (thanks to my brother for the Brooks, best birthday present in a long time) and here we are...

Might well do something about the grip tape as it could do with a bit more absorbtion, but I'm chuffed to bits with it!

EDIT - a bit back to front, but I just found some 'before' shots - show off the lugs a bit better and how it looked as though someone had attacked the paint with wire wool!

 

[peter v]

nice build! clean and simple. maybe it's just my fascination with simplicity but have you tried envisioning it with all black tyres?

 

[ninety]

Thanks for the kind words! I thought of all black tyres, but settled on white to lift it a bit - I quite like it looking modern, but tyres aren't forever, so who knows...

 

[otherself]

Blimey that was cheap for an Argos frame regardless of condition. I think swapping out the black TT levers for silver handled ones would look better.

 

[Steve Kish]

The plan was for a cheap/rat bike I could leave locked in town and not worry about

Start worrying! That looks nice enough to pinch. Please post the location of where you leave it!!

 

[ninety]

@otherself - I was pretty chuffed to win it for that, I must admit. And you're probably right about the levers, but I can live with them as they are; I'm still toying with the idea of running drops instead of the bullhorns, so if that happens I'll learn my lever lesson for then.

@Steve Kish - Thanks for the light-fingered compliment! As soon as I got the frame in my hands, I knew it deserved more and there was no way I could rat it. I'm slightly obsessive where neatness is concerned...