Neil McGowranMy previous post turned up a couple of surprises about SB1995. The first, smaller surprise, was the owner’s initials on the fork. The bigger surprise…
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“Never assume with the SBDU”. That is a phrase I say a lot. It is a mantra I repeat when I’m assessing SBDU frames and…
Recollections are a funny thing. Could you remember details or be precise about a specific date from maybe only a month ago? Could you remember…
It was a Thursday evening a couple of weeks ago, and as usual I was sitting in front of the laptop, half watching TV half…
I’ve been collecting for years. I can go for what seems like a lifetime without a new addition while at other times I seem to…
Over the years since bike number one arrived (SB4059), I’ve continued to look at what I’m collecting and I’ve tried to add frames that plug…
Frame weight… it’s often talked about, requested and used as a measure to try and determine tubing type. From my own experience I can see…
I’ve planned before and never got there, I’ve bought a ticket before and never got there, but this year I actually did get there. Karen…
It has been a long couple of days but I’ve finally completed this small and difficult project to bring SB4059 up to spec in terms…
I think I must have been slightly bonkers to start this project but the desire to get SB4059 looking correct was too much! That morning…
You probably think seat stays are quite boring, why on earth would I devote a blog post to the two narrow tapering tubes on the…
I wasn’t planning to do this job today, it just happened. I’d been thinking for the past week about how to tackle the task of…
It’s just over six years since I fastened the first component to this frame and four or five years since I completed the first build…
It was just another night in front of the television when an email dropped into my Inbox regarding an SBDU frame, this is a situation…
Following the change of cables on SB4059 there is now only one thing that I need to do, one more thing to sort out, one…
It’s been a while since I’ve written anything about this bike. SB4059 is my original bike, number #1 in the collection, the bike that started…
Every new addition gets a good clean and although it was already looking quite good, SH377T still needed a bit of work. Wet oil and…
eBay… it is a place I try to avoid. I like to find bikes and frames that haven’t had much exposure to the internet. eBay…
What would you consider rare about the Specialist Bicycle Development Unit (SBDU)? I’ve heard people say that SBDU Reynolds 753 frames are rare… are they,…
If I ever get the time and opportunity, I’ll take bikes into my wife’s photography studio and pick up the camera to capture the details…
The SBDU seemed to stop stamping their H reference on frames towards the end of 1979, meaning the frames coming out of Ilkeston at the…
I’ve been itching to bring the original paint on this frame back to life ever since it arrived last week. And even though SB3505 is…
The process of purchasing SB3505 was super smooth… a late Friday evening email, additional images on the Saturday, deal done on the Sunday morning, packaged…
I have several frames and bikes in my SBDU collection that constantly vie for top spot. Should top spot go to JR178T, my Jan Raas frame?…
After working out that SB664 was built from an early type of Imperial Reynolds 753 tubing, I wanted to use the calipers and metal rule…
In the beginning there was Metric Reynolds 753 tubing, and then later in 1982, a new Imperial Reynolds 753 tube was introduced. The new tube,…
There is no long winded waffle from me on this post, at least that is the intention… it’s hopefully just a short introduction about a…
Back at the beginning of May, I had a weekend of frame repairs! SB4409 had new transfers and a bit of clear coat, while SB6560…
Now that is a massively bold statement to make… here it is again just to make sure that I did actually say it… “The most…
There has always been lots said on the subject of Reynolds 753, and that doesn’t surprise me. This tubing had such an impact on the sport of cycling; the…