Anyone know about this bike/make?

[GoatBeard]

Bit of a garage find this, but I have myself a new 'old' bike! It's a Richmond Optimo Trekk all-steel tubed bike circa 90's I believe. Unusually it's sporting a triple and a 5/6 speed rear mech. It's built like a tank and comes with nice chrome mud guards.

Be interested to know more about this make/brand and whether it was a quality bike back in the day. Looks bloody robust, could be a lovely around-about town type relaxed tourer.

 

[SkipdiverJohn]

Pictures are required! Not familiar with them myself, but the constructional details of the frame tube joints, dropouts, mounting bosses etc, can often tell you a lot about the quality level of the bike apart from the mechanicals fitted.

 

[Spiderweb]

I think you may mean Optima?
Not the best quality bikes, the Richmond is what I would call a town bike and was one of the slightly better models that Optima made.
I don’t think they are that old, maybe 2000.

 

[SkipdiverJohn]

I've found some pictures of one up for sale now. Cheap hybrid, with the lowest level Shimano gear mechs and twistgrip shifters on the bars. Pretty much the same as other cheap hybids such as an Apollo CX10.
If everything still works, especially the shifters, and you maintain it properly, it would make a perfectly practical if rather heavy hack bike to use for running local errands on and things like that. The sort of bike you don't mind taking to a dodgy area and leaving it locked up on the street because it isn't valuable and is unlikely to get stolen.
If it's anything like the two CX10's I've stripped for parts then it will be a pretty hefty thing and you'll feel the weight if you want to get up any sort of real hill on it. Perfectly ok for just knocking about on locally but nothing special.