Can anyone help identifying the frame on my Bio Racer

[keith brown]

I have a Bio Racer "personal" bike which has all Durace cranks, brakes and sprocket / gears. On the basis of this kit I assume the frame to be of "good" quality. I know that Bio racer did a bike measurement system back in the late 80's and am assuming this was a product of that system. However the only indicator to the frame manufacturer is the following label which appears on both front forks and the frame; STYU 878 Mannesmann tubing.
Looking for any help in finding out a bit more about this frame. Although I purchased it second hand in the UK it has the brakes reversed so assume it was originally possibly a Belgian bike. Any info would be appreciated.

keith

 

[biggs682]

pics please .

 

[keith brown]

Hope these help. If different view will be more useful please let me know. The saddle it came with was a Royal Girardi and the bars and stem have been changed otherwise everything as I bought it. The Saddle stem is Dura ace as are the cranks but the chain rings are SG, otherwise pretty much everything is Dura ace, hence my assumption the frame should be reasonable quality.

Regards

Keith

 

[biggs682]

i have seen that "B" on fork crowns before but cant remember where .

either way very nice looking machine

 

[keith brown]

thanks for looking and corresponding. Regards
K

 

[PloddinPedro]

Hi Keith. I have two custom Bioracers in my 'stable', both acquired through the now defunct Buckley-Saxon Cycles of Castle Hedingham. The earliest frame was built for me in July 1991 and looks to be the same red as yours. The second frame was actually built for my son and dates from April 1994. This second frame has the same stickers as yours and has a noticeable degree of elliptic tube shaping of the seat and downtubes at the bottom bracket, which makes it a bit stiffer laterally than the earlier frame.

I cannot remember much about what I was told about the tubing at the time but I do remember that the Reynolds 753 was king-of-the-hill then and I was given the impression that the Mannesmann stuff was its equal, although I suspect this was perhaps a bit of 'marketing' speak at the time! I would say though that the material was certainly good quality tubing and worth hanging onto if you're minded to go with steel.

Neither of these frames got very heavy use since they were 'best' bikes at the time and have always been in 'race' configuration so have largely stayed snug and dry at the back of the shed! By coincidence, encouraged by the good weather, I recently dug out the later frame and built it up again with stuff that had become superfluous off other machines, so SRAM doubletap shifters and 53/39 crankset and derailleurs, plus a good pair of light wheels (approx 1,450gms the pair) and 23mm Ultremos. I swapped the steel fork for a Visia carbon bladed one and fitted some FSA carbon 'bars and stem - I needed to shorten the reach as the top tube is too long for me now. Complete with pedals, it weighs 8,800 gms. To me, it feels pretty quick, but I am an ageing randonneur who hasn't really ridden 53/39 for quite a while, so anything that makes me use high gears would probably feel speedy!

I am still in touch with the guy who ran Buckley-Saxon and who sold me the frames. If I can, I'll tap into his memory banks and see if I can glean any more information about the tubing.

 

[keith brown]

Many thanks for info. Would be interested in any additional info you can find.

V interesting about the location of the builder as I'm not that far away although as I said I assumed a foreign origin due lever reversal. However who's to say not built here and then sold abroad and the levers swapped there!! Who can tell. However I haven't actually weighed mine but will do so as it would be interesting to know how much I am trying to move!! My crankset is a 52/42, not many hills round here, just the odd short sharp hump which makes me get out the saddle, if nothing else but to make the blood circulate my "dead" posterior. I have to say that whilst I feel it is doing me good "she who must be obeyed" isn't quite so enthusiastic as my aged body needs at least a day of housework and garden duty free activity.

What difference did you find with the carbon front end? Interestingly the reason I changed the bars and stem was that the original was causing me a problem of leaning on my wrists too much and they started to become painful and the hands lost circulation. Much better now though after extending the bars, just everything else hurts as I can go further! Any ideas for stopping toes going numb after about 25 miles, shoes fit ok just wonder if again the positioning is wrong?

Cheers

Keith

 

[PloddinPedro]

Sorry, I may have misled you slightly. Buckley-Saxon were dealers for Bioracer. They had the bike fitting/body measuring system and the measurements were faxed to Bioracer and you received a 'computer print-out' a few days later. The frames were indeed constructed in Belgium. In my case, I bought the wheels and groupsets separately and assembled them myself. If I recall correctly, Bioracer was something to do with the ex-pro racer Patrick Schils who now runs the Inter-Bike shop at Marks Tey, though I'd need to check this.

Switching the fork and adding carbon 'bars and stem saves a little weight and to my mind 'deadens' some of the road buzz that I find causes pins-and-needles in my hands. It's not a big difference - in no way a miracle cure - but every little helps! Getting my position sorted and acknowledging the ageing process and switching to frames with shorter toptubes and a higher front end have done more to alleviate discomfort in hands, neck and shoulders I've found.

If your toes are going numb - your shoes may not fit as well as you think. I used to take a size 43 until about three years ago I was shopping for new shoes and went into Condor in the Grays Inn Road. Carl there measured my feet and made me stand on a steep slope - I came out with a pair of 45's! As you age, your instep collapses and your feet lengthen. It's not always apparent just walking about but when you ride a distance and get tired, your instep weakens and without realising, your toes are pressing against the toebox. Also, you might want to try moving your cleats back and getting the pressure point a little away from the metatarsal joint; though this is probably best done only if you have shoes with a good stiff sole. I have found that paying out for top end stiff shoes is well worth it, although I am 80kg and it may not be so important for lighter riders.

 

[Tony Smith]

Didn't Bianchi engrave/stamp a stylised 'B' on some of their fork crowns ?

 

[keith brown]

Sorry, I may have misled you slightly. Buckley-Saxon were dealers for Bioracer. They had the bike fitting/body measuring system and the measurements were faxed to Bioracer and you received a 'computer print-out' a few days later. The frames were indeed constructed in Belgium. In my case, I bought the wheels and groupsets separately and assembled them myself. If I recall correctly, Bioracer was something to do with the ex-pro racer Patrick Schils who now runs the Inter-Bike shop at Marks Tey, though I'd need to check this.

Switching the fork and adding carbon 'bars and stem saves a little weight and to my mind 'deadens' some of the road buzz that I find causes pins-and-needles in my hands. It's not a big difference - in no way a miracle cure - but every little helps! Getting my position sorted and acknowledging the ageing process and switching to frames with shorter toptubes and a higher front end have done more to alleviate discomfort in hands, neck and shoulders I've found.

If your toes are going numb - your shoes may not fit as well as you think. I used to take a size 43 until about three years ago I was shopping for new shoes and went into Condor in the Grays Inn Road. Carl there measured my feet and made me stand on a steep slope - I came out with a pair of 45's! As you age, your instep collapses and your feet lengthen. It's not always apparent just walking about but when you ride a distance and get tired, your instep weakens and without realising, your toes are pressing against the toebox. Also, you might want to try moving your cleats back and getting the pressure point a little away from the metatarsal joint; though this is probably best done only if you have shoes with a good stiff sole. I have found that paying out for top end stiff shoes is well worth it, although I am 80kg and it may not be so important for lighter riders.

Interestingly it was Inter-Bike where I bought the bike and it was Patrick Schils who sold it to me.

The shoes do have a stiff sole and I think first off I will try moving the cleats. I have already gone up from a 44 to a 45 a couple of years ago, perhaps the ageing process is happening even quicker than I thought! The weight is 81 Kg so impact may be the same with respect to the shoes stiffness. I can but try and see.

Many thanks for the info, very useful and interesting. It is a small world in the end being that I live only about 10 miles from Marks Tey. I collected the Interbike "club gold card no 10098", so that tells you it was some time ago if I was the 98th bike buying customer.

 

[keith brown]

Didn't Bianchi engrave/stamp a stylised 'B' on some of their fork crowns ?

Don't know to be honest but another avenue to investigate. Cheers.

 

[keith brown]

Have just been looking and found a comparison between a Bianchi and Trek frame and lugs and whilst it was using cro mo frames in the early 80's it clearly shows a "B" stamped on the crown forks very similar to the one on mine although picked out in a different colour. It does also show a "B" on the rear forks but mine are not flattened at the seat post end like those on the 80's bike so not perhaps as easy to do.

So am thinking perhaps bike designed for a particular individual using the Bio Racer system and the info sent off for a computer print-out to be drawn up for the frame builder. The frame is then put together in Belgium using, possibly a Bianchi frame construction. Obviously the other components could have been a specified requirement to the builder or could have been fitted by the owner as in Ploddin Pedro's case.

The seat stem is elliptical but not so much at the down tube bottom bracket end. So it may have been around the early nineties, between Ploddin Pedro's two Bio Racers.

Having said all this it may 2+2 is really 5!!!

 

[Tony Smith]

Or it may be a set of Bianchi forks

 

[Simon Daw]

I'm the chap to whom PloddinPedro refers, who used to work at Buckley-Saxon Cycles in Castle Hedingham. The information he's given you is good, and I can add very little, really.

We were agents for BioRacer for several years - from their introduction to the UK market until they ceased frame production a few years later. They were around in the early 90s. As has been stated, the designs were based on an early (the first?) personalised, computer-designed geometry derived from measurements we took, and the frames were built in Belgium.

Patrick was the UK agent in the days when he was a wholesaler and not a retailer. It's possible that your frame was one of his demos, and therefore not strictly a custom frame at all, given that you acquired it from him. Why not ask him? In fact, his very first frame - the one he showed us when selling us the concept - was a red Personal. Who knows!?

The tubing is Mannesmann, as you say. It's not like 753 - much heavier. It compares better with 708, or maybe Columbus SL. It rides well; I still have two BioRacer frames, and got some of my best results riding BioRacers. Those forks don't look original, so the Bianchi theory could be right, BUT if that's a Sytu decal on them then I think it's unlikely, and that my memory is defective; I don't think I ever saw the tubing used by another builder, though presumably some did.

The stays have definitely been repainted; BioRacer powder coated their frames (no chips in mine after 20 years), and they were one colour only. The most radical their frame finishing became was to offer a contrasting fork colour (so the black forks prove nothing). I'd have a look at those stays carefully - they may have history if they've required repainting.

Hope that helps a little!

 

[keith brown]

I'm the chap to whom PloddinPedro refers, who used to work at Buckley-Saxon Cycles in Castle Hedingham. The information he's given you is good, and I can add very little, really.

We were agents for BioRacer for several years - from their introduction to the UK market until they ceased frame production a few years later. They were around in the early 90s. As has been stated, the designs were based on an early (the first?) personalised, computer-designed geometry derived from measurements we took, and the frames were built in Belgium.

Patrick was the UK agent in the days when he was a wholesaler and not a retailer. It's possible that your frame was one of his demos, and therefore not strictly a custom frame at all, given that you acquired it from him. Why not ask him? In fact, his very first frame - the one he showed us when selling us the concept - was a red Personal. Who knows!?

The tubing is Mannesmann, as you say. It's not like 753 - much heavier. It compares better with 708, or maybe Columbus SL. It rides well; I still have two BioRacer frames, and got some of my best results riding BioRacers. Those forks don't look original, so the Bianchi theory could be right, BUT if that's a Sytu decal on them then I think it's unlikely, and that my memory is defective; I don't think I ever saw the tubing used by another builder, though presumably some did.

The stays have definitely been repainted; BioRacer powder coated their frames (no chips in mine after 20 years), and they were one colour only. The most radical their frame finishing became was to offer a contrasting fork colour (so the black forks prove nothing). I'd have a look at those stays carefully - they may have history if they've required repainting.

Hope that helps a little!

Simon,

Many thanks for the info. really interesting, the whole history. I have looked closely at the whole frame and found that I missed a "B" impression on the bridge between the rear forks and where the brake mechanism is located. It is the same style as that on the crown of the front forks.

As to the colour, there is a small (2 mm) mark where at some time there has been something rubbing, probably the tail of the front brake cable, against the forks where it is black and you can see that it was originally all red and the black is a coat laid over the top, that is what I am assuming.

I will call in and see Patrick and see if he can help further.

Many thanks for your input.

Regards

Keith