Chromed Steel Rims! I forgot how awful they were...

[Sheffield_Tiger]

Just taken a bound-for-ebay bike for a test ride to the pub after a full strip-down service, including ripping out the 3-speed coaster hub and replacing with a straightforward singlespeed.

It rides lovely, a proper upright pootling bike but....chrome steel rims! It's got some of the shiniest rims I've seen for the age of the bike - albeit with some polishing and a rear wheel rebuild.

I forgot though, how bloody awful steel rims are in the wet. It rained heavily and although the brake calipers are half-decent (for single pivot) with modern Dia-Compe levers set close for optimal pull by the fingers, and old-school leather faced Sturmey blocks.....given that the pub is atop a hill I had a fright coming down it and realising how abysmal the stopping power was! In my youth, did I REALLY cycle 80+ miles on a weekend on steel rims with no effective brakes??

But the rims are shiny...

(Sorry crap photo..the pink one not the Trek)

 

[Deleted member 1258]

Yes I remember steel rims, when combined with suicide levers you'd been better off putting a foot in the spokes, I rode with a touring club in the mid 1980's and would happily do an all day Sunday ride on a steel bike that weighed a ton that had steel rims, must have been bonkers.

 

[Salad Dodger]

I remember, as a kid, spending a whole summer's day proudly cleaning and polishing my first bike. Those chrome rims shone like mirrors after I had wax polished them. It took weeks before the brakes worked.....

 

[Cycleops]

Alloy rims can be just as bad! I came over in October and was staying maybe not far from you. I bought a seventies J.F.Wilson (whom I am sure you know) and used it locally. The brakes were scarey on those Sheffield hills. They were Campag side pulls, probably the blocks.