Saturday 30 October 2010

Triumph 20 with matching luggage

Delayed from yesterday when I was mad busy, here's a little Triumph 20 shopper bike. These 20 inch wheeled bikes were made popular back in the day, and really they make a lot of sense. By having these smaller wheels you do reduce the potential top speed of the bike, but with that trade off you get much better acceleration from a stop and a reduction in the force needed to progress along at lower speeds. Ideal for city use then! It's why the folding bikes being made now by the likes of Brompton and Dahon with the smaller wheels make so much sense.
I really appreciate the matching luggage that came with this old Triumph.

A sweet little 20 inch rear fender with that nice round reflector...

And the usual awesome Triumph bicycle logo!

Some nice lettering...

And a claim of being a registered design, tops it off!

Wednesday 27 October 2010

Raleigh Criterium Racing Criteria

How about this for a racing criteria, you need to have sweet retro bike graphics all over your bike or you can't come and race it.
This Raleigh Criterium looks smart, I like the continuation between the stripes on the top tube and the seat tube. Neat.
Raleigh racing showing their stuff.

Here is the Raleigh Criterium.

And here's a photo which should have been awesome if I had taken it properly and in focus! Yuck! Anyway, following on from the 333 Special Carbon frame from Monday, here's the classic 501 Reynolds sticker, and a colour coordinated mountain bike pedal on this vintage Raleigh racing bike.

Monday 25 October 2010

333 Special Carbon Tubing Graphic

Total lazy post today. I didn't even bother taking a picture of the whole bike because it was nothing special, and neither is 333 Special Carbon Tubing anymore I guess. Still rad graphics from a time when industrial stuff had a more vocal place in culture.

Friday 22 October 2010

Commuter Wars IV

I've spotted some bizarre bikes being used as commuters before, like this Swedish steel three speed with aero bars, a fully carbon designer mountain bike and a sit-up-straight town bike with an aero cut-out. But this is perhaps a bit more understandable, because presumably this person bought a bike to compete in time trial or triathlon events, and then realised the really just wanted to cycle around town.

So they hop on their painfully psychedelic 1990's bike saddle.
Grab the fully prostrating aero bars, finished in tasteful camouflage bar tape.
And blast their way to the shops on their time trial bike! Awesome.

Wednesday 20 October 2010

Beige Bicycle Logos by Triumph

So The Bicycle Safari has become a bit focused upon vintage bike graphics of late, but with these kind of vintage bicycle logos sitting around on the pavements it's hard to resist. Take a look at these I spotted on an old 'Triumph Traffic Master' bicycle made right here in Nottingham.
A rad badge up on the front.

Some suitably brown graphics on the down tube.

A pretty incomprehensible logo for the Traffic Master name on the seat tube.
But overall it's a classic bit of brown and beige bicycle heritage. Extremely practical and suitably simple, my only improvement might be some hub gears.

Monday 18 October 2010

Huret Heart Shaped Bike

I'm getting back into my old bad habit of not taking a picture of the bike these bits were stuck to, but I don't think it matters too much in this case, and the details are the best bits.

These Huret tube shifters rest upon the cutest little heart shaped tube stop I've ever seen! I don't know if I even saw it when I took the picture, as I was pretty interested in the lettering on the shifters themselves, but WHAT a nice touch it is.

And a shot of the rim logo for good measure!

Saturday 16 October 2010

Devon Flag Flies Downwind

Had to rack my brain a bit to remember what flag this is. But it's Devon, one of the English counties. Nice idea to have some flags on your bike. Regular posting schedule will resume next week.

Thursday 14 October 2010

Harry Quinn Quality Logo Win

How's this for a quality logo! Let's see what's going on here then, we've got: a crown, the helmet from a suit of armour, a shield, some nice lettering, a scroll and some kind of plant in the background! Haha what a great logo from Harry Quinn.

Perfect lettering!

Some fun touches on the seat stays, and a nice seat post just sticking out of the frame there.

What an awesome bike!

Monday 11 October 2010

Raleigh Racer Equipe Equipped Rationally

Another day another Raleigh bicycle from here in Nottingham. This one doesn't have the awesome vintage logos we've seen on others, but does have a questionable teal and pink colour scheme.
Nice bit of banding on the top tube.

Questionable bit of colour coordination on the bars, with that vintage Raleigh badge in the middle.

Friday 8 October 2010

The cleanest bar set up ever

Spotted this and had to share. Clearly a new bar tape job, because I doubt a white tape can last long in the wild whilst staying this clean. By while it does, let's enjoy how nice looking it is.
The bike also benefits from some vintage Campagnolo down tube shifters which look awesome next to that nice lug work.

The rest of it is ok too, but the brilliance is in the details here.

Wednesday 6 October 2010

The Falcon Road Bike

Check out this Falcon head badge. Absolutely awesome! What's going on here... a fire, a falcon, olympic rings, some trees and a signature! Wow! Kicking rad.

Nice foil logo on the seat tube!

The Falcon logo is pretty cool too.
Not brilliantly locked up, but I think the owner does care for the bike and that's really nice.

Monday 4 October 2010

Perfectly pulverised Puch

Spotted this old Puch bicycle in one of my local bike racks. What didn't strike me at the time, but seems ever more bizarre the more I look at this, are how many little chips there are in the paint! I can only assume that someone regularly parks it under a cliff face where many small stones fall off daily. Or perhaps the owner throws little stones at the bike, to... find it?

Whatever the reason, they haven't managed to erode this cool stripe from the seat tube yet.

Whether they should remove what I can only describe as this epic metal pie plate is perhaps more personal choice, I think it's a bit rad in a funny way.

Here is this funny, heavily chipped, beige Puch bike with a massive pie plate.

Friday 1 October 2010

Perhaps the pinkest Peugeot pushbike pictured

Unbelievably pink! This catches your eye from a good 100 meters away.



An unfortunately blurry overall picture as I didn't really want to stand in the rain photographing a bicycle carefully.