Steve Malkin
Veteran
- Location
- Cheshire
Just thought I'd share a few pictures of my latest Ebay acquisition and see if anyone could shed any light on its origins.
The guy selling it didn't know anything about it apart from that it had belonged to his uncle and he believed it had been custom built for him and was 'very expensive' when new.
Date stamps on the Maillard hubs indicate it's from 1981 which would seem to fit in well with all the other components, but there are no marks on any kind on the frame to indicate who manufactured it, just transfers stating "Supplied by John Perks Aldridge" on the frame and the wheels.
It's a decent quality 531 frameset though and most of the components are shimano 600
When I picked it up it looked in a fairly sorry state, the tubular tires were badly perished and all the components were covered in a thick layer of crud. I feared this might be hiding some nasty corrosion, but once everything was striped down and cleaned it turned out that the crud was in fact grease that had become so dried out and hardened over time it resembled varnish. Underneath the components all look in remarkably good condition with very little wear - result
The only thing I've replaced apart from the perished tires are the brake calipers, the originals were some pretty flimsy looking side pulls and I've replaced them with a more modern set of dual pivot calipers, brakes are one area where I prefer to err on the side of practicality over originality!
Does anyone know anything about the John Perks name?
A quick Google search revealed that there is (or used to be) a bike shop of this name in Aldridge - no surprises there, and that someone of the same name used to be a rider for the Falcon racing team in the early 60s, but I've no idea whether the bike shop owner was the same guy who raced for Falcon.
I'm assuming that "supplied by John Perks" means that he assembled the bike to the customers spec using 'off the shelf' 531 frames from some other manufacturer rather than actually building the frame from scratch himself - anyone have any idea where the frames might have originated from?
All I need now is to shake off the stinking cold that's laid me low for the past week
and I'll be able to get out on it and see if it rides as well as it looks - it certainly feels a lot lighter than my old carbolite Peugeot and I'm looking forward to putting in some miles on it this summer.
The guy selling it didn't know anything about it apart from that it had belonged to his uncle and he believed it had been custom built for him and was 'very expensive' when new.
Date stamps on the Maillard hubs indicate it's from 1981 which would seem to fit in well with all the other components, but there are no marks on any kind on the frame to indicate who manufactured it, just transfers stating "Supplied by John Perks Aldridge" on the frame and the wheels.
It's a decent quality 531 frameset though and most of the components are shimano 600
When I picked it up it looked in a fairly sorry state, the tubular tires were badly perished and all the components were covered in a thick layer of crud. I feared this might be hiding some nasty corrosion, but once everything was striped down and cleaned it turned out that the crud was in fact grease that had become so dried out and hardened over time it resembled varnish. Underneath the components all look in remarkably good condition with very little wear - result
The only thing I've replaced apart from the perished tires are the brake calipers, the originals were some pretty flimsy looking side pulls and I've replaced them with a more modern set of dual pivot calipers, brakes are one area where I prefer to err on the side of practicality over originality!
Does anyone know anything about the John Perks name?
A quick Google search revealed that there is (or used to be) a bike shop of this name in Aldridge - no surprises there, and that someone of the same name used to be a rider for the Falcon racing team in the early 60s, but I've no idea whether the bike shop owner was the same guy who raced for Falcon.
I'm assuming that "supplied by John Perks" means that he assembled the bike to the customers spec using 'off the shelf' 531 frames from some other manufacturer rather than actually building the frame from scratch himself - anyone have any idea where the frames might have originated from?
All I need now is to shake off the stinking cold that's laid me low for the past week
and I'll be able to get out on it and see if it rides as well as it looks - it certainly feels a lot lighter than my old carbolite Peugeot and I'm looking forward to putting in some miles on it this summer.
)
