Revell Romany frame - who built them ??

General cycling advice ( NOT technical ! )
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McVouty
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Joined: 21 Jul 2008, 5:32pm
Location: Stirling

Re: Revell Romany frame - who built them ??

Post by McVouty »

I don't think you can tell, definitively, unless you can persuade a framebuilding firm to match your frame number with its records, something which not all firms will see as central to their continuing struggle to stay in business (if the firms/records still exist).

Personally, I'm content that my Romany is a good frame built by a reputable firm; I don't think Freewheel/Madison contracted the building to just anybody.Without knowing details of their contracts and specifications, it's impossible to tell how different frames from the various builders were, but Dave Yates' statement suggests that differences existed.

For what it's worth, my own frame number (870348, stamped under the b/b shell) matches Mercian's format (at the time) for a 1987 frame. They also told me, after seeing photos, that "it looks like an early King [of Mercia,presumably]".
Runner30
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Joined: 27 Jul 2011, 1:06pm

Re: Revell Romany frame - who built them ??

Post by Runner30 »

This is a Romany 26" framed bike with Campagnolo dropouts 531 tubing, lugs with fish tale cutouts. So it must be a M Steel / Dave Yates made frame from the 1980's? What do you think......

http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a146/ ... 030705.jpg

http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a146/ ... 030704.jpg

http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a146/ ... 030702.jpg

http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a146/ ... 030701.jpg

http://i10.photobucket.com/albums/a146/ ... 030700.jpg
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McVouty
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Location: Stirling

Re: Revell Romany frame - who built them ??

Post by McVouty »

Not an M.Steel/Dave Yate frame, I think. As I understand it (I've never seen one) the swallowtail effect was produced by cutting the points of the lugs and opening them out so that there were two thinner points.

Your frame looks like mine but there are differences; the lugs on mine look less pointed, and the seat stay caps on mine are concave while yours look flat and wrap over the seat lug more. Also, the Romany name on mine was not on the top tube but the down tube (although the style is the same), with smaller repeats on the seat stays.

Frustratingly, I can't get pictures to load on this site. If you PM me I could send you an email with the pics (of a very scruffy bike) attached which I showed Mercian.You're welcome to post them here, if you can.
recumbentpanda
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Joined: 6 Apr 2009, 12:13pm

Re: Revell Romany frame - who built them ??

Post by recumbentpanda »

Hi,
I was working at Madison Cycles at the time, helping stick together the Freewheel catalogue. I wasn't privy to all the details, but I seem to remember Saracen were involved in building some Romanys. I may have remembered that wrongly, but Madison certainly took a close interest in Saracen for a while. Incidentally, I designed the Revell headbadge transfer, and the Romany logo. Sorry, no, I don't have any samples left!

It was a great time, when interest in cycling was really booming for the first time since WW2. Touring was a big part of that, and the company was keen to create something to match the classic tourers - Mercian, Dawes Galaxy, etc etc. I never owned one of the Romanys as I already had a nice classic tourer of my own at the time, but I remember thinking they were a nice bike.
creakycranks
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Joined: 8 Jul 2011, 5:15pm

Re: Revell Romany frame - who built them ??

Post by creakycranks »

My Romany also has fluted (concave) tops to the seat stays. Images can be seen at photobucket creakycranks. Runner 30s could perhaps be one of the custom versions that appear in the Revell pages from the Freewheel catalogue, also in the same photobucket album.
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McVouty
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Location: Stirling

Re: Revell Romany frame - who built them ??

Post by McVouty »

broadway wrote:But is there any relationship between the Orbit Romany and the Revell Romany?
A bit more digging has provided the answer which is, essentially, no. Orbit Romanys were a development, or rather a rebranding, of the company's Caraway model, which was a 26" wheel design with a sloping top tube and TIG (or MIG) welded frames. They first appeared in 2001 or 2002; early Romanys were almost identical to late Caraways, the offset rear triangle appearing later. By 2002 the original Revell/Madison Romany design (700C wheels, horizontal top tube, lugged frame) was at least 25 years old and I'd guess none (or very few) had been made for about a decade.

Orbit at that time (the ownership of the company has changed at least once since then) contracted framebuilding out, with results that varied in quality. The reason for the name change, I'd surmise, was in order to market the model as an expedition tourer rather than an Audax sort of bike, capitalising on the original Romany's good reputation. Caraways and early Orbit Romanys had mountings for racks front and rear, but the brazeons were drilled through the fork blades and seat stays rather than brazed on to the back of them, which I wouldn't think is ideal for heavy loads and rough roads. Perhaps the design was beefed up as time went on - the offset rear triangle giving an amost dishless rear wheel suggests that it was. Not that Caraways or early Orbit Romanys aren't decent bikes, but I wouldn't want to take the kitchen sink to Kazakhstan on one.
Brucey
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Joined: 4 Jan 2012, 6:25pm

Re: Revell Romany frame - who built them ??

Post by Brucey »

zombie thread this, but I have recently been asked to help fix up a Revell Tandem bicycle. Judging by the equipment fitted it is an early '80s machine. It is built in the same frame style as this one

Image

and is mostly of very tidy lugless construction, with elliptical drainpipe, vertical dropouts, cantis, and rack braze-ons. The spec includes GB bars, atax stoker stem, dia compe 980 canti brakes, mafac tandem brake levers (RH lever working both sets of cantis), 40h maxicar hubs (including drum brake rear), Mod 58 rims (27"), wheelsmith spokes, stronglight 99 chainsets with crossover drive, front eccentric BB, shimano friction mechs (3x5 gearing) and a set of enormous friction levers mounted on the stem. The rear mech is one of the last drop/horizontal parallelogram ones before the range went fully slant parallelogram in ~1985.

Q. does anyone know who made these frames for Madison/Revell?

cheers
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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~Brucey~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
drossall
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Joined: 5 Jan 2007, 10:01pm
Location: North Hertfordshire

Re: Revell Romany frame - who built them ??

Post by drossall »

There's often one in the bike shed at work too. I remember looking at them in the Madison catalogue. Nice-looking machines.
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