Guerciotti Cyclocross
Part Diary, Part Technical Manual, Part Tips & Tricks

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My recent bicycle enthusiasm began in 2005 when I bought a Bianchi Axis cyclocross bike. Since then, I got into fixies, road bikes, track bikes, unusual bikes, to rigid early mountain bikes. So recently I've been thinking about getting another cyclocross bike, but not a modern aluminum or carbon one, but a traditional diameter steel one. The bike that came to mind was the Lemond Poprad, but they stopped making these quite a few years ago and they are surprisingly hard to find for sale. So then I came across an ad for a Guerciotti cyclocross frameset in my size - perfect! Traditional steel tubing, decent lugwork, cantilever brake bosses, braze-on front derailleur, and a nice fork crown with reinforcements. So on May 27, 2012, I drove to SF with my cousin to pick up this frame. The paint was in rough shape as advertised, but I had planned on repainting it anyway, so it didn't matter to me. Now I just have to decide what color(s) to paint it.

6/9/2012 - Instead of spending a bunch of time and money restoring the frameset and then buying nice parts for it, I thought I would spend some time actually riding the frameset, to see if I like it and if it has any defects. So the quickest way to ride this bike was to just build it up as a fixie - minimal parts and minimal time. After ordering an Italian BB and a seatpost online, I had everything I needed for a quick build. I spent a couple of hours in the garage this morning and got her all built up. Now I just need to rack up some miles on the bike to see if I like it.

12/27/2012 - I decided that the frame was just a bit too tall for me, so instead of doing a complete restoration, I ended up selling the frameset on eBay to a person in Wisconsin.

Here are the specs:

Frame: Guerciotti Cyclocross, 57cm, 130mm spacing, 27.2mm seatpost, Italian BB, blue.
Fork: Guerciotti Cyclocross, 1" threaded, blue.
Wheelset: Alex rims with Alex cartridge bearing hub, 130mm width, black.
Tires: Ritchey SpeedMax Pro cyclocross tires, 700mm x 32mm, Kevlar bead.
Cassette: SRAM, 11-32T 9spd.
Headset: Shimano Deore LX
Brakes: Shimano Deore LX