An Italian bike – a Masi no less. They’re none too common in the smaller frame sizes, so when this one showed up, I picked it up straight away. Getting it home took some finagling. The seller dropped the bike at Village Cycle Shoppe in Cocoa, FL, and they packed it up for me. I sent them a bikeflights label to get it up here.
I stripped the frame and cleaned it up, and shipped it to my paint guru, Duane at chestercycles.com. There are some scratches that need attention, but he will (as usual) do a fantastic job with it. I picked up the frame from Duane on March 7th, and it is stunning. The red paint looks about an inch deep and the chrome fork is a great accent.
I have a full Chorus 3×10 drivetrain that I was going to install on the Lemond Zurich, but the Italian Masi practically screams Campagnolo, to me, anyway. So, the Zurich will get a different group and the Campy group goes on this Masi.
I’m going to use the Chorus-hubbed Mavic rims with tubulars on this one – that combination seems appropriate too.
I sprayed Framesaver inside the frame tubes, and twisted the frame around to ensure that all tube surfaces have been coated. Then, it sits for a day or two.
I greased and pressed the headset cups into the headtube, installed the crown race onto the fork, and installed the fork. The wheels for this bike are already built, I laced Chorus hubs to Mavic GP4 tubular rims with DT Swiss spokes. I have a rolling chassis (frameset?) now.