This is a temporary frame for my wife to see if a smaller bike works better for her (before pulling the trigger on a custom.)
What came in the box:
The frame is a 49 from their geo chart. (51.3 mm effective top tube.)
984 grams - Painted frame with RD / FD hangers and all internal cable routing plugs.
388 grams - Painted fork uncut with 300mm steerer.
68 grams - Headset
58 grams - Compression plug.
21 grams - Seatpost clamp
23 grams - 006 bottle cages each weigh this in matte 3K.
This will effectively drop her bike weight by over 1 kg from what she is using now (53 mm top tube steel Ciocc, which will be sad to see go in all honesty).
Pics are below. I will build it this week time allowing.
Some first impression comments:
Workswell was pleasant to deal with on the order. There were some moments of 'lost in translation' but that was expected.
The frameset was nicely boxed and the shipping via UK to Austria did not result in any additional charges.
The paint seems acceptably applied, but it is not anywhere near the color requested - which was a light silver metallic. The color that arrived is a dark, flat, gloss gray. Kinda battleship gray.
This is odd since I did provide Workswell with color codes and the correspondence on the paint was considerable. Perhaps they had this color ready. Whatever, it is a temp frame anyway.
I initially ordered the Pressfit frame and then was advised this might take some additional time but that a BSA threaded frame was available.
I took that, but am again left with the feeling that this frame 'needed a home' so to speak and it got into the shipping box.
The correspondence with Workswell indicated that the frameset came with a seatpost, but I did not receive one. I have inquired about this.
The frame and fork will fit fat 28mm Challenge clinchers, but I will put 25mm tires in for the build.
The frame / dropouts are straight. The rear derailleur hanger only needed nominal adjustment to get aligned well. It does seem like a soft RD hanger from material.
I will keep my eye on the shifting quality when it is on the road.
The bottle cage mounts are aligned properly, but for some reason the aftermarket bolts I planned to use will not feed into the threads.
They are same size bolt diameter and pitch as provided by Workswell.
The seat tube bottle cage mounts are set slightly too high to use the 006 cages as the front triangle is small and the bottle needs to be twisted into place.
I will dremel out the plastic Blackburn cages I have so that one sits further down and frees up some bottle access.
The headset dropped into place with no issues and the seat tube ID appears to be right on spec and a snug 27.2.
The one item I am having trouble with is the routing of the internal cables.
There is a plastic guide that sits on the underside of the BB shell but I cannot get it out when the screw is removed.
(The threaded BB shell insert that is bonded in prevents me from accessing the cables from that vantage point.)
I am afraid to lever the plastic guide out for fear of breaking it or chipping the finish on the BB shell. I'll post a pic later. Any advice is appreciated.
Scale pics for now:
; Anvil Custom steel Etap;1996 Colnago Technos Record
