Chinese steel frame project

[fluffandstuff]

hi, relatively new to the forum. This will be my first time building a bike. I currently ride a Tarmac, mostly on my trainer. I have been toying with the idea of getting a durable steel bike to put on my trainer and do occasional short grocery errands.

My current buildlist is:

Frame:
Chinese 4135 Cr-MO Steel frameset size 56, polished/silver, 1720g
Chinese Carbon fork, silver, 350g,
Chinese Headset (comes with the frame)

Groupset:
Sram rival 10 speed groupset 2300g

Others:
Brooks b17 saddle, 460g
Cinelli cork tape, 83g

Wheelset
DTSwissr460 clincher / Bora clincher
Veloflex master gum wall
Standard Continental tubes

TBD:
Seatpost
Stem
Handlebar

I'm trying to get my build at around 9-9.5kg. Aesthetics wise I'm debating if I should go with silver stem, handleabr seatpost or black color.

Still waiting for my frameset to ship and will post updates on this when it arrives.

[saverin]

Yes! I've been waiting for someone to take the plunge on something like this so I don't have to be the guinea pig. Where did you order the frame from, if you don't mind me asking?

[2lo8]

Report back on alignment and plating quality if you can. I had a different brazed Chinese steel frame pass through my hands and the quality was awful with bad plating, gaps in brazing and badly filed dropout slots from the factory, presumably to fix alignment issues. Listed vs actual weight was also completely inaccurate, unlike many products direct from China.

[fluffandstuff]

Yes! I've been waiting for someone to take the plunge on something like this so I don't have to be the guinea pig. Where did you order the frame from, if you don't mind me asking?

Yeah I thought about getting something locally made here in NorCal but I did not want blow up my budget for my trainer bike. Used was another option but I could not find many in good condition.

I ordered from this ebay link
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Chrome-CR-MO-S ... 2508601873

[fluffandstuff]

Report back on alignment and plating quality if you can. I had a different brazed Chinese steel frame pass through my hands and the quality was awful with bad plating, gaps in brazing and badly filed dropout slots from the factory, presumably to fix alignment issues. Listed vs actual weight was also completely inaccurate, unlike many products direct from China.

Will do.

This is my first ever bike related purchase directly from China. This whole buying direct from China thing is known to be a hit or miss, so I did some Chinese forum search (I'm a Mandarin/Chinese speaker) on this particular brand I ordered on ebay. It seems to be one of the more known entry level steel frame builders in China. But again most of Chinese frame exports are carbon so not many data points can be collected on this frameset in the States.

[Marin]

Interested!

[DJT21]

Wonder how it'll ride? At 1720g and a tubeset that doesn't look very OS, I can imagine it'll be quite comfy.

[euan]

I mean, they are straight up lying about the weight. That will be closer to 2000g if not over. Also that frame is going to rust so quickly with you sweating all over it

[JerryLook]

I’m curious to here about the quality from that company also. I was looking at one of their aluminum fixed gear/single speed framesets on eBay.

[Marin]

I mean, they are straight up lying about the weight. That will be closer to 2000g if not over. Also that frame is going to rust so quickly with you sweating all over it

Their aluminum models seem to come in under the quoted weight, see their Aliexpress listings. I generally have very good experiences with specs from Chinese sellers, except for obvious errors. I also don't see why it should rust quicker than any other plated frame.

[maxxevv]

Spray on wax polish will help enormously in keeping rust at bay.

Application of marine grease to the various cable contact points will a great deal too.

And not to forget, the rust proofing stuff for the internals such as JP Weigle spray or its equivalent stuff for marine applications.

https://www.google.com/search?q=marine+ ... 39&bih=819

Those were the typical things we did in the old days of riding steel frames in humid climates.

[euan]

A chromoly frame in that size is generally going to be 1900. Even a Road Logic in an equivilent size is around that weight and its a more compact frame than this. Especially if this has been chrome plated as they claim.

[bm0p700f]

I have several steel frames.

Sannino size 58cm in Columbus genius 1630g

Pinarello stelvio 58cm Ken's tubing weight 2000g

Traitor exile some jap double butted tubing weight 2200g size 59cm

Carlton kermese 501 tubing weight 2200g

So a cheap Chinese frame will be at least 2000g

[fluffandstuff]

Frame arrived today but the headtube was somewhat damaged during shipping.


I contacted the seller but they havent replied back. At the mean I took the frame to lbs and the mechanic/owner hammered it back to round shape and got the headset installed.


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[fluffandstuff]

Ok the important stuff. I dont have good scale and this is what my amazon scale reads

1840g for the frame
340g for the fork

Looks pretty good actually.


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