Trade my 1990 Fat Chance Team Comp for?

[jonsonneborn]

I would like to trade this 1990 Fat Chance Team Comp for a comparable frame & fork of larger size. The measurements are as follows:

Seat Tube Center of BB to top of seat tube 18 3/4 inches
Seat Tube Cernter of BB to center of TT 17 1/4 inches
Top Tube Center to Center 22 inches

My understanding is that the Team Comp uses the same geometry as the Wicked but uses lighter tubing and is the predecessor to the Yo Eddy. Team Comps were much more expensive than the regular Fat Chance and Wicked framesets and were made in much smaller quantities. Feel free to chime in if this information is not correct.

Serial Number is 06449TC (not 100% sure the "9" is not an "S"). I am told by Jeff at First Flight Bikes that the "0" most likely means it's a 1990 & the "TC" a Team Comp. The Bike has the GP Wilson Drop outs on the frame. You can see outlines of where the "FAT CHANCE" decals were on the downtube & a tiny bit of remnance of the "FAT" decal from the head tube which was yellow. The seat tube was heated to remove a seat post which has discolored the paint around the top of the seat tube & a little on the seat stays. There is no rust anywhere on the frame, no structural damage, no dents.

I am 6' 1" and this frame is just too small for me. I Would love to trade for a larger Team Comp of similar year or a Yo Eddy in a larger size. Let me know what you've got and we can talk about what is fair. I am located in Northern California (near San Francisco). Cheers, Jon

This 1st picture shows the damaged paint due to the seat tube being heated up to remove a stuck seat post. There is no damage other than the paint.

 

[RobTu]

love those G.P. Wilson dropouts

 

[jonsonneborn]

Building it up!

I decided I could not just let a Fat Chance frameset sit in the house without being built up & ridden so I started to assemble it while steeling parts from my 1992 Paramount Series 70 PDG (Deore XT). Desperatly seeking a seat post, seat collar clamp & bottom bracket spindle. Cannot wait to take the bike out on some single track trails. I haven't ridden a Fat Chance since I sold my 1987 Fat Chance in 1993! Still looking to trade for a larger frame but not in any rush.

 

[jonsonneborn]

Anyone?

 

[I-ROBOT]

Hey Gang!

Wish I had something to trade for that!!

The George Wilson dropouts are cast from 17-4 PH stainless steel (the PH stands for precipitation hardening). I welded them to the 4130 tubes using SS 309L filler metal. I think by 1990 I was purging the insides of the chainstays when I was welding them but I'm not 100% sure now. The GW drops were at least 10 times the price of steel Shimano drops but so much nicer! We used some other stainless drops later that were machined from plate but I forget who made those.

The tube set was a mix of Dillsburg aircraft 4130 and Tange Prestige which was much more expensive than the True Temper since it was was seamless drawn tubing. All of the True Temper tubing that was 1" diameter and larger was seam welded. The Tange tubing was imported from Japan and it was made in a Japanese factory and not in Taiwan or mainland China. It was nice stuff but it was really intended to be brazed. The True Temper tubing actually welded better. The early Team Comps also came with a box crown fork that used Tange blades and a Columbus steerer tube that was rifled. Since we had a number of box crown forks fail, I think that's why that one has a unicrown. I think we used Campy dropouts for the forks. I don't remember using stainless for the front drops.

I welded virtually all of the Team Comps that came out of Somerville from 87 on since they were the high end of high ends and Chris only wanted me to weld them. We had some other good welders but I was the lead and the only certified inspector and welding engineer on the staff.

She still looks pretty good for a bike that has obviously been ridden and that was always our intent. It s nice that there are still some pretty ones tucked away for posterity but the ride is what makes them so special. We can thank Chris for that!

Regards
Scott Bengtson
Somerville chief welder 1986 -1994

 

[jonsonneborn]

Hey Gang!

Wish I had something to trade for that!!

The George Wilson dropouts are cast from 17-4 PH stainless steel (the PH stands for precipitation hardening). I welded them to the 4130 tubes using SS 309L filler metal. I think by 1990 I was purging the insides of the chainstays when I was welding them but I'm not 100% sure now. The GW drops were at least 10 times the price of steel Shimano drops but so much nicer! We used some other stainless drops later that were machined from plate but I forget who made those.

The tube set was a mix of Dillsburg aircraft 4130 and Tange Prestige which was much more expensive than the True Temper since it was was seamless drawn tubing. All of the True Temper tubing that was 1" diameter and larger was seam welded. The Tange tubing was imported from Japan and it was made in a Japanese factory and not in Taiwan or mainland China. It was nice stuff but it was really intended to be brazed. The True Temper tubing actually welded better. The early Team Comps also came with a box crown fork that used Tange blades and a Columbus steerer tube that was rifled. Since we had a number of box crown forks fail, I think that's why that one has a unicrown. I think we used Campy dropouts for the forks. I don't remember using stainless for the front drops.

I welded virtually all of the Team Comps that came out of Somerville from 87 on since they were the high end of high ends and Chris only wanted me to weld them. We had some other good welders but I was the lead and the only certified inspector and welding engineer on the staff.

She still looks pretty good for a bike that has obviously been ridden and that was always our intent. It s nice that there are still some pretty ones tucked away for posterity but the ride is what makes them so special. We can thank Chris for that!

Regards
Scott Bengtson
Somerville chief welder 1986 -1994

Scott,

Thanks so much for the write-up. It's great to know the history of the Team Comps & I am now really excited about owing this bike and maybe should be content with this as opposed to keep searching for a Yo Eddy (I worked at a Fat Chance dealer in Connecticut from 1989 to 1993 and always wanted a Yo but couldn't afford it). I also am beginning to think that I can ride this size too (I am 6' 1"). The Drop-outs on the fork are Shimano; I guess I cannot be sure it's the original fork. It looks like the seat tube was heated up to remove a seat post at some point. I have not been able to detect any structural damage except to the paint/finish. I'm hoping that heating up near the seat stay & top tube welds didn't do any damage to the welds. I just need to track down a seat collar and seat post and also a bottom bracket spindle. Do you happen to know the size of seat post I need? There is a bike shop in town that has some old non-threaded bottom brackets that fit some of the old Fisher frames. Any idea if these bearings & spindles will work? Cannot wait to get it built and hit the single track Cheers, Jon

 

[rick]

hey Scott,

I also have a 90 Team Comp with a unicrown and it has the Wilson dropouts front & rear.
There are no eyelets on them as on the regular Wicked. Your information helps to understand why the TC was so much more expensive than a Wicked ($400?).

jonsonneborn,

your bike will use a 26.4 seatpost


rick

 

[jonsonneborn]

hey Scott,

jonsonneborn,

your bike will use a 26.4 seatpost

rick

Thanks Rick!

 

[jonsonneborn]

hey Scott,


your bike will use a 26.4 seatpost


rick

Can you also tell me what size seat collar I need?

Thanks,
Jon

 

[DC]

Can you also tell me what size seat collar I need?

Thanks,
Jon

1 1/8" (28.6mm)

 

[I-ROBOT]

There is no risk of damaging the welds by heating the seat tube to get the post out. You would have to heat the area to over 1350 F to change it metallurgically. That would have melted the silver braze on the washer that gussets the hole for the seat collar.

I found that using an ER80S-D2 wire gave much better fracture toughness in the as-welded condition than trying to match the 4130 base metal which would have required it to be stress-relieved. We did not want to add the expense of heat treatment and it would not have added much value.

We built a fatigue tester using an old Bridgeport milling machine. Ron Andrews and Chris came up with some tooling and we rigged up a cycle counter. We tested various downtube gusset designs and weld metals (including some TIG brazing!) using our homemade rig and it gave us lots of good info.

Happy Holidays Everyone
Scott Bengtson

 

[jonsonneborn]

Hey Gang!

Wish I had something to trade for that!!

The George Wilson dropouts are cast from 17-4 PH stainless steel (the PH stands for precipitation hardening). I welded them to the 4130 tubes using SS 309L filler metal. I think by 1990 I was purging the insides of the chainstays when I was welding them but I'm not 100% sure now. The GW drops were at least 10 times the price of steel Shimano drops but so much nicer! We used some other stainless drops later that were machined from plate but I forget who made those.

The tube set was a mix of Dillsburg aircraft 4130 and Tange Prestige which was much more expensive than the True Temper since it was was seamless drawn tubing. All of the True Temper tubing that was 1" diameter and larger was seam welded. The Tange tubing was imported from Japan and it was made in a Japanese factory and not in Taiwan or mainland China. It was nice stuff but it was really intended to be brazed. The True Temper tubing actually welded better. The early Team Comps also came with a box crown fork that used Tange blades and a Columbus steerer tube that was rifled. Since we had a number of box crown forks fail, I think that's why that one has a unicrown. I think we used Campy dropouts for the forks. I don't remember using stainless for the front drops.

I welded virtually all of the Team Comps that came out of Somerville from 87 on since they were the high end of high ends and Chris only wanted me to weld them. We had some other good welders but I was the lead and the only certified inspector and welding engineer on the staff.

She still looks pretty good for a bike that has obviously been ridden and that was always our intent. It s nice that there are still some pretty ones tucked away for posterity but the ride is what makes them so special. We can thank Chris for that!

Regards
Scott Bengtson
Somerville chief welder 1986 -1994

Hey Scott,

So I bought a wicked on ebay that's about the same vintage and tried both the 26.4 seat post and the seat collar on this team comp and neither seems to fit! The collar allignment loop is lower on the team comp; on the wicked it's almost flush with the top of the seat tube. The 26.4 seat post slides in an out of the wicked frame with ease but is very difficult to get more than an inch or so into the team comp frame. Is there a chance that the Team Comps used a different seat post size?

Jon

 

[RobTu]

Hey Gang!

Wish I had something to trade for that!!

The George Wilson dropouts are cast from 17-4 PH stainless steel (the PH stands for precipitation hardening). I welded them to the 4130 tubes using SS 309L filler metal. I think by 1990 I was purging the insides of the chainstays when I was welding them but I'm not 100% sure now. The GW drops were at least 10 times the price of steel Shimano drops but so much nicer! We used some other stainless drops later that were machined from plate but I forget who made those.

The tube set was a mix of Dillsburg aircraft 4130 and Tange Prestige which was much more expensive than the True Temper since it was was seamless drawn tubing. All of the True Temper tubing that was 1" diameter and larger was seam welded. The Tange tubing was imported from Japan and it was made in a Japanese factory and not in Taiwan or mainland China. It was nice stuff but it was really intended to be brazed. The True Temper tubing actually welded better. The early Team Comps also came with a box crown fork that used Tange blades and a Columbus steerer tube that was rifled. Since we had a number of box crown forks fail, I think that's why that one has a unicrown. I think we used Campy dropouts for the forks. I don't remember using stainless for the front drops.

I welded virtually all of the Team Comps that came out of Somerville from 87 on since they were the high end of high ends and Chris only wanted me to weld them. We had some other good welders but I was the lead and the only certified inspector and welding engineer on the staff.

She still looks pretty good for a bike that has obviously been ridden and that was always our intent. It s nice that there are still some pretty ones tucked away for posterity but the ride is what makes them so special. We can thank Chris for that!

Regards
Scott Bengtson
Somerville chief welder 1986 -1994

Wish I had come across you back when I had my Fat with G.P. Wilson dropouts; this is the thread I made when inquiring:

http://www.fatcogs.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1983

The person I traded it to, might be looking to move it again...perhaps some three-way deal can be worked out for you Jon. This thread should be moved with all the good info in it.