When my wife and I first started dating, her dad and I bonded over bikes. He had just upgraded to a Specialized Roubaix from a vintage Bridgestone RB-2. I told him how much I loved the Bridgestone and he told me if he ever got rid of it, I’d have first dibs.
Fast forward about 15 years. We’re married, have kids, and my in-laws were moving out of their house. During the clean out, he surprised me by gifting me the bike.
Today I finally started stripping it down to clean, swap a few parts, and get it ready to ride again. That’s when I noticed the rust.
How bad is it? Is just surface rust that can be cleaned up, or deeper corrosion that’s unsafe to ride. I’d love to bring this thing back to life, but not if it’s beyond saving.
by Jazzlike_Expert
8 Comments
Just wire brushed the same stuff today. It’s fine.
It’s not terrible some frame saver and a wire brush/ touch up paint will go a long way
Honestly you’ll never know until you sand it
You should look inside too, in the chain stays near the bottom bracket.
Probably fine but you need to scrape away all the loose paint, check inside the tubes, etc. old paint hides rust and we don’t know how deep it might go… especially when it’s on and under the lugs like that, there may be a lot of hidden rust under the lug if it’s trapping moisture.
If it were my bike, I’d use a scribe and exacto knife and clean everything back to silver metal. I’d probably also rig something up to soak that area in Evaporust for day. I’d grab the back of a screwdriver and push down all over the place and look for any signs that the lug is moving, and worst case scenario you make a divot in the metal, or at least what was metal, if there’s some rust under the surface. If the integrity seems ok, looking at the tube from the inside it doesn’t appear to have any spots going through, etc. then I’d seal it all up with some testors model paint.. probably a fire engine red, and call it a day.
Surface rust. I’d just polish/wax and ride
Don’t worry just brush it away and repaint.
Frame- 3-10
Lit pipe- 7-10