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Meu sonho

Ah, the good old days, bikes used to be so affordable and simple... I have a 1999 TCR in unpainted anodized finish (replica of the special climbing bike for Laurent Jalabert), still ride the bike from time to time and will keep doing so until it breaks. Except for 1" fork and headset, there's no shortage of upgrades for this old horse! I just love old and iconic bikes of 90s and early 2000s. Incidentally, the second iteration of TCR (model year 1999-2000) already had nicely finished smooth welding that is on a par with modern alloy frame. From what I gather, 2001-2002 version with internal headset is the lightest one (1.2~1.3kg) before the advent of carbon TCR. In later years alloy TCRs used hydroformed tubes and gained some weight. By the way, your blue TCR doesn't seem to be the very first 1997-98 model(as in 2:28), which doesn't have smooth welding and the dimple behind the seat tube (that feature is found on later versions because the chain stays are shortened from 405mm to 400mm). Original blade seat post is cool but harsh, personally I like round carbon seat post for comfort. As for stem and wheels, I think there's no need to keep the original vibes, a normal stem and light weight silver wheels will be more enjoyable to ride. Even deep carbon wheels won't look out of place on this slender frame. (think about Jan Ulrich's 1997 Pinarello Paris with Campy Bora) If you can find 1" threadless carbon forks (Look, Time, Columbus or original Giant fork as used in 2000 model), that would be a nice upgrade. I put a Look fork on my TCR and it looks and rides better than original fork. There are still high quality 1" headsets with cartridge bearings, such as Cane Creek S2/S6 or Tange-Seiki Technoglide Classic/RDC. Beware of the crown race ID, it must be 26.4mm instead of 27.0mm. One last advice, if you keep the Ultegra crankset, make sure the shallow splines of BB axle are engaged as deep as possible with crank interface before you install the bolt or you may damage the crank inadvertently. Use a torque wrench, tighten bolts to official spec 35~50 Nm, also check the bolt torque after the first few rides. The interface is too delicate so Shimano later revised the Octalink design with wider V2 spline (but not compatible with Ultegra). Good news is that BB-6500 will last a long time and not require any maintenance, it's fully sealed like the legendary UN series square taper BB, thus impossible and unnecessary to overhaul.

i had sue Alliexpress for a lose of over £400 its a sick crap company

Thank you for comparison… and I’m just need these information but may I ask about “Pedal Cover” … is ok not bad as well?

Love these early TCRs. Especially this purple/blue TCR1. Had one new, sold it two years later, regretted it, found one 15 years later (actually the one used in the archive pic on here), sold it (at a great price!), regretted it, bought another three years ago with just 200 miles use, which is a keeper! 😎 Looking forward to the build. Hope it's to original spec, although the stem chosen isn't original. Someone probably said already, but the frame finish isn't paint. It's anodised 🤓

you took our ebike but didn't reply my email, why???

How ist easier to get your leg over easier when the saddle is still at the same height?

Great video: very clear and informative. Thanks!

Beginner here: can I transfer all the Shimano 105 bike parts from my 2014 giant defy to an Elves frame?

I'm loving my Fiido D3 pro. It's fun to ride and very nimble. I'm 6' by the way and 15 stone.

bottom bracket. but sound to me like boem bracket. tic england accent

Make it mire realistic man... Like, how hard it will be on actuall crash

Eh? What? I'm surprised that you considered that teeny-weeny bit of muck (on the paper towel) to be significant after 35-odd miles of riding around London. Surely you jest, dear boy? It's an uncovered, lubricated bike chain with hundreds of sliding, rolling, crunching, grinding moving parts. Expecting to retain a perfectly clean chain outdoors seems a bit unrealistic to me. The air is full of dust, soot, exhaust particles, tyre rubber and other nasties that'll stick no matter how 'dry' your waxed lube claims to be. Any substance capable of forming a film and effectively lubricating moving parts MUST be able to pick up dirt as the bits slide over each other. It couldn't do its job otherwise. If you were riding on rollers indoors with the windows shut you might have a point, but not outdoors in deepest, darkest Britain. I'm not a proper cyclist, but I do 70 road-miles per week, every week (business, not pleasure, in West Yorkshire) on a 22 year-old bike that cost me £130 new. My chain is thick with black gunge because I'm skint and use 10W-40 car engine oil to lubricate it (I just happened to have some in the garage). It gets a weekly wipe down with a rag soaked in white spirit, and a monthly(-ish) wash in one of those £6.00 chain-scrubbing tools with the rotating brushes. Yes, serious cyclists will be horrified, fretting about drag and friction and lost watts and component wear and whatnot, but I'm not bothered. The bike's cheap and uses the cheapest available parts. It works well enough for me. My current no-name chain [£4.00] is over five years old and still functioning satisfactorily. Why worry? My motto is: if pedalling's hard, eat more porridge!😁 And if you think that picking up a bit of road dust on your chain is bad, you should see the state of your lungs...😲

I say avoid the old collectible carbon wheels and just get a nice set of chrome aluminum wheels. No reason to make the bike unrideable/unsafe for aesthetics, especially given that all the other vintage parts you're putting on will actually be robust and usable.

Sensah do a silver version now !

TCR: Timeless Classic Road.

So let me get this straight. You didn't save it from landfill. You broke it yourself and then had it repaired.

I gonna subscribe to you and like

Team ONCE. ( Pronounce ONSEE) 🤣

❤❤❤

I was a mechanic at one of the biggest volume Giant dealers in B.C. when these bikes came out. Absolutely game changing, but the lower spec first gen bikes had crappy front shifting. The seat tube angle was too slack for the front derailleurs of the day. Maybe Ultegra is more capable but the 105 of the day was not happy. We solved the issue with a really thin shim washer under the upper front hanger bolt. In later years Giant machined the hangers to compensate.

Show beautiful

Show beautiful

my 2 year old bike is a beat up mess compared to this :D nice frameset

does it go slower the less battery it has?

Very good review, well done 👏

It would be impossible for me to resist getting those wheels. The bike is such a beauty

90s bikes, love it! I remember 8 & 9 speed Shimano XT & XTR derailleurs held together with E-clips. You could take these apart for cleaning. They even had phosphor bronze washers in-between moving parts for ease of movement and longevity. I had a Gios road bike back then, i regret selling to this day. Regarding the quill stem: you can influence ride quality and compliance to a great degree with these stems. I had a very slim and long Colnago stem once. This thing flexed like crazy and absorbed a hell lot of vibrations. Sold it with the Gios bike, unfortunately.

Still got my TCR Once yellow frameset, and use it every week. It's on my turbo set up and has been for years so the paint has seen better days. I also still have the original groupset that I built it up with in a box in the garage. Plus, got my other half one last year too with Ultegra 6800.

I have the OCR 3.0, looks like the exact same frame. Mine is mounted with Shimano 105 5800, Reynolds AR58's and a integrated handlebars. Also I removed the shim to replace the seat-post for a carbon one in 31.8 i think. Still feels great today, despite being picked up for 150 euros (upgraded for about 1500) and used for many miles. Great frame

How's the saddle man?

Can you tell us the grade of Aluminum? I.e. 6061, 7005, 6069? Cheers .

I love a good TCR!

What an awesome project!

Once means and is pronounced as 11 in Spanish.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike_Burrows

"made to last." Remember that? To 90s and early 2000s bred the best bikes ever made.

Ahoi! What a charming frameset, and the previous owner is a saint: such a nice paintjob in mint condition, but enough waffling: I have done some restorations from bikes of similar eras and at least one upgrade has left me with an Ultegra 6500 rear derailleur. It's a 9spd, short cage-type (did they even do medium/large cages back then), and it should be in good condition. Long story short: if you want it, you can have it. I'm sure there's even more period-correct stuff lying around (at least one Ultegra or DuraAce-cassette, 9spd from 20 yrs ago, 3x9 Ultegra Shifters). Lemme know if you are interested, then I can rummage around and post some pics.

I have the same frame in the same colors. I hope to restore it next year and bring the bike back to life. It ride like a train and it is very fast.

Cani recommended a Chris King headset expensive but worth it my son has one on his bike and still going well teenage tough

lol, that bottom bracket has not been serviced recently. That is just a square taper bottom bracket, they just don't suck like other ones do, haha.

What an awesome project, you have me envious already.

I had 2 of these back in the day. The first was the Giant team edition with orange red and blue paint, and the second was the Oncé (pronounced onsay) team edition, which was mainly actually anodised rather than painted to save weight. If you strip the frame down you will find it's incredibly light, around 1100gms I think, amazing for ally. The handing is more like a current day endurance bike rather than a twitchy race bike, so really easy going. The seatpost though... Good luck with that. SO stiff. I fitted round 27.2 carbon ones in mine with a shim. The seatpost creaked horribly till I part split the font to effectively create 2 tightening gaps. That fixed it. Condition of your frame looks amazing. I think there might be some magnesium in the alloy as mine was prone to corrosion around bottle cage mounts. Really interested to see how the build goes....

Older bikes just look so cool and have character in them. Most modern bikes feel like they're cut from the same cloth.

I wonder how old it is.

i want this

Mike Burrows deserves an MBE

Don't inhale the toxic carbon dust while working on the frame.

what does this video have to do with AliExpress? Which parts did you buy off there? Totally missed the mark with this video

Needs a rack that's also a to stand it up on its end. Makes sense not having a folding frame.