THE EVOLUTION FINISHED GABBA GABBA HEY

Here is the Evolution all finished in satin black with new green decals, pretty sexy I reckon.

This is the decal sheet as retraced by Lee at Black Robin
( cheer pal ), let me know if want some.
Contact Lee at lee@blackrobinclothing.com if you have some decals or graphics you need done for your restorations he's the MAN.

Sure looks a lot better in black, than that tri colour paint option, man what were they thinking back then?

GIRO AND EVOLUTION CATALOG PAGE 1989

THE GIRO AND EVOLUTION BEFORE RESTORATION

THE GIRO

The Avanti Giro showing it's nice lines, the first Avanti to be made of Reynolds 531c tubing as far as I know (although I could stand to be corrected on this). It came with a full Shimano 600 Groupset and Wobler rims, all and all a pretty nice package.
Frame weight; 2.186 kg, not bad for a 60cm frame (seat tube height)

THE EVOLUTION

Yeh this is one cool bike, or I should say it will be when I have finished painting it in it's other colour option...satin black, this one is definitely my pick for a future classic, so hang one in your garage now.
(and if it's this terrible colour, come and see me about painting it satin Black).
I think this is a second generation Evolution model, with straighter front forks, if you check out the catalog photo above you will notice some pretty crazy frame angles, obviously to in an attempt to slow the steering down, so all the weekend tri riders wouldn't end up with a face full of road. Not a bad idea but not liked by the buying public I guess, as this 'year two' model looks more 'normal' with it's straighter forks.
I also am pretty sure these were only made for a couple of years, as they only pop up in one catalog that I have seen.
The Evolution came with a Suntour Accushift Plus group set, which as far as I can tell is a Suntour SL group with the cool "Gripshift" shifters on the tri bars, look I know it's a real gimmicky gadget, but what can I say, for some reason I think this is a neat bike, especially the series 1 with it's 74" 78" frame angles. Mark my words a future classic for sure.
Going to have to get my self one of these....
Frame Weight (she might be pretty but she ain't no light weight); 2.106 kg

The Avanti SLX
Well I have finally finished the first bike in the Avanti project, after a few trails and tribulations.
Still I think that it should be pretty smooth sailing from now on, as I have put a few good systems into action which will speed things up, so stay tuned.
I picked up three new bike to restore from Avanti last week, and will put up some photo's and details of them over the next couple of days.
Anyway the SLX came up really nice, and really looks the part and everyone at Avanti seemed pleased with the result so that was all good.

The SLX finished yay

Stem DNP shifters, they worked ok to.

Still have to find some dust caps, steel cranks look pretty flash.

Bare frame, just back from the strippers, paint that is....

THE SLX 10 SPEED
Some new shiny bits...bling!
I found a couple of NOS (that's new old stock, in case you didn't know) parts for the SLX resto, a crank set and brake set, these will really sharpen the bike up in the final build up.
Below is the redrawn decals, they are to small for anyone to use here, but if you need some. let me know, and I will email a bigger file.
I have got the bike all painted in it's new colour matched silver, and am waiting on the new decals from the signwriters, before applying the clearcoat.

The frame in the raw, back from the paint stripper's, and ready for a new coat of paint.