Hi, I’ve not been on for a while. How y’all doin?

I bought an “Orange P7” frame off ebay for £27 plus postage. The seller wasn’t sure it’s really a P7 so it didn’t attract much attention. But, from the pics and now that it’s mine, I think it probably is. It’s gold – I’d say it’s a respray – with blue Orange stickers and a “Tange CROMO MTB plain guage tubing” sticker. It’s certainly steel and not light so that sounds right!

I don’t actually care – it’s just what I was after for a steel hack hardtail – but it would be nice to know. Basically I think it’s a “real” P7 because it has that Orange seatstay design and it has downtube crudcatcher bosses. One definite clue is that it needs a 26.8mm seatpost – do (old) Orange P7s have that?

I’ve built it with old bits and pieces including squeaky XT V’s and proper Deore thumbies =) Oh, and those are the wheels I built years ago at the Edinburgh Bicycle wheel-building day. Great fun.

What do you think?

(Eagle-eyed viewers : you’re right there’s no gear cables. I ran out of time, it’s a “geared singlespeed” for now!)

Cheers, al.

We need bigger pictures….. especially of the dropouts and the cable routing to be sure. But from a distance it looks Orange though it could be Clockwork rather than P7.

SB
BTW – Looks lovely

Wishbone stays, crud catcher mounts, top-tube cable routing – it’s ticking all the boxes, but some close-ups would help ID it properly. Seem to remember older Orange HTs having a fatter seat tube and needed shimming to 27.2… but there’s been many guises!

Looks nice, and if it rides well, you’ve got a winner! 🙂

Thanks SB. Well, I’ll take more pictures then. But for now the cable routing is all top-tube, with a pair of stops on the RHS and a single stop on the LHS. And the dropouts are pretty big – I think you can see them OK in the shot above.

There is a serial number stamped into the BB shell – does that help?

al.

I remember the auctions for those particular steel frames on ebay.
They came in various colours and were generic and indeed stickered Tange but not sold as Orange P7s.
The rear drop out doesn’t look Orangesque.

Thanks HTTP404 “page not found”. So it’s a good rip-off. Well, that’ll do me =)
al.

… and that’s Belhaven Bay, Dunbar, East Lothian.
=)

I think HTTP404 may well be right regarding the dropouts – doesn’t look like any of the vintage Oranges:

http://www.retrobike.co.uk/forum/gallery2.php?g2_itemId=3349

Still, for £27, happy days.

I remember them well because I think I posted a PSA on here when they were on sale.
Rest assured i’m sure it’s a bargain and will ride much the same as any other half-decent steel frame I’ve ridden.

Thanks guys, it’s a bargain either way =)