Pleas help me identify these parts.

[datas_brother]

As I wrote on my SO I bought a jig awhile back that I've been cleaning up. I need help identifying some of the parts as well as who made the jig. It is definitely old since all of the parts are set up for 1" TT and 1 1/8" DT. Nothing at all for OS or even 1 1/8 " fork. I've posted more detailed pics on flickr but here are some of the main ones.

The complete jig


These are the unidentified parts. There is a HT holder with cones but I can't figure out how to mount it.


This is the only part with any kind of marking:

It has what appears to be SILVAW or SILVAM stamped on it. I don't know what it's for but the black knob is spring loaded and when push extends a T shaped pin on the other end.

This seems to be for setting up the TT hight but I don't know how or where it mounts.


Some wedge shaped thing.


You can find more pictures on flickr here . Please help me get the rest of this back into service. Icing on the cake would be a copy of the manual but that's probably going too far.

Thanks

[zetroc]

The stamping reads SILVA \\\\ - Silva was (still is?) a manufacturer of tools and framebuilding parts. Unfortunately that's all I can contribute. Good luck.

[Eric Estlund]

The Silva tool looks like it's a front drl. tab holder. Do those pins in the larger tool indx into the holes at the top of the jig plate? I'm guessing the wedge tool uses the bolt on the small face to mount roughly in the seat stay plate slot, and the flat at the top holds both stays in plane with each other.

[EricKeller]

I think you are missing parts.

My first guess about the hinged silver/black assembly is that it is for the head tube. Usually with a keel jig, there is a pivoted head tube holder.

If you look through Dave Porter's pictures you can find some of Pino Morroni's jig. For example, HERE I think what you have is a good start, maybe you should fill in the blanks from this point instead of trying to make it work the way it was originally built.

[datas_brother]

Thanks Steve and Eric (both)!

Peter (Ceeway) sells hand tools from Silva. I should have thought of that. This morning I found a part that I had misplaced. It was the hinged bracket that mounts to the top of the base plate exactly under the BB. It turns out to be part of the silver black index part which is used to set up the TT hight (ST length). The pins don't index into the holes. Those hole are to hold the TT clamps, which I removed (only fit 1" TT).

I will have to fill in the blanks since the tube holders don't fit modern tubing (and certainly not the squarish tubes I make). Understanding how it's supposed to work will help me make the right parts, though. I still would be interested in the history of it. There are too many industry made parts for this to be a one off handmade fixture.

Thanks again for the feedback.

[steve garro]

Well, the rod with the two rusted cones & the nut is either the HT holding rod or a tool for measuring HT twist.
- Garro.

[Doug Fattic]

I love a good fixture mystery/puzzle. I was also going to suggest what Eric #2 said that some pieces are probably missing and add that some of those spare parts don't belong with your fixture either. Those cones on a threaded rod don't appear to be in the same quality range as the rest of the jig. Also it would take an ice age to thread the nuts down to tighten up the cones and that doesn't seem to fit with the philosophy of how the rest of the thing was designed. I would expect acme thread on that rod if it was made for the fixture. I also agree with Eric E. (#1) about the Silva tool and that the wedge shaped tool is for holding the seat stays.

What is odd to me is that they have wheel diameter settings on both the front and rear axle (not bb drop settings). The reason that it is strange is that it has a complicated and expensive way to raise and lower the jig to establish for bb height as well. Ordinarily a designer would use one or the other but not both and use bb drop as his way to measure the difference between the 2 heights. Are there any marking to show how much the top wheel turning the center threaded rod moves the plate up and down? In other words instead of using a mathematical formula to arrive at drop by subtracting the desired bb height from the tire radius, it would appear they set tire height two places and then bb height a third. The only time I can see this being a benefit is if the wheels were 2 different sizes.

It would also help if you took pictures of the any other pieces attached to the fixture to give us a better idea of the philosophy of how things were expected to go together. By the way I wouldn't dismiss using 1" top tubes for modern frames if the customers aren't big people. Racer types would disagree and maybe that is your only market but some normal smaller people can benefit from standard diameter lighter tubes. Just like I don't need or could even use an 11 tooth rear cog (or even a 12 for that matter) on my bicycler, I don't like the ride of 7/4/7 standard oversize tubes for myself. I want my personal frame to be less stiff. It all depends on the size and power and intended use of the customer.

[Scheisserad61]

I used to have a (30 yr. old) brochure from the Italian company that made this jig. Damn I can't remember the name.

It was set-up using a complete front fork that located and held the headtube. The builder would have a pattern fork on hand for the different style frames they would be making. Because it was Italian, this wasn't hard since everything had settled into a basic across-the-board short-reach brake, 1" steerer, with roughly 45mm of rake (+/-5mm) style fork.

I'll try and dig around and see if I still have the brochure. I do recall the company had some VERY different and strange fixtures for fork blade raking, braze-on holders, etc.

[datas_brother]

Thanks again for the help guys. Steve that does seem to be for the HT but I think doug is right since there is no way of mounting it to the jig with the parts I have.

Here is a pic of the measurement rod mounted to the base plate:


The jig came with a fork jig but it is handmade. The dummy axle for the front doubles for the jig:


Doug, I'm not sure how BB-drop is set up. the mount is fixed and does not move when adjusting the backplate hight. You need to loosen 2 bolts to move it but if you do the measurement device becomes inaccurate. It also has an index-rod so putting it back to the "correct" hight is easy. That would lead me to believe that the designer never considered a variation in BB-drop unless using different wheel sizes. I guess I'll need to re-mark the dummy axles to show drop to make things easier.

The wedge either isn't for this jig or I'm using it wrong The bolt is off center to the frame when mounted:


The jig for the FD must be made for Italian BBs since the post is too big to fit a BSA BB.

It would be really cool if you could find that brochure or the name of the company, Schisserad61. From there I think Goggle would help me out. BTW are you in Germany?

It's 1:00 am now time for bed.

[Scheisserad61]

Dear Kevin,

No luck yet on the brochure, but now I believe I remember the name of the company : Patelli

[datas_brother]

Thanks.

I found a Patelli catalog from 1981 with a very similar fixture. Likely a predecessor to mine, which is a little bit more advanced.

[e-RICHIE]

I was in Bologna in 1979 and bought a load of small fixtures at Patelli Cicli. Several of those front der holders,
a bottle boss locate/driller, and some other sundries atmo. I still use the bottle hole maker on all my frames.
At the time, the frame jig was a bit arcane for my tastes. It works off of a surrogate front fork that the head
tube and lugs are loaded on to find the lower end of the bottom lug so that with drop, fork span, etc, the top
tube remains horizontal.

[JFW]

A Swedish collector just recently posted a set of photos over at Flickr after his visit to the Pelizzoli workshop in Italy. A similar jig is in use there, so they might be able to provide you with some information and experiences. Full set can be found here: Pelizzoli - a set on Flickr

Cheers,

Truls

[datas_brother]

Hi Truls, Thanks for the link. I'll get in touch with them.