Raparee bikes

feck sake lads

wonder is there any truth in the rumer that des maye (Raparee bikes) is starting up again:cool:

bcmf

Ohhhh....lets hope so. They made some of the nicest frames back in the technicolor days.

feck sake lads

he sure did way ahead of the possie was Des bit of a genius and a really nice guy.

Tomred13

Hope they do too. Des is a legend n a gent, fixed and resprayed an old steel frame for me 3 years ago. seamless welds!

25sean

Head into ON TRACK bike shop on Cook St, they have a minters raparee track bike, orange and black with dura ace track groupset and all the trimmings.. a thing of beauty!

smush76

I think Des would be getting on in years a bit now. I've had a couple of frames built by them; the last in 1997. I still have it, a fantastic bike.
The first was stolen never to be seen again and had a beautiful paint job like the Dave LLoyd concept 90's, purple, pink and white:rolleyes: the second followed the theme with a sloping top tube and some nice fillets to boot.
IIRC his son Colm did build along side him so perhaps it's him reviving the brand, should there any truth to the rumor.
It would be great to see an Irish builder at it again especially with the resurgence in interest in hand built frames. I wont be around to stick in an order but if I was it would be one of their team issue filet brazed multi colored colombus MAX framesets that some board members might remember.
They were great guys to deal with and of course a comprehensive fit process was part of the deal so you could ride straight from the shop knowing your position was dialed.
BTW if anyone has or knows anyone with the above mentioned MAX frameset lurking in a garage or strapped to a turbo for sale I would be interested in talking with them

feck sake lads

i think des does a lot of cycle touring france mostly, got talking to him a few years back at a race fit as a fiddle:D
anyway thats the rumer raparee are back in action.
wonder would he build me a lightweight TI touring bike emm lovely.

smush76

feck sake lads; forget TI definitely get them to build a nice tourer outa steel, you wont have to trawl the Internet far to find inspiration or I can lend a suggestion or two:p

smush76

out of interest are there any boards members who have a Rapparee in their collections, attics or garages? would be nice to see a few pics if so. Not sure what I can route out as mine is at present in the aforementioned attic. In fact any retro rides, I know there have been a few posted in the images of beauty thread but no harm to stick up another pic here?

feck sake lads

smush76 wrote: »

feck sake lads; forget TI definitely get them to build a nice tourer outa steel, you wont have to trawl the Internet far to find inspiration or I can lend a suggestion or two:p

i do have a Thorn touring bike but yeah love to have Des build me a light weight tourer ,he painted my raleigh753 road bike about 5 years ago still in great shape ..
my nephew has one of his custom bikes in his attic you would think it was just made its in that good of condition
us lot keep our bike in pristine condition:D

LCD

My brother has a custom racing frmae. Built probably around 1991-1992 & then had Des respray it AFAIK in about 2002

silver campaign

I had an old raparee I used to race underage, back around 1992/3. I sold it on at the time and it's had a few local owners since then. I think the frame is up in my neighbours garage at the moment.

Rovi

Here's me on mine about a year ago:


Note the 'Period' shoes
(and rider)

It dates from sometime in the early '90s, and has been 'upgraded' with a variety of drivetrain odds and ends since.
I have all the original Campy parts though, and intend restoring it to original at some point.

feck sake lads

Rovi wrote: »

Here's me on mine about a year ago:


Note the 'Period' shoes
(and rider)

It dates from sometime in the early '90s, and has been 'upgraded' with a variety of drivetrain odds and ends since.
I have all the original Campy parts though, and intend restoring it to original at some point.

Say rovi did you know patrick kennedy from drogheda i'm sure i seen you before at some races..

Rovi

feck sake lads wrote: »

Say rovi did you know patrick kennedy from drogheda i'm sure i seen you before at some races..

Don't think I know him

I haven't 'raced'* since the early '90s though, so memories are hazy.




*my 'racing' consisted of trailing along in the wake of the fast guys for as long as possible and trying not to end up in the broomwagon. Finishing in the peloton was considered an achievement

feck sake lads

Ah patrick is no longer with us sad to say but he was a fine cyclist and always rode raparee bikes his dan still has his old bike pride of place in his sitting room ..if you raced in the 80's you would remember him believe me.

Rovi

feck sake lads wrote: »

Ah patrick is no longer with us sad to say but he was a fine cyclist and always rode raparee bikes his dan still has his old bike pride of place in his sitting room ..if you raced in the 80's you would remember him believe me.

I'm afraid the name still isn't ringing any bells , but then I never made it to anything like the sharp end of national racing; I only ever competed (:rolleyes:) in local club leagues around Laois/Carlow/Kildare, and was very much making up the numbers at that!

Here's the invoice from when I bought the bike (I got my dates wrong in a previous post, I got it in 1988!!!:eek::eek::eek:):

r27

Great photo ^^ wish the prices were still the same
Any news on this ? Seen a rapparee track bike recently and was
Intrested
anybody know what's going on ?

feck sake lads

great price right enough but those were the days when money was worth something.
no idea if des maye is still in business great if he did start up again the man was good really good.

neilr4

Hi all,

Sorry to hijack the thread.....

I raced with both Stephen and Patrick Kennedy late 80's early 90's, knew Patrick from Badminton in the O'Raghallaighs before I got into cycling, trained a few times with Patrick he gave me great training advice. Both Patrick and Stephen were trained by the legendary Colm Nulty, very strong both of them and absolute gentlemen both on and off the bike!!

If my memory serves me correctly Patrick rode a red metallic Raparee built with columbus SLX tubing!!!

Sadly missed!

Neil.

andy69

..and sorry for double-hijacking, but if any of yee still have your Rapparee bikes then clean 'em up guys! There's a reunion spin next month....

http://www.clonardroadclub.com/events2014.shtml

....more details will follow shortly, the club will post a thread in this forum soon. Just thought yee might like to know in case ye needed time to get the bike ready ;-)

secman

Still riding my 1992 Raparee colombus slx tubing, just replaced the original dura ace chain rings 2 weeks ago thanks to eBay, the 52 came from calefornia and the 42 from Brighton, managed to source these brand new, unused:)
This photo was taken in courtown on Sunday ..84km spin.