Joonya!

  It was only once I started scrambling round my computer for photo's that I realised I hadn't really taken any of Joonya. Bought sometime in Autumn 2012, Joonya is my splendid lugged steel road bike, the Viscount Indy 500. This is the most profile shot I could find:

The only full-profile shot of the bike, not obstructed by some tit riding it

  That picture was taken about a year later in 2013, by Harry (Of Halfords Commodore stripping fame) as we and Daryl rode from Pisa, Italy to Split, Croatia last September.

  The Viscount Indy 500 is a 10 speed with a steel lugged frame fit for 27" wheels. I've no idea what components were original, or what was replaced by the previous owner, but here's how I found it:

• Steel rimmed 27 x 1 1/4" wheels with high-flange Shimano hubs and QR skewers; 
• 5-speed (14-16-18-21-24t) Regina Corsa freewheel;
• SR Apex 750mm cranks with 52t & 40t chainrings;
• Weinmann 610/750 centre-pull caliper brakes;
• Shimano Del-50 brake levers with suicide levers;
• Shimano 600 Rear Derailleur;
• Shimano Uniglide 500 Front Derailleur;
• Shimano LB-100 'ALMI' band-on downtube shifters

  The steel rims were a little bent (and they were steel), so I immediately bought some replacement alloy Rigida's from SJS Cycles, some spokes from Spoke Save, and laced up the byooootiful high flange hubs. My inexperience and naivety in the world of old 70's bikes meant that I didn't even consider changing to the modern standard 700C rims, and I just went for a straight like for like replacement. Probably fortunate though, as my brain probably wouldn't have been able to comprehend the issue of trying to get the brakes to reach a slightly smaller 700C wheel.

Oooosh; check out those flanges

  Due to the name (Indy), the running joke was to put do an abysmal stellar Sean Connery impression, and quote the line from Indiana Jones and the Holy Grail "Indy was the dog's name!".
... OK so that actually wasn't the line from the film, but my memory's poor and "We named the dog Indiana!" doesn't work as well. Either way, the Viscount became known as Joonya!, with Sean Connery's accent embedded for eternity.

 Originally when I bought the bike, it had some fairly ratty tyres, and some slowly unravelling black cloth bar tape. The tyres I straight away replaced with some cheap Michelin World Tours, and the bar tape got gaffer-taped down so it didn't flap about.
Over the next few months into early Spring 2013, a few more bits and pieces got replaced as I decided to keep it a 'traditional' old roadie:

• New handlebar tape;
• Some Velo Orange quill pedals with MKS toe cages and leather straps (these cages were particularly questionable due to the amount of 'toe overlap' I already had with the front wheel... something I became aware of when I clipped my toe on the tyre going round a sharp corner, which oversteered the wheel and sent me flying to meet the ground. Lesson learnt; when turning left, keep the right foot at the back/bottom and vice versa);
• A longer Valvert seatpost so I could stretch my legs, decked out with a lurrrvely Selle San Marco Regal suede saddle, which my bum slowly buffed to a sheen over the first 1000 miles;
• A 130mm Cinelli stem - the frame is pretty compact, so an extra 30mm gave me a more 'normal' reach for my size, plus more control (or less 'twitchiness', that can come with a shorter stem as the handlebars are closer to the headtube);
• 27" x 32mm Continental Gatorskin tyres - Gatorskins are renowned for their resistance to punctures, and even though they were supposed to be the same size, they were a lot slimmer than the balloon tyre Michelins, which left so little clearance with the frame they rubbed at any sign of a wobbly wheel.

  My other bike was (and still is) Mighty Martha II. But if she was for getting me to work or pootling around Guildford, then Joonya was for stretching my legs as far as they'd go. I got into road biking, and spent a lot of weekends out in the South Downs, blowing out my arse trying to go up hills. It was also around this time when me, Daryl and Harry decided to take a trip out cycling later in the year; they'd already done a trip from the Hook of Holland all the way down to Nice 2 years previous, but for me this was a whole new ball game. 60-70 miles training rides were a weekly occurrence through a particularly hot summer, and I'd messed with Joonya's gears and brakes so much that I knew every little bit of chrome and alloy of that bike.

...well, except for the fact that the headtube had been bent at an angle, and I'd never once noticed...

  I only realised when the bike was in a stand and the toptube was at eye-level; the previous owner had clearly collided with something, pushing the headtube to a more vertical angle, and slightly kinking the downtube and toptube in the process. Mild panic set in as we were set to leave for Italy in a few weeks, until I realised I'd never actually known the bike to be any different; I'd dragged the bike around the home counties for hundreds of miles over the past months and it had been fine, so why worry? Joonya's a bit banged up, but he's clearly a tough old bastard.

  So, I changed the cables (Jagwire) and handlebar tape (Bontrager) to a bright yellow, and decided to tart Joonya up a bit. By this time, I'd had frame's powder coated, but I still wasn't sure what I wanted to do with this bike. So for the mean time I took to hand painting enamel bits onto it for kicks:

Sadly, it's this sort of elegant cursive that's dying out in the modern world...

  I also decided that if I was to wear a helmet (I bought one in the run up to leaving for Italy), it'd have to match:

Science has proven that the lightning bolt decal can improve both speed and acceleration, and is markedly more effective than the 'go-faster' stripes of yesteryear

  

  And so, off we went and spent 2 weeks in September cycling from Pisa, across the body of Italy via Florence and Forli (by way of the stonking Passo del Muraglione), then up and around the coast of the Adriatic, through Slovenia, and down the Dalmation coast into Split. 

Joonya: A mighty steed. Picture taken on the D54 near Obrovac, Croatia

  The whole ride was a hell of a lot of fun, and save for a few broken spokes in the rear wheel Joonya ran beautifully; we had to stay an extra night in Trieste to have the spokes changed, which due to the language barrier (and some very unhelpful, effete staff) would have been near impossible had it not been for Massimo, the bike builder extraordinaire at Cottur Giordino Sas.

Unfortunately, an old problem I'd had with my rear wheel that I'd never fixed was that there weren't enough spacers on the axle, and without a washer on the outside of the frame, the QR skewer wouldn't tighten up enough (if the washer had been on the inside of the frame, the rim would have been improperly dished, with the tyre being about 2-3mm off-centre). With all this broken spoke business, I'd misplaced the washer, and had to make a "ghetto spacer" out of electrical tape and folded paper, which lasted me all the way through Slovenia and Croatia.

Wheel fixed and true, ghetto spacer on, ready to ride another 300 miles

  Since Italy-Croatia, I've been wanting to properly 'do-up' Joonya and make him into a racier version of his old self (like putting Nike Air Max's on your Grandad); I plan to keep the Shimano parts for another project, but I can't let go of Joonya just yet.