Comet Cycles Road and Track bike and sad news.

Sad news on Jackie Hayes, owner and frame builder of 

Comet Cycles frames since the early 1960's and son

of Comet Cycles founder Slater Hayes.

Unfortunately Jackie is now in a retirement home

after his condition of a dementia became to 

much for his wife to manage.

Comet add from a 1952 NZ cycle sport Magazine.

I was in Auckland a week after hearing this bad news,

so took the opportunity to track down a very original and 

extremely pretty mid 1950's Comet road/track

bike, that I had tried to buy several years ago. 

However the owner had wanted quite a bit to much 

money for it at the time.

Unfortunately the owner had in the intervening years

moved house, and left the frame on a damp floor

underneath their new house, the rust, which had only

just started biting into the chrome when I had last

seen the frame, had now completely destroyed

the chrome, a real shame.

I really shouldn't have really brought the frame in the condition 

it was now in, as I do already have a couple of Comets, but 

what can I say, I was feeling pretty sad about Jackie, 
so I decided that I would buy this one (for still way to much!) 
and fully restore it back to it's full glory as my homage to 
my friend Jackie Hayes and Comet Cycles.

Jackie was a great guy, and I always enjoyed visiting him,

hitting the record button on my Sony TD-D5

and listening to his memories of the cycle trade, 

frame building and cycle racing.

The real bummer about this bike, is that the beautiful original 

paint,handpainted writing and box lining was in pretty 

good nick, but the rust is just to far gone on the 

front forks and rear stay's.

Comet writing is sprayed on using an alloy stencil, then hand lined

Chrome Nervex lugs always look the business.

This is the early Karangahape Rd shop decal,

with the subtle fades, and nice light blue, 

compere this to the later Great North Rd

decal here.

Another thing that I really liked about this frame is that

it was custom built as an actual dual purpose bike.

It has track rear drop outs, and also cable guides for rear brakes,

and two sets of forks, road with light boss, for night training 
rides, and track forks for the weekend track meets.

This wasn't uncommon in New Zealand, cycle racing wasn't

really a rich man's sports in the 1950's, most riders where

young, and had to make what money they did have, stretch.

Many competitive riders could only afford the one racing

frame, so rather than go for the compromise, like  the 

Carlton path bikes, some would have a custom built frame

with two sets of forks made like this. 

Classic Slater Hayes half wrap seat stays.

Looks good with the Red Airlites, it didn't come with these,

but I will have to use them in the final build, they suit the 

frame just right I think.