Can you name this Frame?!

I had a 531ST Evans (EVANS stamped on the stays) with lugs and detailing like this. 27mm seatpost because ST. The dropouts were unmarked IIRC.

Have the same heart lugs on my Mercian, never seen a Reynolds stamped dropout before, it's pretty.

Heart shaped cut out lugs might be Prugnat S4 or Haden Sovereigns they look very similar apart from the down tube/head tube one.
They aren’t specific to any one frame builder.

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yeah they look just like the mercian and the raleigh ones too

nice, yeah its unlike a builder not to mark the frame somewhere, maybe i need to remove the gear router and take the paint off the bb to be sure !

i decided to spray and build the bike up (the stripped photos were taken a week ago!)
it looked like this... which turned out not awful

and then i got curious about what the BB was, its a british thread, and then what was under the plastic cable router so i decided to strip the paint and investigate and i found this....

haha, great! its the first frame made by someone - which is aweosme, but it still doesnt really help with getting any closer to who

That is brilliant. 1.

If you listen to @JackThurston’s The Bike Show episode from Nov 2011 (iirc) there’s a brilliantly edited interview with the late great Ron Cooper, a framebuilder who had a workshop in Honor Oak SE London back in the 50s-80s (ish). There’s a lovely moment where he says something like
‘People bring me some nice old frame made of 531 and nervex lugs to look at, and ask “ere Ron, who dyou reckon built this?” and I say “I don’t bloody know!” ... back then, there was someone building bike frames on every other corner out of 531 with nervex lugs!’

So even with some idiosyncratic touches frames are super hard to identify. It’s just nine little tubes innit!

The '1' might be to mark which builder in the workshop made it. My frame has a '2' floating disconnected from the frame number.

The seat stays are thick because it's 531st I think, standard thing, thicker for touring. Reynolds st was an 80s thing, so probably dates frame to then. I'll second @TheShipwright to check the steerer column for clues. Nigel Dean/fw Evans made frames with 531st that look close to this one. The sloping fork crown is nice too.

Like skully says, doesn't matter too much, it's a decent frame just ride it!

no markings on the inside of the headtube sadly. it might just be nine little tubes to some but to others its a passion and a lifetimes work so im not giving up on its identity !

haha, i definitely will ride it!! i love the frame and was looking to finish it off, but im glad its definitely 531st and maybe someone will recognise the maker it and let me know

If you only have the '1' then it might suggest to be more mass produced than by a name English builder as I'd imagine most would have a numbering system there. My number was initially difficult to find on the steerer.

The Nigel Dean radius model is very similar that I saw and might be worth contacting Mercian if you are determined. Catch them on a good day and they may offer knowledge. Hilary Stone is the other oracle to attempt to consult. They may come back with Skully's take though understandably.

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Wait, you had a stripped frame, then you painted it, then you stripped the BB and took off the cable guidey thing to find ‘1’.

This is the perfect frame to invent a randomly named fake framebuilder (Stan Barker, Reg Tubbs, Tom Knowles, whatever), make a convincing old school decal, then see if you can get a know all to start telling you all about how they were big fans of Reg Tubbs’ frames before he was well known...

Have you started a list of imaginary builder's names yet? You came up with good ones over the years. Love it.

I really must rebadge an ‘unknown’ frame sometime. I’m loving Reg Tubbs for a 60s number. I rather like all the Daves from the 80s too.

Hackney Flyer?
Are there any birds of prey left...Merlin,Falcon,Kestral,Eagle

My son has a fake Claud Butler, haven’t got any pictures of the decals on me

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No frame number either
Maybe rename it Longer to go with my Shorter

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fake Claud Butler

fraud butler.

Ha!

yep, stripped, painted, stripped and now painted again, it was worth it to find the '1' You can imgaine what it was like to see the outline of a number then the full outline, then... nothing... bitter sweet aint it.

haha, great idea. ...i did hear on good authority there was a guy on Bridge Street, Macklesfield making audex frames in a tiny workshop using reynolds rear and allez front dropouts in the ealry 70's, his name was Roy Wood, still to this day he says his first was his best....

??

yes, nice! ill try the steerer again tomorrow

no number on the steerer

i have it on 'good authority' that Cliff Shrubb/Pearson made a number of custom steel race/tourer frames like this in 531st, his style of concave seatstay cap plus the cable guides he used are on this frame. The columbus and Allez dropouts could have been requested as custom and the heart detail lugs aparently featured a lot on his early 80's bikes and Pearsons who he built for

Sounds like you are getting closer then. The Reynolds / Allez dropouts are the most interesting clue in all this.