Azmi's Samson Illusion

It is always exciting to have Samson bicycles coming though our place. We would like to think that Harada-san who founded Samson, is one of the best if not the best Japanese framebuilder that is around today. 

A thrilling project was on the horizon when the owner approached us for a Samson Illusion build. The Illusion is one of the older model among the lineup by Harada Tetsuro which uses the lugged construction with either 1" threaded or threadless fork. A timeless design which offers the aesthetics of a traditional steel bike. 

Samson produces a lugged fork which is made with his own fork crown as well as Columbus Max tubing. It has become a signature of Harada Tetsuro's work. 

CPS : We notice your use of 'variety' not relating to frames but to components. Quite the intriguing mix of European brands on a Japanese frame.

Azmi : I have planned for this to be my last bike, thus I decided to go with Campagnolo Super Record 11 speed for my groupset. The good folks at CPS helped me sourced for a nice used groupset from Japan but in very mint condition.

I had the Enve 2.2 wheelset for quite some time and decided to bling it up with Extralite silver hubs to match my silver Chris King headset that is on the frame. Thanks to the good folks from Buillt who had that sorted. Since it’s a tubular set, I decided to scratch the itch on this particular tires that I’ve been eyeing on from Rene Herse, the unicorn FMB Paris roubaix cotton tubulars. Please do not ask me how much it costs as I am trying to forget about that!

If you have read up to this point, you should have figured that I am kind of huge on supporting the indie guys and small businesses. Cockpit is from Darimo. I decided to go with their new silver alloy stem & bar combo since I had the integrated bar stem nexum on the other bike.

For the saddle, I went with berk which is a new brand that has been added to the non exhaustive list of brands that CPS is carrying. I didn’t want to go with my previous saddle which was sworks power which has zero warranty cover for the amount you’re paying for. Pretty ridiculous if you asked me. Specialized please sort this out and be inclusive.

Basically the gist of the whole set up was to be different from my other bike otherwise what’s the point right if it’s just the frame that is different. It’s all about having the option of variety.