Plz help identifying mountain bike frame

ted ringer

I've bought this bike as a project, the seller said it was a Merlin chromoly frame, however since getting it home and having a better look it has Ritchey stamped into the frame either side of where the back wheel fits. Searching the net has thrown up nothing that I can find, and even the serial number does not seem to match up with a merlin or a ritchey, so I'm lost in knowing what this frame is or it's worth, so any help would be much appreciated.

Logo Stamp


Overall frame


Serial num
You can't see the S at the start of the number in my pic, so should read S97085870


Rear end


The bike was advertised as a custom XC mountain bike.

Thank you.

paul.skibum

Ritchey dropouts were an addition to collaberative frames - Merlin/Rock Lobster made the old Tig Team frames together - I would imagine you have something from that collaberation. Spelling seems off on collaberation but cant be arsed to work out why.

ilovedirt

Yeah, it's probably a Merlin. As paul said, Ritchey made dropouts, which a lot of manufacturers used on their frames. Ritchey did/do make their own frames, but it's unlikely that it is one. Maybe ask on retrobike.co.uk

paul.skibum

By the way - you say searching the web has found nothing - did you try google? the words Merlin, Ritchey and mountain bike gave me some info albeit not the name of your bike.

It looks very similar to the Rock Lobster Tig Team frames of a few years ago though. Maybe an early iteration.

ted ringer

Thank you both for your help, i took your advice ilovedirt and opened a thread on retrobike.co.uk, and found out much more about this frame, for any interested you can find the thread here.

http://www.retrobike.co.uk/forum/posting.php