I’ve said in the past how I really like Bianchi aluminum bikes, only reluctantly selling my 2000 Bianchi M Alloy Pro. It has always surprised me how these aluminum mid-00s Bianchi frames don’t seem to get a lot of appreciation. About a year ago now, after picking up the most gorgeous gold 2004 Bianchi ML3 in France for my girlfriend, the search began for another one for myself.

I thought it might be hard to find one at the right price, but finding one in my size at all was a challenge! Zero chance of finding one locally, I would occasionally find one listed in Italy or France, and even then it was often nowhere near my size.

FFWD to now, and I found one in Italy in my size, and the seller was sound enough to ship it to me. At about the same time, a mixed Campagnolo/Miche 9 speed groupset (derailleurs, brakes, cranks, shifters) came up for sale in Belgium at a very good price. All this came together for the perfect build, as I already had (from the ML3) the correct Bianchi wheelset with a Miche 9 speed cassette!

Here’s a specs breakdown of what I’ve built, I had a few other things in the shed already:

• 2004 Bianchi SL3 “Lite Alloy” aluminum frame, Bianchi carbon fork
• Bianchi Ambrosio aluminum wheels, Miche 9 speed hub, 13-26t Miche cassette (already had these)
• Miche Primato “GranTour” 50-34t compact square taper 172.5m crankset
• Campagnolo Chorus 68mm square taper BSA bottom bracket (already had this)
• Campagnolo Mirage derailleurs f&r
• Campagnolo Mirage 9 speed Ergo shifters/brake levers
• Campagnolo Centaur skeletonized brake calipers
• Deda Mara 44cm aluminum road handlebars
• Tifosi 100mm road stem (already had this)
• 27.2mm aluminum seat post, Decathlon 145mm wide saddle
• Shimano SL road pedals (already had these)
• Vittoria Zaffiro Pro Graphene 2.0 700x28c tyres
• Elite water bottle cages (already had these)
• Overall weight (incl pedals & bottle cages): 9.2kgs (20.3lbs)

If I was looking to shave weight off this build, I could spend some money on carbon pieces, such as the stem, handlebars, and seatpost; I could get one of those 3D-printed saddles; I could upgrade the pedals; I could get a lighter wheelset and lighter cassette. Lighter cranks. All of those changes could certainly get the bike to weigh close to 8kgs. As it is I’m not complaining, it’s “light enough” for me, and having a lot of parts on the shelf kept the budget reasonable. It’s nice to have “room for improvement” if, for example, a deal on a used set of Campagnolo Zondas presented itself.