Charlie Cunningham - Paint & Cantilever Brakes ? in 1980 with frame #5 ! im Album #b) B1 American ELF - Early Cunningham Homage (Race ATB & DH Klunking wide bar n big wheels)🔧🔗

Cantilever brakes front and rear ?,
Well for less aggressive modulation capabilities and publicity Charlie did these versions of his frames in small numbers (the later same goes for bondo/paint finishes). But it was not to his personal conviction and later such options were no longer available due to ideology and simplicity - not conforming to mainstream acceptance as for brakechoice and also probibiting the extra costs and time going into "only" optically pleasing surface management ... !

Usually CC was known for no compromise and anything he would design around a specific bike was strictly done on purpose. If there were changes tolerated they would have been severely specified by custom order such as here on this frame pictured. Paint and "cantilever option" was a means for CC to gain some mainstream acceptance with his pioneering of the then considered to be impractical use of aluminum on an offroad bicycle. CC did a lot of work on testified studies with numbers and measurements to pave a way for the later widely spread Aluminum-Hardtail and Full-Suspension frames to come in MTB history.