Coolwall - Klein

[cce]

no, i think you're a snob because of your schoolgirl-level sarcasm.

I agree. All my friends and EVERYONE else I talk to only talks positively about Diamond Back. Klein is uncool and Diamond Backs rule!

If you read the whole thread, my sarcasm was directed at Neil for his large generalizations that EVERYONE he talks to had nothing nice to say about Kleins so therefor they must ALL be rubbish. Sorry, but whenever I see such blanket statements, my sarcasm is difficult to control. Must be nice to live in a world where one can form their solid opinions about the rest of the world based on only a few interactions, eh? (note: I'm being sarcastic here too. )

i think this is largely a perception based on the majority of klein owners THEN (not now)

back then, most kleins were bought by people who simply wanted the most expensive one. This automatically precludes their being cool, simply for the Gordon Gekko factor. Cool bikes were the realistic aspirations - frequently the halo models from the manufacturer you already owned. Zaskars. Explosifs. Diamond Back Axes....

 

[GearlessinSeattle]

I say cool for sooooo many reasons.

I will say this again as I have in many different threads and posts:

"Most people don't understand what it is about Kleins, but then again, I don't understand most people."

Also, this sums it up why us Klein owners feel the way we do. I wrote this almost 2 years ago:

In 1989 my friend and I moved to Sun Valley, Idaho or Ketchum as the locals like to call it. We moved in with a friend that had an 89 Rascal. What a bike! It put my 87 DB Ascent to shame. I could not believe the beauty of this thing they called a Klein. It was then that my love of Klein’s started as well as my love of all things MTB.
By 1990 I was working in a shop called Backwoods Mtn Sports in Ketchum that sold Kleins, Trimbles, Cannondales and Bridgestones. I still could not afford a Klein so I settled with a 1990 M800 XT. My friend that had the 89 Rascal left his bike out in front of our house 1 night and to his surprise the next morning it was gone never to be seen again.(stoner mistake #67) He got the insurance for it and bought a 90 Attitude Team. WOW! Even better then the Rascal.
During the summer of 1990 and 1991 I was riding the trails around Sun Valley and Ketchum at least 4 times a week with my friend that had the Attitude. Did his Klein ride better then my “Beast of the East”? Did it climb better? Descend faster? I was able to ride his Attitude a couple of times on the same trails that I would ride my M800 and even though his bike cost 3 times as much I did not think the ride was much different but that did not stop me from wanting one.
It was 6 years later that I finally was able to afford a Klein. I found a 1994 Adroit in the paper for $1400. It was my size and it was Gator. The fellow that I bought it from was a team rider for a local bike shop and was selling it for the cost of his new ride. He was going to full suspension.
I brought that bike home, sat it in the living room and just looked at it until my girlfriend, now my wife, made me take it downstairs. I loved the feel of the Adroit and it handled like a dream. Sure, it beat the heck out of me and I ached after each ride but it was a good kind of pain. I owned that bike till 98 when, shipping it to Georgia, UPS lost it. I was crushed. By then the full suspension craze was at full force so with the insurance money I bought a Specialized Stumpjumper FS. Since then I have owned about every type of bike you can imagine. I flip-flopped between hardtails and FS bikes, geared and SS and all types of tubing. But for some reason I still missed that Klein.
Now 10 years later I can find Attitudes and Adroits but it is hard to justify buying them. A friend of mine once said “when you’re young you have all the time to do what you want but not the money and when you’re older you have the money but not the time”.
I think the reason that Kleins command the price they do is not because they are the best riding bike of their day but because they are a legend, a mystical creature that only a few owned new and something we all have wanted at 1 time or another. I have owned 4 since my first Klein and I am now an owner of a 1992 Attitude XTR. Now every time that I ride it, it brings me back to a time when things were simpler. I still get comments about how cool it is even now. There is just something about a Klein that makes your heart beat a little faster and your smile to get a little bigger.
Thanks for reading.
BTW-I am in Chehalis about every 2 weeks and I can still feel the ghost of Gary riding around.

That 1992 is gone and replaced by my 1990.

Cheers all.

 

[Neil]

no, i think you're a snob because of your schoolgirl-level sarcasm.

I agree. All my friends and EVERYONE else I talk to only talks positively about Diamond Back. Klein is uncool and Diamond Backs rule!

If you read the whole thread, my sarcasm was directed at Neil for his large generalizations that EVERYONE he talks to had nothing nice to say about Kleins so therefor they must ALL be rubbish.

And if you read the thread, PROPERLY, you'll see that's not what I said.

What I said was in response to the comments that Klein defined mountainbikes for the 90s, which were made in turn because I questioned that surely retrobike was bigger than one historic make of bike.

To be accurate, what I was saying was rejection of the exaggeration of the significance of the brand. I didn't rubbish them at all, nor did I comment that others that I knew, then, did - what I did say was (in response to the supposed cultural significance of Klein) was that nobody I knew BITD was talking about them, or mithering about owning them.

I went on to say the only person I'd ever met in real life that actually owned one, didn't talk about riding it, or the rides he'd been on, just about the bike, it's cost, and the paint work.

If you're gonna put words in my mouth, at least do the job properly...

Sorry, but whenever I see such blanket statements, my sarcasm is difficult to control.

Then you should read it again, and the context, because you clearly didn't understand it the first time around.

 

[SF Klein]

I did read it carefully. If you knew me better, you'd know that I'm a very careful reader. It's what I get paid to do as a living.

I'm calling BS. BITD I cycled with and knew many mountain bikers. I can't think of one instance of any of us talking about Kliens, then, never mind with any reverence or desire.

The inference that I read here is that you know a large group of MTB'ers, much like the large group here on RB, and since the large group "us" never talked about Kleins, with reverence, desire, or otherwise, then surely the population at large must mimic the group of MTB'ers that you talked with BITD and thus don't hold Klein in any high regard. If I've misread this, would you please paraphrase again or PM me so I can better understand your point here?

Even now, I can only ever remember actually meeting one person in the flesh who owned a Klein (this would be in 95, when I was on holiday) and he never once talked about where he'd cycled or the rides he'd been on, any talk he had were just about the bike, how expensive it was, or it's paintjob.

Again, the point of your inference that I understood is that this 1 Klein owner who liked to babble on and on about his bike vs. actually riding it, somehow represents the Klein community at large. If that's not what you meant, could you please confirm you meant this only as an anecdote? Or if you had another point, could you PM me to let me know what you meant?

 

[SeeingisBelievingGTMuseum]

Sure they look great but people over paid for a fancy paint job and status. Most that have owned them have had another bike that rode better. Amongst aluminum manufacturers they had a fairly high frame failure rate in the early years.

 

[GearlessinSeattle]

Once again the "high failure rate" comes into play.
I sold Kleins for 2 years, 90-92, and never had one come back.
I have owned 5 Attitudes and 2 Rascals and never had one fail.
I have had countless friends that have owned them and theirs never failed/crack.
I know that some cracked, but all, and I mean all, bikes from the 90's had their faults/failures at some point.

Coming from a guy that has more GT's than the average wholesaler I would think your opinion is somewhat bias.

BTW, I have seen a Zaskar that was cracked.

You know I kid, right?

 

[tintin40]

The best has never been cheap. And they were the best alloy mtb made

 

[Neil]

I did read it carefully. If you knew me better, you'd know that I'm a very careful reader. It's what I get paid to do as a living.

I'm calling BS. BITD I cycled with and knew many mountain bikers. I can't think of one instance of any of us talking about Kliens, then, never mind with any reverence or desire.

The inference that I read here is that you know a large group of MTB'ers, much like the large group here on RB, and since the large group "us" never talked about Kleins, with reverence, desire, or otherwise, then surely the population at large must mimic the group of MTB'ers that you talked with BITD and thus don't hold Klein in any high regard. If I've misread this, would you please paraphrase again or PM me so I can better understand your point here?

Even now, I can only ever remember actually meeting one person in the flesh who owned a Klein (this would be in 95, when I was on holiday) and he never once talked about where he'd cycled or the rides he'd been on, any talk he had were just about the bike, how expensive it was, or it's paintjob.

Again, the point of your inference that I understood is that this 1 Klein owner who liked to babble on and on about his bike vs. actually riding it, somehow represents the Klein community at large. If that's not what you meant, could you please confirm you meant this only as an anecdote? Or if you had another point, could you PM me to let me know what you meant?

Why paraphrase?

You've quoted what I've written, it's YOU that's extrapolating.

The point I was making, in counter to Klein's being the bike of the 90s and of such huge significance to mountain biking / bikes over those years, was simple - for a make supposedly so influencial, the people I knew weren't talking about them - that's all.

I'm not suggesting that's a representative sample size, or indicative of any greater numbers, merely that if Kleins were of such importance in the 90s, as was being asserted (ie that which I was replying to) you'd have expected I'd have had or heard some discussions about them.

Which leads me on to the other point you raised.

I was vaguely aware of Klein bikes, BITD, but only really because I'd seen the odd advert for them in bike mags.

The only discussion I ever had about them, was with the guy I mentioned. That was all I was saying.

There was no point of my "inference", it would have been your inference, if I had have been doing anything, I would have been implying - but you know this, you do this for a living.

So over all those years, from around 1988, 'till joining Retrobike, I've only ever heard or had discussions about them either here, or the one person I actually met who owned one.

And all of your botched accusations is what happens when you try and over analyse something, with a pre-existing bias.

By all means, argue with what I've written, you know, the actual words that were written - those things. But: 1) they were written countering a point you're not even giving context for, in favour of what it seems is your preferred bias 2) as a result your inferences are merely white noise.

 

[Elev12k]

Yes, they are Cool, but a bit overhyped also, what makes them a little less cool than they could have been.

 

[any123]

now the words have gone to big thanks for nothing.

To answer your question regarding bike of the decade I fully stand by for 2 points.

1) Klein was there in 1987 playing with aluminim and continued to do so till 1997 with great success.

2) no other bike from that era can lay claim to what we have on bikes today they had then. bb30, bar/stem combo, 2 inch downtube, stiff, light, responsive, I won't even start down the road of paint.

Kleins were expensive due to the fact that they had expensive technology for those days. Also bikes are bland today and i know this because i have the best you buy today and the best you could buy then, and the Klein still steps up to the plate when people see the two bikes today.

also i don't wish to know about sexuality for italian steel

thanks andy