What is a Retro Classic Road Bike ?

[hamster]

I think part of it is the spirit, and the second bit is what is testable for a definition.

In spirit I think craftsmanship and framebuilders in small grotty workshops weaving their magic with a brazing torch, rather than hugely efficient TIG factories in Taiwan.

For what is testable then it's lugged steel, with of course the notable and well-documented exceptions of Alan Alu, Viscount Aerospace, Speedwell Ti etc.

For me it all goes wrong with TiG welding, indexed shifting and (horror of horrors) Aluminium and carbon fibre.

 

[doctor-bond]

For me it all goes wrong with TiG welding

Word.

 

[doctor-bond]

Been thinking about whether modern (built now) bikes made the old fashioned way have a place in the retroverse. Instinct says yes, but the pic below has me 'conflicted': lugs, craftsmanship, but all I see is the hideous aheadstem. I thought earlier that components shouldn't be used as criteria. Aheadstems are the exception. Devil's spawn: never seen a sweet one and as for spacers .....

 

[legrandefromage]

Nice

- Ritchey 'Classic' stem/ bars would suit that.

 

[grumpycommuter]

Hows this for a definition? - retro will always be what your dad used to ride....
I can't look at a lagoon blue carlton, not that i see many, without going very weak at the knees and thinking back to the times when i chose his bike for a spin over my purpose bought dawes discovery.

 

[Elev12k]

Couple days ago my neighbour told me he were busy with a 40s Gazelle Dutch-bike. What he appreciated on them is for example that the fender bolt comes loose with ease, even though it is many decades old bike. The Gazelles of that era have a great reputation. It is the kind of attention to detail that I associate with an engineer with sincere dedication to and a clear own vision on how things work best.

Nowadays a marketing department would conclude after research that it would be best that the part can't be disassambled and if it can not without facing you will break it. As they do keep spares for only 3yrs, you have to buy new. The customer doesn't seem to care as with 3yrs their stuff is dated anyway. At least that is what they read in the mags.

Classic is for me like a rendez-vous with the old world situation. When that was common sense.

It didn't happen one day on the other. Easier would it to pick from where you operate this or that or when a certain shop closed, but I consider it subsidiary. For me it is not where my passion is about, apart from that it is a bit arbitrary to my taste.

 

[SeeingisBelievingGTMuseum]

My Panasonic PR-6000 has dual pivots and STI...I think what for me is an important difference between old era and new era is that old era was more traditional and new era is much more based on innovation. quote]

Elev12k.

Interesting...innovation is not a new thing, the quick release, the parallelogram derailleur, Reynolds Speedstream tubeset, carbon fibre frames, various other alloys, even the Sturmey Archer hub gear: only a few innovations from the"old...traditional...era".

Without the old era there would be no new era (following your argument). So-called innovations are merely developments of real innovation. It is simple to develop an idea, very difficult to be a true innovator and work off a blank sheet of paper.

Carbon fibre frames for example aren't the innovation, carbon fibre is the innovation, anyway Gerald O'Donovan built the first way back.

Roots.

Early mountainbikes were simple modifications of beach cruisers...they developed from there - all part of the same"tree".

Amongst my school friends in the 1970s (I'm of a certain age), there was an off road development...we modified old roadsters or grey porridge racers and converted them into what we called"track bikes", with cross tyres, no mudguards and cowhorn bars, often converted to single speed (not fixed) or retaining a hub gear.

We were there off-roading before the Americans.

Roadking.

So evolution by innovation screwed what is now the modern day bike!

 

[roadking]

Agreed about aheadsets...devil's spawn, who could think that was an improvement over a Cinelli 1a?

I first encountered the Tour de France when on holiday in France with my parents (one of our holidays was always in France) it seemed other worldly, mystical; it was certainly"foreign", I'd read about it at school - we had a cycling club, and the library had various magazines - the trade names were unfamiliar, romantic; even when I did find out that Molteni was a mincemeat company; Faema was better it was a coffee maker!

And when we speak of Globalisation we really mean(?) Corporationism, which really began in America, and is resopnsible for our consumer, consumable society that is all about fashion, marketing and short product lifecycles.

My Father, BITD, used to buy Mercedes cars (why I still like them - older ones), they were built to last, relatively inexpensive to repair and the lifescycles were long, the W124 E class was introduced in 1986 and lasted until 1996.

This is why all high streets look the same, wherever you go, in most of the countries in the world, the cities are the same characterless places, without charm, without soul (not everywhere I might add).

I look back to those schoolboy days in France with a certain amount of nostaglia for a miriad of reasons, but seeing those warriors in pink, orange, blue was the catalyst for my interest, although I didn't get my first proper bike until 1978 (a Holdsworth Mistral, which I still have) when I was still at school, that was when my interest really blossomed, and although my"cut-off"date is 1989, the"rot"probably set in once it started being televised (the TdF that is) around the globe.

Bernard Tapie, who once owned Adidas*, the businessman behind La Vie Claire, commented at the time that the main reason for contracting Lemond was to promote his business interests in America.

Enough of my ramblings.

Roadking.

*post LVC. Tapie specialised in restoring failed businesses, also, during the LVC period Tapie also owned Look and Wonder, sponsors of LVC.

 

[Elev12k]

The w124 were introduced in the same year as the Saab 9000, in 1984. It had its successor in the than avantgarde double eye model that was issued in 1995. Volvo, Mercedes, Saab -- all proper motorcars once, but it for sure went very much downhill in the 90s, as with the rest of the car industry. However when I go through a late 80s overview catalogue of the Mercedes line up it is amazing to see how petit it was compared to they offer us today. Moreover back than they sold about 500.000 of them. Nowadays that is approx 1.3 million. The progress came with a price.

In a previous post you considered SBDU deminish as appropriate for cut off point. The French, with government support, continued with their Vitus line and Mavic issued the Zap group. While it involves such as electronic shifting, it was certainly a quirky French approach and it can be considered their final attempt to keep a meaningfull position in cycling. I do not know whether the French care much about when SBDU was shut down. Dito for Holland. Last Gazelle left Dieren years after SBDU was closed. I think other countries will have their own story too.

Also heard in this thread is that a frame needs to have lugs. So that excludes this Slim Chance that can imo can be considered a very interesting classic, just because it is an early attempt with no lugs >> Slim Chance

My Panasonic PR-6000 is built by Jan Legrand using the best 'old world' materials and techniques, while being among the most advanced bikes at the same time. Its roots go back to TI Raleigh team, however it was the 1st year for STI, so no classic?

Max tubing bikes: representatives of the modernish kit or the final peak of the classics?

 

[David B]

This is why all high streets look the same, wherever you go, in most of the countries in the world, the cities are the same characterless places, without charm, without soul (not everywhere I might add).

On a UK scale, this isn't a new argument - even pre-WW2 the likes of John Betjeman were commenting on the increasingly identical high streets of big British towns and cities, each with all-too-similar looking branches of Boots, M&S, Woolies, Burtons, etc. (the latter two often used their very 1930s "house styles" of building regardless of the prevailing architecture of the rest of the town).

David