Why Old Bikes ?

[Grannygrinder]

Old?

Old bikes,old cars. If you gain pleasure for tinkering with what you have then theres point having brand new. In my current level of fitness I could never do justice to a modern £1500+ bike. But I can buywhat would have been the equivilent bike from 10 years ago for a 1/4 of the original value and nearly do it justice! Also I prefer steel framed bikes, they have gone a bit niche and as a result are more expensive than they have ever been, so it makes sense to buy old.

 

[jimihendrix]

I wouldn't mind having a read of that magazine under the phone. It's no Swank but I like your taste.

That's a GuitarWorld tuition book i got with a DVD , it's not got the people on the cover in it, the teacher (Andy Aledort) just demonstrates the styles they use, i play mostly classic rock though

 

[Mr Panda]

You started having sex aged 21
soz - couldn't resist that :mrgreen:

You never stop loving the stuff that was around when you first started having s@x, is how I think about it. The movies, music, food, bikes, etc. Things from that era will always have a special place in your heart.

That said, when I was 21 and drooling over these Ringle, Kooka, Paul bits and pieces, I couldn't afford them at all, they remained a dream. Now, I'm in my 30's, a Manager drawing a very nice salary, and I can afford to have these bits and pieces draped over my ideal framesets. If I can now just find them!!

 

[Kestonian]

You never stop loving the stuff that was around when you first started having s@x, is how I think about it. The movies, music, food, bikes, etc. Things from that era will always have a special place in your heart.

Now there's an interesting one ... my fave girl from BITD was Nicole from the Renault ad. Is she preferable to the newer, more "technically enhanced" models of today?

Frankly, I'd take NOS Nicole any day, but would hold off getting her at a knockdown price from someone on here

But back on topic ... I just think steeds from the early / mid 90s look nice, and I like the individuality aspect. Having said that, I race on a modern bike.

 

[silverclaws]

Well, I just won an old bike on fleabay, yet another Saracen, it looks to be the year later than the one I had, due to the 'tin foil' like decals I remember back in the year MBR mag was slagging off. It is a Tufftrax Elite, the bike I originally wanted before I got the Traverse Elite cheaper. Altus stuff on it, but that is not staying, I just wanted a bike for a rolling rebuild, like I did with my Veewee, but not the Land-Rover.

Now I have just got to find someone with a car, so I can go and pick it up. My first time since I passed my test at seventeen I have not had a car, student status prevents it at the moment.

Yeah, I like old stuff, stuff that can be fixed, I always was a tinkerer and my last ten years of employment, I worked as a tool repairer, where to me, it was anethema to replace something unless it was well and truly knackered and even then I stripped the machine for salvagable parts for later use and the metals to be weighed in at the end of the year for the Xmas piss up.
The throwaway society, to me, goes against my grain.

Anyone know how to strip the colour off of anodised alluminium parts ? I have heard Nitromors is good, but to me, it seems a bit harsh, any other ways ?

 

[jimihendrix]

Cool , get some pics up when you get it

Nitromorse wont work on anodising, you need to use drain cleaner

 

[legrandefromage]

If it wasnt bikes, it would be cars, or Hornby model railways, or guns, or drugs, or beer, or (shudder) football, or (wretches) Golf....

 

[Kintore]

In response to 92-94 bikes

Possibly the best vintage with 22-24 lb steel framed bikes. Let put it in perspective. I at 30+ then (95ish) went out for a day with the local bike club four of whom were racers. They all wasted me on the ascent and had finnished their lunch by the time I got to the summit. There were two racers, with Merlin framed bikes and the rest of the hardware was scarely expensive for the time. This was before suspension and the most you could get in those days was a springy seat post and a dodgy sprung stem!
I wasted them on the downhill. they couldn't get near me and this could have been my skill level, age or sexual prowess but allas it because I had a wonderfull steel framed bike. Al that vibration on the titanium Merlins finnished the hardiest riders and this was arround the time Alu started appearing. For me I proved the point way back then. A good steel frame is untouchable by any other. OK so a steel wobbly full susser would be pants but if you want fast, feel and purity pick up a top speck steel steed from the early ninety's and live!

 

[silverclaws]

A few months back I was going to get an ally framed bike, as a departure from my past. But as with all things the past always catches up, and I have yet another steel framed bike, and another Saracen, which I still have to collect. Having no motor transport is not fun!

Why Saracen I ask myself, why do I like these things, well part of it, is no one else seems to like them, and I like to be different, the other is when I first started looking at MTB's, my only outlet was Halfords, and I fell in love with a grey Tufftrax, I am not quite sure, but it might have had magura brakes. But as of then Saracen cycles were my ideal, based on the tufftrax, the style suited me down to the ground. Am not entirely sure what, ''Hand built in England'' meant, but it appealed to mt Britishness.

Pals had Diamond Back's and Marin's, but they were crap in mud, the Saracen, then shod with Megabites sailed through, ok, it might have gone sideways through the mud, but it was better traction than no traction.

 

[Saddle up]

Road bikes have been around for ever and what is considered a mountain bike has only been around for a relatively short period of time. Before the eighties mtb's were basically customs, hand built and expensive or modified klunkerz. Once mtb's started being built with the same exacting standards and processes as the quality mass produced road bikes of the day we started to see all of the bikes that we would now consider retro.

The ability to call a mountain bike retro is a relaitively new concept in the world of cycling. I think the main reason for their popularity is because a lot of people here were around when it all started. If you mountain biked in the 80's and 90's you would be the first generation to do so in large numbers. At the time no one knew just how big of an impact the mountain bike would have on the cycling industry. I can be fairly sure that no one here was around when people first started to show interest in retro road bikes? When would that have been?

And of course retro mtb's use properly shaped small round tubes made out of the right material and formed into triangles.