What constitutes a Classic or Vintage bicycle?
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Brifters mark the end of C&V
Anything that came stock with brifters isnt C&V ...I agree with Grant Peterson I hate Index shifting so for me personally anything that came stock with friction shifting is C&V
#177
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I would consider the early 90's Cannondale R series as vintage classic. Made of aluminum and what is now a classic design. My friend owned a '93 Cannondale R400 and gifted it to me when his eyesight failed to the point he could no longer ride. I was amazed a bike could be made of aluminum and be durable. That R400 was always a joy to ride and I owned it for 20 years before I ended up selling it after I could no longer ride it due to lower back issues. A classic design that has stood the test of time while also being mechanically simple.
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Ummmm
I would consider the early 90's Cannondale R series as vintage classic. Made of aluminum and what is now a classic design. My friend owned a '93 Cannondale R400 and gifted it to me when his eyesight failed to the point he could no longer ride. I was amazed a bike could be made of aluminum and be durable. That R400 was always a joy to ride and I owned it for 20 years before I ended up selling it after I could no longer ride it due to lower back issues. A classic design that has stood the test of time while also being mechanically simple.
#179
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My view is that the industry has absorbed a (to me offensive) brutalist aesthetic to the point that modern classic frames such as those of Richard Sachs are disfigured by the parts that hang off them. To my eye, Campag's aluminum crank with the hidden bolt was a beautiful thing, and I gag when I see the ugly drive trains that are common now. Let's not even talk about the wide billboard downtubes. My Mooneys certainly sport the maker's name there, but it's small and tasteful rather than visually screaming.
On Sach's blog, he cites the founder of Honda as saying that racing improves the breed. Trouble is that the optimizers of modern racing have no sense of aesthetic charm. I'm at an age where I don't give a rat's keister if it's aero when it's ugly as sin. To quote Sachs again: "bring back the elegance."
Last edited by MooneyBloke; 02-22-23 at 10:37 PM.
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#181
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Ooooooooo... You going to try to see how thin the ice is again?
I honestly don't give 2 ***** about what's C&V. I see it more as watershed years. Large changes in the industry. I suppose they could be used as a definition, but again, I think debating it is silly. Of course the following is an approximation, plus or minus a couplethree years.
1887 - Pneumatic tires and safety bike.
1930 - Lug carving, use of aluminum, modern geometry, derailleurs
1951 - Parallel-o-gram derailleur, groupsets, paved roads
1983 - Indexing, clipless pedals, crabon fiber, aero
On the other hand, I know what isn't C&V. Blue bikes. They suck.
I honestly don't give 2 ***** about what's C&V. I see it more as watershed years. Large changes in the industry. I suppose they could be used as a definition, but again, I think debating it is silly. Of course the following is an approximation, plus or minus a couplethree years.
1887 - Pneumatic tires and safety bike.
1930 - Lug carving, use of aluminum, modern geometry, derailleurs
1951 - Parallel-o-gram derailleur, groupsets, paved roads
1983 - Indexing, clipless pedals, crabon fiber, aero
On the other hand, I know what isn't C&V. Blue bikes. They suck.
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Lots of different definitions in this thread. If, say for example, I wanted to do a thread to collect information and showcase/document a build of the following frame:
(Late 90s/Early 2000s Quattro Assi)
Would the C&V forum be an inappropriate place to do so? And at which point in time would the frame become old enough to be titled "C&V?"
(Late 90s/Early 2000s Quattro Assi)
Would the C&V forum be an inappropriate place to do so? And at which point in time would the frame become old enough to be titled "C&V?"
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#185
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I have and old Nishiki with a suntour rear derailleur and gear shifts that are turning ones instead of clicking ones. But I think that bike must be from the end of the eighties or beginning of the nineties.
Will post a picture if i find one decent.
Will post a picture if i find one decent.
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#188
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(Thinking out loud begins here) Ahem.... Anyway... It might seem silly to post it here, given that it's threadless equipped, carbon fiber forked, and could be a viable weight weenie build. I get that. On the other hand, to many people, that frame is "too old" and anything 20+ is "vintage" to them. I was scrolling on another cycling page one day and saw someone refer to Ultegra from 2003 as "ancient." I saw another say they wouldn't ride aluminum from that time period and that it needs to be retired. On the other hand, to many members here, that frame is way too new for this forum. Different perspectives.
I suppose it depends on whether you consider very early 2000s frames with horizontal top tubes to fit under the C&V umbrella just yet. At some point they'll have to, it's just a matter of when that will be. I'm not personally sure. Maybe the definition of C&V should just be "any bike which GCN would refer to as retro in a video title."
I could put my upcoming build thread in "Early Brifter Bikes," but it's rather...... *crickets* around there. I guess it doesn't matter too much, it's mostly for my documentation and maybe the occasional ask for advice.
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I'm scared of having it in my house... It could assplode at any second! I don't even think my renter's insurance would cover damages caused by spontaneous combustion(s) of crabon fibber objects, as any self respecting gentleman would know better than to disgrace his household with such modern, black magic lunacies.
Omitted: the Shamal 12-HPWs that were my TT thingies back when I was foolish enough to enter those sorts of things.
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#191
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I think the main dispute is what counts as old. Some of the tech some consider newfangled is at least two decades old now. I think there is a strong demarcation between what is considered a conventional road bike these days and what that was even two decades ago.
Here's a video depicting a Gilco tubed Colnago equipped with Shimano STI:
I certainly think the paint is loud, and I don't have much fondness for straight bladed forks, but it certainly predates the watershed that I take as the distinction between vintage and modern.
I think it's the rise of a brutalist aesthetic complete with loud downtube branding, the increase in complexity and cost, and the tendency of more and more parts to have shorter lifespans (e.g. design strictly for weight savings at the expense of durability), that are my turn-offs in regards to the current road bike.
Here's a video depicting a Gilco tubed Colnago equipped with Shimano STI:
I certainly think the paint is loud, and I don't have much fondness for straight bladed forks, but it certainly predates the watershed that I take as the distinction between vintage and modern.
I think it's the rise of a brutalist aesthetic complete with loud downtube branding, the increase in complexity and cost, and the tendency of more and more parts to have shorter lifespans (e.g. design strictly for weight savings at the expense of durability), that are my turn-offs in regards to the current road bike.
Last edited by MooneyBloke; 03-27-23 at 06:01 AM.
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#194
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This is going to be greatly influenced by the age of the beholder. A forty year old would probably say anything before 2000 is old. Others, ahem, however, idea of old is more like downtube shifter era bikes. Classic Rendezvous is of that mindset and there are others across a variety of interests. There is already a wide range in the ages of bikes being discussed here, which indicates that the C&V scene is evolving as younger enthusiasts join the party. Someday they will be the old farts answering questions about how it was “back in the day”.
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This is going to be greatly influenced by the age of the beholder. A forty year old would probably say anything before 2000 is old. Others, ahem, however, idea of old is more like downtube shifter era bikes. Classic Rendezvous is of that mindset and there are others across a variety of interests.
I think that bicycles have undergone more than a few aesthetic changes since the days when Merckx and Gimondi raced. People may grumble about brifters and pedals devoid of toe clips and straps, but perhaps an even greater visual change was to brake levers that ran the cables long the bars rather than having two huge loops poking out above the levers. I do tend to think that quill stemmed steel bikes from the mid to late nineties were at a aesthetic pinnacle. This is coupled with the fashion definition is why I pin the term vintage and classic there. It's more a matter of using these terms in revolt against the brutalist aesthetics and technical complexity of the modern race bike.
Bicycling and the bicycle seem to mean different things than they have for the majority of my life, and I'm definitely not on board with that.
Last edited by MooneyBloke; 04-01-23 at 06:44 AM.
#196
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https://www.sheldonbrown.com/bridges...3/pages/64.htm
https://www.sheldonbrown.com/bridges...4/pages/73.htm
I'm guessing most would consider a 29- or 30-year-old RB-1 to be "C&V".
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#197
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I begin to wonder if anyone got that SurferRosa's line was also articulated in justice Potter Stuart's statement about hard core pornography in Jacobellis v. Ohio.
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#199
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I begin to wonder if anyone got that SurferRosa's line was also articulated in justice Potter Stuart's statement about hard core pornography in Jacobellis v. Ohio.
Yeah, some of us recognized the quote and it's SCOTUS pedigree - though I will admit I didn't remember the specific author of the phrase.
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I had to look it up myself. IANAL. I was just a little disappointed that the reaction to SurferRosa's comment was pretty much crickets. Maybe I don't understand the general sense of humor in C&V. "Know it when I see it" out of the SCOTUS context is pretty much a straight line handed out on a silver platter.
Last edited by MooneyBloke; 04-02-23 at 08:10 AM.