bikingshearer 

Bikes Direct?

wrk101

Most of my riding is in the recreational/exercise category. As such, top speed and performance is less important, but easy gearing is.

Speaking about vintage value, I had a first printing Atlas Shrugged, with no dust jacket. Sold for $300. So apparently there is still interest in old stuff.

Most old bikes I find are not parked and ridden due to performance or capability issues, Instead, they are similar to much exercise equipment, bought for good intentions and then never used. Newish bikes sit idle too.

ClydeClydeson

So why are the Paramounts and their peers rare and sought after? By your estimation, they could have stopped making them after a few production runs and the cycling world just passed around the ones that were made into infinity.
THe only reason ANY of them have lasted is because they were not subject to hard use, probably because the components were so fragile that the wheels would normally break before the frame saw any significant stress. People were conditioned to treat their racing bikes as fragile thoroughbreds.

ClydeClydeson

Many many failures. Were you working in the industry in the 80s and 90s? Lightweight steel bikes were fragile and failuires were common. Failure rates are much lower with modern aluminum and carbon, and the expectation of durability, and hence the amount of abuse they see, has gone up. Why do you think the steel bikes currently sold as suitable for abusive use are 6 lb frames and not the 3.5 or 4 lb frames used in racing BITD?

merziac

This brings up another very good point, changing gearing, wheels, modifying cockpit, bars, stem, etc. can and increasingly so be a nightmare if not a no go on modern bikes.

georges1

True and that is when the quality of the batteries is optimal, andsomebatteries even four quartz watches aren't to be found anymore case ofthe Omega Megaquartz and Rolex Oysterquartz. Once electronics are outdated, they are outdated.

smd4

Old quality steel bikes aren't really all that rare. And they are "sought after" because of their intrinsic qualities. We see WAY more vintage Paramounts posted here than Kestrel 4000s. Or have you not noticed this?

Utter nonsense. What are you talking about? Hard use? On a road bike? Is this even a thing? You're right--these aren't gravel bikes.

Kilroy1988 

Last year I was riding strong because I had the opportunity to do a few more thousand miles than any year since I was first in college. I could get out on my 1979 Mercian 10-speed and do a 75-mile ride at about 18mph average. I bought myself a fancy 2013 Look 675 with Ultegra and got out to do 130 miles one day at 19mph average. This was around the same time of year and on similar terrain. My stance is slightly more aggressive on the 675 and there was a 10-pound weight difference between the two bikes fully loaded (18 lbs vs 28 lbs), plus I had lovely Continental 700x25mm tires on the 675 and generic 27" tires on the Mercian.

Considering I wasn't out sprinting or climbing much on such rides, I think that slight benefits from aerodynamics, weight difference and tire size/pressure probably accounted for about 95% of the performance differences between the two bikes. Almost all of those factors could have been negated if I were on a racier vintage bicycle than the Mercian (as equipped).

The Look isn't even that uncomfortable except that I refuse to put a two-pound Brooks saddle on a modern bike like that, so my butt suffers a bit despite my use of a very plush Selle Italia Flite.

-Gregory

georges1

Are you some kind of frame builder in the league of Richard Sachs or John Slawta or a bike shop owner ??? You didn't name the series of tubes prone to failure, nor the makes nor the models which were prone to it . Depends which aluminium we are talking about and whether it has been heat treated or not but also how it has been welded. Carbon is hardly durable with a crash or with severe abuse even if it is uses T700 toray carbon fiber. The frames that tend to outlast the rest in terms of life expectancy and resistance to fatigue are the ones made of high end steel and high end reynolds and sandvick double butted titanium. Aluminium frames like Canondale's CAAD3-CAAD10 are expected to last a lifetime, an Altec, an Altec2+, a Starship, a Dedacciai 7003 and Aegis and Easton Scandium and an Easton Elite have a life expectancy from 10 to 20 years at best. Most of the pro peloton rides carbon, back in the 80's -early 90's the 753 as well as the oria and the columbus sl were the steels used in the TDF champions 's road bikes.

merziac

BS

100,000's if not millions of these frames live to tell the tale and are still going strong, we here are proof of that and we're only one of the many large groups.

Many were beat to death even by members here and are still going strong.

This all plays out here everyday when someone finds one that has been languishing, may be cracked, broken, rusty or not and brings it back to life and the fight where they do just fine.

Nevermind the huge amount that have never faltered after decades so far.

Fragile is relative, many of these were ridden by very hard men for 10's of 1000's of miles without any failures, many of the ones that did fail were ridden very hard, put away wet and stewed in their own juices for their whole life.

Many of them are still going strong despite it.

smd4

I don't think anyone is arguing that modern bikes don't have more bells and whistles (although the Mercian does have at least a bell ). But the classic bikes just have more...class.

georges1

Old steel bikes are sought after because they are durable , comfy and are more lively in terms of ride compared to a carbon one. The 753's an 853's framed Paramounts are some of the finest Paramount bikes ever made including those with the 531 frame. The Raleigh SBDU models could be considered as rivals of the Paramount. I have never had the chance to try a Paramount but I know that quality wise they represent among the highest quality of craftsmanship regarding an american made bike.

georges1

Steel frames are made to last even after a bad treatment you can always bring back a steel frame to life , restore it and use it. "Steel is real" like we say here.

tkamd73 

Just curious, how long do the batteries last on the D12 system, and how many will I go through in 57 years. I have power tools less than 10 years old, that I can no longer find batteries for. That will never happen with D12 right?
Tim

merziac

Guess I should have remembered that you had this when I guessed at the new one.

merziac

Tongue in cheek application of Atlas's logic, infinitely superior, lighter, better, no contest, ridiculous logic, etc.

Atlas Shrugged

With that, we agree. It's a bit harsh to say the Trek will be trashed or discarded because, like most OG carbon bikes, many remain and are still ridden. That Schwinn is not regularly ridden today but placed in storage in some basement or hung on a wall in a coffee shop as a curiosity at that point; why does it matter if it still exists? In general, I view my bicycles as a tool to be used, much like most other items in my life, and I try to use the best tools for the job. In 50+ years, the very few assets accumulated during my life remaining will have been dispersed and disposed of, with a few heirloom items which remain and be passed down to a select few. I don't consider my bicycles in that category; they will be well-used and given to anyone interested after I am done with them. I have lost count of how many performance bikes I have owned since the 70s and have only kept a couple; the rest were sold or given away. My Garmin's are the same way, I am on my 2nd Fenix Series Watch, and I can't remember how many Edge bike computers I have been through; they are fantastic additions to my enjoyment of the sports I love and like footwear replaced when I determine their time has come.

I incorrectly weighed into the C&V subforum to debate the premise that modern bikes are inferior to vintage ones for the sport of cycling; I was on a fool's errand. Much like jumping into a Catholic forum defending Judaism would be irrational, nothing positive would come from that kind of interaction, especially on an online forum.

vinfix

If your only criteria is speed, I suppose the Domane wins. But that's not why most of us are here in this sub-forum.
I've proven that to myself, I'm about 1/2 mph faster on my modern steel bike than my vintage Schwinn Peloton. I've been through it all with trying to upgrade vintage- from not enough gears, to going to brifters, carbon parts, etc.. I finally landed on modern 10 speed, rim brake, steel frame, carbon fork & seatpost, 19# bike, I'm good. Only thing I can think would be better is a pretty frame with an "O" or an "i" at the end of the name.

Every time I shop for a new bike, though- I can't bring myself to spend over $5000 for a carbon bike that will be obsolete or broken in 5 years.
Last Fall, I went on a shopping safari- try to find a bike that doesn't have electronic shifting and disk brakes! And half the carbon bikes are downright uncomfortable on every bump.

I tried a Trek Emonda, leftover team replica. $12K bike, I could have had for $7K. There's a tip-off right there! Internal hydraulics, bottom bracket that needs annual service (the frame is the bearing race!), no adjustment on the integral aero stem, etc. I enjoyed the test ride, but I realized it wasn't for me.

bikemig 

I agree with all of this. Plus if people stop feeding the trolls, eventually they'll get bored and move on.

Trakhak

You clearly didn't work in a bike store in the '70s, '80s, or '90s. Failures in steel racing bikes weren't exactly common, but even in the backwater shops north of Baltimore where I worked in the '80s and '90s, we saw our share of non-crashed bikes with cracks at the bottom bracket or in a seatstay or chainstay at the fork end or at the seat cluster.

I remember a rep for a high-end distributor telling us that we should buy some of his newest San Rensho frames, because, as he explained, they'd fixed the problem with down tube failures at the head tube lug by increasing the butting thickness there, and then, when the other end of the tube started cracking at the bottom bracket shell, they increased the butting there, and then finally increased the chainstay thickness, first at the front and then at the back.

That's just a glimpse into the very different world of distributors and manufacturers, where anecdotal evidence that is reported by a bike owner here and there as evidence of the immortality of steel frames is replaced by real numbers---i.e., how many frames they have to replace under warranty.

Another rep, for Trek this time, told me, when I asked him in the early '90s what effect the recent introduction of their aluminum frames had had on business, "We're saving a lot of money, because we're getting far fewer warranty claims that we did with the steel frames."

I'm sure, though, that it's true that the frames built with high-end steel in the '90s and 2000s will last a long time. Steel bikes represent a very small slice of the already small high-end market, and, of the few in that slice that see anything like significant mileage, they're not being raced---and it's racing that reveals frame weaknesses. (Remember that 12 High-End Frames fatigue test posted on the Sheldon Brown site: unlike the Trek carbon bike and two of the aluminum bikes, all of the steel frames that were subjected to high numbers of repeated stresses failed, sooner or later. Mostly sooner.)

Plus, non-racers in their 40s, 50s, and 60s, who represent the majority of that tiny minority buying cutting-edge steel bikes, often have a number of bikes to rotate through, and do so on a regular basis. Ridden that way, sure, any frame is likely to last effectively forever.

smd4

I did. I don't recall seeing any broken steel frames. But I only worked in a college town in Northern California and two shops in Southern California, where cycling wasn't all that popular.

georges1

They tested steel frames were which were mid range slx steel frames as seen in sheldon brown fatigue test . Would it have been a columbus genius or a columbus nemo or columbus ultra foco or reynolds 853 or reynolds 953 or the dedacciai dr zeo the data would be totally different. The data in this test is more than 30 years old so it isn't really representative, nor very relevant today . How many high end to very high end columbus frames excluding slx such as neuron, genius, nemo, foco,ultrafoco or reynolds 753, 731, 708, 853, 653, 631, 531c or deda dr zero ordeda dr zero uno have you seen broken or damaged ? Please share numbers and pictures because I am curious to know the stats. SLX isn't a high end steel. The high end steel at Columbus starts with Nivacrom and continues with Thermacrom,for Reynolds its 631,853, 725, 931 and 925 steels that are high end and at Dedacciai , its is DR Zero and the DR Zero Uno.

iab

Incorrect. And again, shows astonishing ignorance.

It is hard to believe that any one thinks its about the bike. Bartali on his first team bike in 1934, 49 up front, 16/18/20 in the back and serious contortions to shift, would drop you in your prime on any bike today like a bag of wet sand. Your humiliation would be epic. Kind of like now. But go ahead, keep on telling yourself it is about the bike. The world needs a good patsy.

Hondo6

Sub 10 lbs is probably not completely farfetched, either. Sub-13lbs has apparently been do-able since 2021. See the special edition version described at the end of

https://bikerumor.com/585g-specializ...k-catching-it/

Not my cup of tea. I'm not a competitive amateur or pro cyclist; I just ride to please myself and get some exercise. But if it "floats yer boat" and you have the cash, then go for it if you like.

Kilroy1988 

'Eh. If you were to give Gino Bartali a modern carbon fiber racing bike with disc brakes and electronic shifting and 22 speeds, he might feel like it was something of an upgrade, especially going up or down hills...

-Gregory