rlorenz2

Hey all. Came across this Silca floor pump and was unable to find a similar one with the brass base on the interweb. Looking for a little help on when this was produced. The barrel measures 28mm so that narrows it down to 1917-2008....? I sanded and re-stained the handle, its looking nice again now. Also cleaned and re-lubed the leather washer and inner valve. Just waiting for the presta head I ordered to come. Thanks in advance.

unworthy1

never seen a base like that before but I like it...will subscribe for experts chiming in, (we hope).

rlorenz2

Any pump experts out there?

Soylent 

I like that! Reminds me of those old Bullseye putters.

stardognine

Cool. I had one that wasn't quite that old, but definitely from a much earlier time than more modern ones. I just had to grease the leather washer, even the hose was still good. 😎

Salamandrine 

Is there such a thing? I guess if there is one, they'd be on this forum. I've seen several different bases on Silca floor pumps, but never that one. Very cool. I'd guess it's an older model, but really have no idea. When Silca were the standard shop pump, they usually had the painted oval (stadium) shaped base.

CV-6 

Maybe contact Silca?

rlorenz2

Yes, I have reached out to them and awaiting a response.

rlorenz2

Hoping someone here with a nice old pump collection can educate us, since I am unable to find a similar pump for reference.

rlorenz2

I received a response from Silca and they indicated the pump was produced in the 60's. Since Silca did not put serial numbers on pumps produced during this time that is the closest they can get, which works for me.

73StellaSX76

For broader reference, mine has been in weekly use for about 40 years, still my favorite pump to use. It has had 2 or 3 leather seal changes plus as many hose changes over the years. Only complaint is for large size mtb tires this pump can take forever to fill a tire.

Salamandrine 

Cool. I was thinking maybe early 70s, but it's older. Now you're the expert! That must be a pretty rare pump. Pre bike boom. Looks to be in great shape. I wonder if it got a new gauge at some point? During my LBS years, they usually looked like the orange pump 73StellaSX76 shows above. We'd use those things all day long for years on end.

Reynolds 531 

Under-rated comment.

juvela

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Thanks for posting.

Owned one which was earlier but did not explore a date.

Its cast base was painted black and its barrel was solid bare brass.

The barrel was longer than this and there was a folding foot plate.

Wood handle was slightly wider.

​​​​​​​Purchased at a flea market for @1.00.

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luns

Silca had almost exactly this pump on their website in 2003. The Pompa Strada shown was identical to your pump except with a plastic handle (I've never seen your particular handle) and different graphics on the tube (the same graphics were on the Pista and Super Pista of the time). The description says 'Plastic handle, press-forged brass base'. Foot aside, everything else (including plastic handle) appeared identical to the same era of Pista. The Pompa Strada was removed from their website late 2003

I doubt this is correct. I think the people at current-day Silca were just making their best guess without the benefit of any inside historical knowledge. The lack of knowledge is no fault of their own - not a whole lot made the transition from Italy to Indiana - but it would have been more honest for them to just say they don't know or that they were guessing.

rlorenz2

If the pump was available until 2003, one would expect to find more information on the web?

luns

Not necessarily.

First off, Silca was a very old company and with their ways of doing things and their reputation both being established long before the web even existed. The focus back in the day was in producing product, and not on creating and maintaining fancy web sites, and it was quite common for established brands to not even have a web site at all. It's not like today when people invest in fancy websites and kickstarter campaigns and what have you before even having a product to sell.

Silca's product selection was also very fluid, with items coming and going frequently, and even the old standbys seeing frequent changes. Some products may never have shipped in significant quantities - I'm sure there are products that never made it to the US. I don't think they sent out samples of everything to reviewers everywhere as is common nowadays, so there's not necessarily much secondary web presence of things either.


There was also a Super Pista Supreme on their web site the same time as the Strada. I wish I could still find a picture of one. This was a Super Pista with a chromed tube and high-mounted pressure gauge. Nowadays the only web evidence of it having existed is mostly a handful of forum postings of people who'd seen one before and were looking to buy one. So they existed, but not in significant numbers.

Salamandrine 

Around 2003 makes more sense to me. The gauge, the handle, and rubber hose and everything else look too new to be from the 60s. It could be some sort of reissue of an older model I suppose. That wouldn't be difficult to do, especially if the old casting pattern was sitting on a shelf somewhere. I have to presume Silca was a pretty small company always, and when full size frame pump went out of fashion in the 90s, much of their business must have more or less disappeared overnight.

For sure not everything is on the web.

luns

Someone could very well replace the gauge, handle, and hose on a 60's pump with fresh new parts: the availability of these parts was what made Silca so great. However, I don't think the foot is an old casting pattern.

My own Silca Pista is from around that time, with a triangular die-cast foot - which they still touted as new and improved in 2003 - and has what I think is the same cast brass valve body as its immediate predecessor. They changed to a plastic foot in 2004, and the valve body went to pot metal some time after that. The instructions PDF for the metal foot pump was dated 2003 but was still on their web page for the plastic footed version through to the end.

The proportions of the valve body under the Strada's gauge look identical to the same area of my valve body, so I expect them to be from the same era. Earlier Pistas had a much chunkier valve body machined out of round, and prior to that, hexagonal, brass stock. I doubt Silca would have started with a cast valve body in the 60's, gone to more primitive bodies through the next few decades, and then ended up at another cast valve body that has the same modern design fingerprints as the supposed '60's part.

For sure.

rlorenz2

Understandable and the pump works great for me.

I refinished the handle and put on a new hose in those photos, so yes it would mis-date off those items.

Looking back at my email to Silca. They indicated some some old catalogs were used for dating the pump. Upon request to scan the catalogs, they indicated they were in too poor of shape to scan.

Salamandrine 

LOL. Maybe. Or they didn't want to share the IP they paid good money for.

Since you refinished the handle and the hose is new, it could be an original 60s pump. The gauge could have been replaced by someone else. The brass base looks remarkably unworn and untarnished for the 1960s though. Could have been cleaned and dipped of course, or sandblasted. I'm still not ruling out reissue, but really it doesn't matter that much. It's a Silca pump made by the original Silca company regardless.

AFA stuff being on the web, I've noticed big companies do a lot of retroactive gaslighting. You'd never know for example that Shimano originally marketed SPD as a road pedal system alternative to Look. They pretend it was always MTB only. And today, digressing a bit into the subject of C&V lunch, I discovered that Laughing Cow cheese triangles were always soft and spreadable, back to 1921. Uh huh. No, they never were fake semi hard 'gruyere', a pasteurized processed cheese food product, the French equivalent of Kraft singles. Never existed. Nope. /s

unworthy1

pretty sure the gauge is a replacement: WIKA is a US-based brand and still in business, it looks too new to be from the 60s and maybe even from 2003! Another beauty of the replace-ability (is that a word) of Silcas is the gauge is also an easy swap!

billnuke1 

Love my Silca! Love my Park Tool pump, too! Bought the Silca

Easier to read the the gauge on the Park pump...plastic , not brass feet!

This is a must have upgrade...


Great double head on the Park Tool pump...
valve upgrade...definitely worth the $!

luns

The gauge on the Strada looks appropriate for 2003 to me. It's very similar in style to the Wika gauges used in the 90's Pista/Super Pista.

Wika was founded in 1946 by Alexander Wiegand and Philipp Kachel in Germany - the company name is a portmanteau of the surnames. Grandson of the founder, also named Alexander Wiegand, is the current CEO. US operations started in NY in 1967.

Silca sourced their gauges from Wika and Fimet for years. In the late 90's, the Pista/Super Pista had a Wika gauge with the Silca oval with the UCI rainbow behind it. The same pumps earlier in the 90's had a Fimet gauge without the rainbow stripes. Or maybe it was the other way around, but both suppliers were used in that generation.

If I'm not mistaken, they started sourcing gauges from Taiwan around or at the same time as the transition to the plastic pump base. This is probably the same time they licensed the Silca name for two Taiwan-made pumps (the Plus and Piperita).

unworthy1

Well I stand corrected! I had never seen that brandname on any of the Silca pumps I own now (probably at least 8 of various models/ages) or owned and passed along (innumerable). But I have seen that WIKA brandname on other, unrelated to bicycling, equipment made in USA...and so I assumed.