robertorolfo

What does that mean, "to say Ferrari is not Enzo is the hight of ignorance"? Not sure what you are trying to say there.

Getting back to Le Mans, this all started with a discussion of modern day racing, since Porsche doesn't have the guts to even attempt F1. To get around that fact, you went back 50 years to start talking Le Mans, and continue to claim that Ferrari thought it was more important than F1. A claim which I see no evidence for. Sure, it was a big race in the day, but F1 was a bigger series. And, getting back to modern times, I can tell you that in current day Italy F1 thoroughly eclipses Le Mans by a scale of about 100 to 1.

Lastly, your taste in cars is growing more suspect with every comment you make. I'm going to start posting pictures soon...

I was referring to the claims about sports motorcycles being bunk. For decades now there have been those talking about 600cc Japanese sportsbikes having better 'numbers' than the Ducati equivalent (specifically the 748 or 749 back in the day), despite costing so much less. Heck, I even drank the kool-aid myself at one point and got a Honda CBR600 when my Aprilia was stolen (long story). Suffice to say, within a year I realized that the 'numbers' didn't tell the whole story. Not even close. As fast as the Honda was, it was equally uninspiring and poorly conceived (routine maintenance was an afterthought for the designers).

So yes, you can compare the bikes you have and say they are similar in performance, weight... whatever, but sometimes that just doesn't tell the whole story. That's what this thread is about, no?

mackgoo

What's not to love?

sheddle

I forgot who mentioned it, but Italians do make the best saddles. Yum.

Brooks saddles are for *holds nose* touring bikes

P!N20

The chain on the small ring.

sheddle

I'd post more pics of my Professional but it is sadly out of commission temporarily after I decided that a great tire choice for a bike that's going to be ridden on broken glass filled city streets frequently was the Vittoria Corsa.

T-Mar

You asked, so here goes: poor indexing, heavy and mediocre brakes, hard to find Allen key size for brake cable anchor. left hand threaded crank extractor, brittle crankarm self extractor bolts, dedicated dust cap remover, rims that are susceptible to cracking. And isn't that the year of the crack prone paint?

Mad Honk 

Wait a minute! Isn't that an Atlanta built German branded car in the garage? Something is not right here... Smiles, MH

jamesdak 

RobbieTunes

Green

RobbieTunes

Oh. The only Italian motorcycle I’d ever seen was a Harley, until some poor broke Duke student talked me into giving him an Ironman frame, then rolled up on a Ducati...(we still bonded over our dislike for Tarheel Nation)

I had plenty of Japanese bikes before there were ‘sport bikes.” And a Low Rider and now a Sportster. So I don’t know Jack about sport bikes.

mackgoo

Spoken like a man that's experience is from what he's read.
Syncro II is dialed in click, click, click and add three more.
I use one finger with the deltas and I've never had a need for any more brake.
The rims are close to 40 years old.
I know righty tighty, lefty loosey is a challenge so to go against that would cause someones head to explode.
Cranks, 40 years old.
What do you have against patina?
It is what it is. I do feel for you though.

mackgoo

Funny you should say that. I have a Swallow on my Mega Tube.



Something about Italian Titanium too.

sheddle

It's perhaps not completely period appropriate but I put a Concor Light on the Vega.



This is Italian, right? I mean, it's called a Competizione!
​​

RiddleOfSteel

...and it's older brother, the Vittoria Open Corsa Evo (CX). But hey, I am a seeming fool and run both those as well on city streets. Minimal flats, thankfully. The ride is great, though, isn't?!?

sheddle

Corners like a fighter jet, man
​​​​.

Old Fireleg

Is the 308 so 80s?
Hombre, the Lancia Delta and his companions were the 80s. Stand next to the 308 with a Lotus Esprit and you’ll see what the ’80s were like.
Flock of Seagulls...
The ’70s were the age of tilt lamps. After the Pantera, it was impossible to come out again with a 246GT. It was in this environment that he had to create something evergreen, Pininfarina succeeded. (Look at the grids above the wheels, he also felt he had to do something.)

Elegance? For me, a sports car should be sexy and run in a standing position too, for elegance there was the Jaguar XJ6. If you’re going to a banquet, you’ll choose Audrey Hepbourn, but in bed, a ’68 Lollobrigida or Raquel Welch seems more of a better option. Anyway, it’s hard to be elegant with red painting, look for a rare metallic brown 308, a new world opens up in front of you. Even the sculpturally beautiful 250 Lusso does not show its beautiful lines in red only in pearl white/gray or black.

mech986 

If you mean headquartered now in Atlanta, yes, but Porsche Boxster and Boxster S models were built in Finland under contract by Valmet Automotive, with additional production at the former Karmann factory in Osnabruk. They are quite capable mid-engined sports cars and have nicely evolved over the past 23 years since introduction.

mstateglfr 

Many of the first generation of US builders were over in England learning from established builders. To claim Masi basically taught all US builders is quite the revision.

As for your comments on ride quality- the geometry you prefer may not be the geometry someone else prefers. So while you prefer Italian geometry(I hesitate to even acknowledge that as a style since there is so much variety in reality), thst doesnt make Italian bikes better.

A bike with tange tubing can ride the same as a bike with columbus tubing when the geometry and tubing specs are the same. claiming you can tell a difference goes against what actual builders, industry reps, and tubing companies say.

Its cool that you like 'italian geometry' though.

mstateglfr 

Brooks is Italian now.

mstateglfr 

Pfft, ugly cuz the tube valves are angled. You may as well toss the bike in the garbage can.

...joking...about tossing it, not about the valves.

kunsunoke 

I never said Faliero Masi taught all US builders, because such was not the case. My point was that road bikes up until that point were quite different, with slack geometry - and sometimes non-attention to details, or joinery. American builders tended to focus on track bikes, and they had more business than they could handle. The Italian influences were eventually adopted as standards - and Italian parts were specified on the high-end offerings.

Yes. To each, his own. Some people do race. And some other people appreciate what Italian geometry and ride quality offers. There are a lot of those people in the world, not just in Italy.

Recall that the question was about why Italian bikes get more love. Love is subjective. If you like Brit bikes better, good for you.

The key word there was "when". Geometry and tubing specifications are usually different. The closest the Japanese ever got to Columbus SL was Ishiwata 022, and the Columbus SL remains slightly firmer and also stronger. Tange promoted Prestige as the best CrMo in the world - and it was good stuff - but the heat treatment and the metallurgy make it stiffer, stronger and firmer at similar geometries - often resulting in a harsher ride. Bruce Gordon website link on tubing

Some people like a harsh ride, as evidenced by the success of Cannondale and Trek's bonded aluminum bikes back in the day.

Thank you.

mstateglfr 

There is no 'Italian geometry'. It varied from brand to brand and model to.model. Even within a.model, it varied by size.
Look at the link earlier in the thread that.compares some Italian and Japanese race bikes from '84 or whenever- the Italian bikes have varying geometry.
This completely negates your argument about geometry.
HTA, STA, bb drop, chainstay length, fork rake etc- all varied in Italian race bikes.


As for the Bruce Gordon link, two tubes of equal buttong will feel and perform the same. Columbus tubing, which i have on multiple bikes in both old and new forms, is not magical and performs the same as any other tubing with the same butting.



Italian brands brands appeal to them because bikes from Italy have been romanticized. Winners used to ride Italian brands and many of the brands were relatively small. Those two things create a romanticized view. Small batch building and winning = demand and a desire to be a fanboy.

robertorolfo

Writing this might be the biggest jinx of all time, but here goes: I've been riding and commuting on Vittoria Corsa G's in NYC for over a year now, and have only gotten one flat from a small strand of steel cable. I was expecting much worse, but figured it would be worth it to enjoy the ride quality (and I could always hop on the subway and fix flats at home if I needed to). I've been really surprised at their toughness. And let's not forget that the tanwalls also look amazing.

It is true that doing any sort of work on the engine is essentially impossible? I remember hearing that you could barely even see it, but those were the early models...

People have always been drawn to winning equipment, and I wouldn't say that necessarily makes them "fanboys."

Trakhak

Fanboys: those whose enthusiasms differ from mine.

kunsunoke 

Those geometries varied for other bikes, too. This concept is called "sizing". Head and seat tube angles are still steeper for Italian bikes. Riding compartments are biased forward as a result. Again, I'm not the only person that notices this stuff.

I suggest you re-read the article. The gist was that, given identical geometry and identical tubing configurations, the Bruce Gordon builds had different rides. Evaluators' preference was clear, and it was for SL over Prestige. The article goes on to state that gauging down the Prestige might have helped with the ride quality. This make sense to those of us that own bikes made from Prestige and understand how they are built (with heat treating).

I am going to have to disagree with you rather strongly here. We have the aforementioned example, whereby the Columbus SL outperformed Tange Prestige at similar geometries, butting and gauge. The Tange was likely much stronger than the SL, but rode more harshly - and would have been closer had it been in thinner gauge. Going in the opposite direction - Columbus SL tubing is likely to provide substantially better ride quality vs. 2040 high-carbon steel at the same butting and at the same geometry. The 2040 would be far too flexible for purpose at those gauges - and likely hazardous to ride - as it would be prone to failure. It's one of the reason that what we refer to as "high tensile" or more pejoratively as "gas pipe" was thicker and seldom butted. Additional mass is required as compensation for lower tensile strength, flexural strength, stiffness, etc. One needs only to check manufacturer's technical sheets.

Butting and external diameter are not the only factors that count. Metallurgy does as well. This is as obvious as the nose on your face to those of us that practice engineering. The steels used in racing bicycles have different amounts of carbon, different amounts of transition metals (notably, chromium, manganese, molybdenum and nickel) for alloying purposes and in some cases secondary treatment steps (such as heat-treating for Tange Prestige).

If that's the case, then we'd have to count a fairly substantial number of American bike builders among the fanboys - because they tended to use nothing but Campagnolo NR and SR on their high end bikes up until the late 1980s. They also favored Columbus SL or SLX - and, later, Neuron (Nivacrom).