On 06/08/2018 1:02 PM, jbeattie wrote:
On Saturday, August 4, 2018 at 5:24:37 PM UTC-7, Sir Ridesalot wrote:
I was looking at the Mountain Equipment Co-Op site for tires and a cassette for a 700C hybrid that I'm tuning up for a friend. Whilst on the site I saw 26" tire for $240.00 CDN. Vee Tire Co Snowshoe XL Studded 26" Tire https://www.mec.ca/en/product/5047-2...ded-26%22-Tire Btw the tire is made in Thailand.

Then I saw a 12 speed cassette 10 -50 teeth for $611.00 CDN! https://www.mec.ca/en/product/5053-7...Speed-Cassette

What gives with these prices? Car tires are not nearly that expensive and I bet motorcycle tires cost less too.

Baffled by these prices.

Cheers

You want ridiculous . . . sorry, Andrew, but really? http://www.bikeattack.com/bianchi-eroica-sale/ MSRP $4K on sale for only $3,700 -- for Dia-compe CP brakes and a knock-off three-spider crank of yore that I wouldn't have bought back in the "pre-1987" era, which is apparently the index point for "old." https://magazine.bikesoup.com/bianchi-leroica


This frame looks like something from the '60s, however, and certainly pre-77-ish when most of the manufacturers started trending towards braze-on TT cable guides. The old style cable clips allow you to snag your wool shorts on little bolt-ends. Always a feature I liked. My son saw the brake cables and worried about strangulation hazard, but I told him that back in the days of yore, us hard men accepted that risk.

I love the bike soup article:

"it's not being geeky and pretentious about vintage mechanics or a manufacturing process of a time gone by, it's about getting into the spirit of a style of racing that is seemingly far-removed from what we have now. It's a handsome sort of riding where pastries were as important as the climbs and style was as abundant as the passion. Long live Eroica events, and bikes like the Bianchi L'Eroica, for keeping the spirit of those legends and their endurances alive. It may be a new bike, but the smile it creates is as old as the sport itself."

Pffff. I about blew my coffee out. WTF? Racing has always been about hacking a lung -- it certainly wasn't about looking good and eating pastries because pastries were as important as the climbs, at least not when I started in the '70s. You wore a bunch of wooly stuff because that's what was on the market or what was sold as mandatory team gear. You rode Italiano frames with BBs that wanted to unscrew, friction shifting crap, nail-on cleats and then went out and beat yourself to death unless you were that genetic freak who made it look easy. I think the bikesoup people are smoking something.

-- Jay Beattie.


I don't know. I bought a Bianchi Volpe around that time for $800. In
today's dollars, depending on how you calculate it, that's around $2000
today.