Actually, in my garage right now I have many handlebars all hung from the wall, being stored until restorations are completed. One thing I have noticed was that almost none of them were "worthy" of installation on what some would call a "Carlsbad MASI".
- On several GB bars, one drop is fully 1" longer than the drop on the other side. I'm sure this is difficult to see this fault if the bike is built up. GB was particularly egregious in this respect, ALL FOUR of my bars have this defect and they placed their stamp on that 1" extra extension to ensure that the 1" extension "Would always be there" !!! (no hacksaws allowed!)
- On some cinelli bars, some of them quasi-NOS with crest, they don't lay flat on the washing machine. I'm pretty sure it's not the washing machine's fault.
- Other bars such as SR or Dawes or Raleigh have what I would call "marks from the maker's file ..." (figuratively)
In other words, you might construct a perfect bicycle frame, but then the variance in the hand-made components might make a travesty of that perfectly constructed frame !!!
- Don Gillies
San Diego, CA