Hi all, I could be wrong, have been in the past, but I've seen some drilled Campagnolo items go for better money than the norm, I've been tempted to drill out some stuff and sell it, maybe a polish as well might get better money still...........wayne davidson invers NZ.............it maybe damp but at least I can eat Bluff oysters........ .
Tom Dalton wrote:
> To blatantly rip off the Bikesnob, I think the apocalypse is upon us.
I call your attention to this eBay item:
>
> 280213042748
>
> http://ebay.com/
>
> Bids are up to $127 dollars on this adulterated set of hoodless et of
SR brake levers. No, these are not the really early ones, and even if t
hey were this price seems crazy given that all the anodizing has been pol
ished off by the enterprising seller. Maybe he figures that the typical
eBay buyer of later SR parts is relatively unsophisticated and easily dis
tracted by things that shine brightly. Sadly, it appears that he's right
. Could it be that Mike Kone is correct that there is a booming new ma
rket for late SR and C-Record parts? It sure looks that way to me, and
by no means do I base this only on this one auction. I've recently seen
some late variants of C-Record parts selling for prices I'd associate wit
h first generation Super Record. $200 of an early 90's seat post, $300+
for a late 80's derailleur, $500 for high flange hubs....
>
> The same pattern seems to be emerging with framesets, particularly ru
n of the mill late 80's to 1990's Colnagos. I just don't get it, but it
has me thinking. I guess it's easy for one generation to see the value i
n the nice bikes of their youth, and not see the value in the nice bikes
of later years. We can rationalize with discussions of hand-worked stamp
ed lugs being more pleasing than investment cast, steel being enduring an
d CF fleeting, but in the end I think the best bikes of an era will be pr
ized by the people who grew up drooling over them. This has been discuss
ed at length on this list, and I don't want to restart that discussion.
Even though many of you believe that newer bikes will never have the valu
e, soul or appeal of those from the on-topic era, lets assume for a minut
e that the nicest bikes of an era will always appeal to those who grew up
with them. Well, great, but that still leaves me scratching my head abo
ut people paying so much money for, say,
> Colnagos that emphatically were NOT the nicest bikes of their era. So
me of the surprising eBay sale prices I've seen lately were for bikes tha
t were not even top-of-the-line for the brand in their day. Many high bi
ds are going toward parts that simply are not at all rare. The only conc
lusions I can draw are that there is a new crop of inexpereinced but enth
usiastic collectors emerging, and that the resulting demands are driving
up prices on items that are not particularly rare but are widely admired
and sought after.
>
> The whole thing makes me wonder about that $3600 problematic Pog. Th
e auction winner is an established collector, and I assume he's aware of
the 10+ year time gap between the parts and the frame. In fact, I have t
o assume that he intends to dismantle that eyesore and fit it with approp
riate parts. Maybe he also has a newer Pog that he wants to hang the par
ts on, or perhaps he'll sell them off. No matter, based on his eBay buyi
ng the guy spends whatever he needs to to get what he wants. But that do
esn't explain how this Pog got bid up so high. My guess is that the unde
rbidders were largely clueless about the bike's issues, and were drwn in
by the bling. I'd say there is a good chance they were the same sort of
people who would be lured into bidding $127 on a set of polished brake le
vers. To me, and I think to most experianced collectors, a part with the
anodizing polished off is radically decreased in value. My personal vie
w is that such parts are worth less than
> rough parts with their original finish. Others may feel that conspicu
ous alteration is the second best choice to pristine parts, and perhaps t
hey are not hands-on types and are willing to pay a premium for the labor
of polishing. I suppose this could all be true, but that sure doesn't e
xpalin why anyone would pay well above normal NOS prices for used, polish
ed parts. All I can conclude is that the bidders are clueless. If I see
this kind of thing keep up, I may just have to polish all my semi-rough
SR parts to oblivion and cash in on eBay.
>
> Tom Dalton
> Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, USA