Classic & Vintage - Fire-sale Pinarello: safe or not?

I double-posted this to the CL finds thread, but I think it poses an interesting issue regarding fire damage to brazed joints: he says it's straight and all the braze-ons are intact, so maybe it didn't get hot enough to warp steel, but if it got hot enough to melt aluminum handlebars and cranks, could the joints be damaged?
Potential death-trap, or ready-to-sandblast and powdercoat Pinarello bargain? You decide...
http://sfbay.craigslist.org/sfc/bik/305383808.html

(I'm reminded of viewing the remains of some of my neighbors garages who lost everything in various SoCal brush fires: lumps of metal where cars used to be...fires can get HOT, baby!)

Probably just hardened the steel. :) Heat is used to draw the brazing into the joint, not remove it, but I'm not a framebuilder. That aside, you did notice that he didn't pull the crank or headset - potential issues there.

maybe for .47 cents!

looks like it got pretty hot, look at the crank. It might be warped from the heat too. i wouldn't waste my time... personally.

EDIT: oops, he said it isn't warped but I would be skeptical.

Given that the guy admits to picking it out of the post-fire trash, he's pretty cheeky seeking $100 for the thing. I'd say it's worth the experiment for $20, not for $100.

Neal

I saw the same CL add and thought the same thing as nierner - for $20 it might make a fun project, but $100 is way to much for something that is potentially worthless (not to mention dangerous).

looks like it got pretty hot, look at the crank. It might be warped from the heat too. i wouldn't waste my time... personally.

EDIT: oops, he said it isn't warped but I would be skeptical.


That bike was in a bad fire for sure. It melted the Aluminum cranks. I wonder if the solder in the lug joints were affected as well. I wouldn't use it especially for 100 bucks.

Too me, if you're going to ask any kind of real money for something like this you should do all the work. Pull all the parts, get it sand-blasted, then take it to a frame builder and have it inspected. As-is, I agree $25 is all I'd throw at it on a bet.

When you read about how careful professional frame builders are about not over-heating a tube with just a localized torch, my gut feeling is this thing is going to have some issues.

man that looks bad

I remember the Oakland Hills fire - it was a firestorm, fueled by dry brush, Eucalyptus trees, and lots and lots of houses. It burned hot and furious, and layed waste to an entire area.

I wouldn't give 2 cents for that piece of scrap.

I remember the Oakland Hills fire - it was a firestorm, fueled by dry brush, Eucalyptus trees, and lots and lots of houses. It burned hot and furious, and layed waste to an entire area.

I was just a kid, but I remember my teacher bringing in a hardened pool of metal after the fire - It started out as handlebars from a motorcycle.

Yeah, it was a bad day, I remember it too.
So it's clearly the concensus that none of us are going to buy this, and the seller's asking way too much. But just to play devil's advocate (he told me I could) Aluminum melts at around 660C, Brass and Bronze at around 900-1000C, and Silver-bearing solder(brazing rod) about the same as as Bronze. Given that there's no evidence of any brazing material having leaked or flowed out of any of the joints (that I see) and if the steel tubing is truely un-warped, then this should be safe to ride, right? The devil assumes that the bike never got heated above 660C, and the devil he knows about fire! ;)
edit: the devil's encyclopedia also informs us that steel heated to around 750C is cherry red, and I'd guess that would be enough to take any temper out of a tempered steel element, so...I'm leaning toward the "it ain't worth sh*t" camp.

The steel has probably become annealed. Annealing is done to soften the metal and make it more workable. It's done by heating the steel cherry red for a while and then letting it cool slowly. That's probably just what happened to that frame.

You might be able to make a nice piece of wall art out of it.

Let's look at if from another angle. Suppose you get the frame for free. How much labor and money would be involved prepping, painting, and doing all the various jobs and collecting bits to make it "right"?

Just so you can say you have a Pinarello?

Better to fish for a decent frameset on eBay, methinks - cheaper in the long run, and you'll have a better bike.

Regarding the temps the frame was subjected to - I seem to remember talking with some firemen that say a common house fire gets into the 1500 degree range. I'll bet the Oakland fire was hotter than that.

It's worth nothing.

Despite the claim that all braze-on's are intact, a brazeon for the rear brake cable is missing. I'd say it's worth a six pack (domestic).

Says it still has the head tube badge. Now that might be worth something to a person rebuilding a good Pinerello who needs a badge to complete the job. Find out what that would be worth.

Despite the claim that all braze-on's are intact, a brazeon for the rear brake cable is missing. I'd say it's worth a six pack (domestic).
Good eye!

Well, looking closely at this frame I would doubt that the steel in the frame ever approached "Cherry Red" from a heat index scale. If that had been the case then all the alloy parts should have turned into a puddle of molten aluminum. However, the stem shows no signs of this level of heat, and did not even start to bend. the handlebars, most likely thinner and more of a pure aluminum composition, did break off. Same with the pedals, but the cranks are still mostly there, so the fire may have approached the 660C level, but most likely not 750C, or there should be nothing at all left of any of the alloy parts.

This bike is toast! In a fire thats burning at the 1500 degree range, which, as pointed out in an earlier reply, is the temp of most house fires, you cant depend on anything being "OK" to use again! When you see pics in the news of people trying to "salvage what they can" out of their burned out homes, its because they remember seing the items just a day, or sometimes a few minutes ago looking shiny and new, that memory tricks them into thinking that I "need" to save this or that, when in reality, its all just trash, its a sad thing but true none the less, I, after serving almost ten years in the Phila Fire Dept, wouldnt give that frame a second look, except, as stated earlier, as a possible sweet piece of art work on my wall ($20.00 tops) and you might be able to sell it for more than your $20.00 investment to some art nut! LOL!

The fire was hot enough to cause the steel adjusting screws in the dropouts to sag and bend.

That's hot enough to have compromised the brazing.

And that blue color showing on the left rear drop isn't paint, that is from high heat.

It's toast.

with free time and as an exercise, it might be interesting to rebuild with "fresh" parts and ride it. The heating effect really depends on how it cooled. It would be fun to set it up on an alignment table first, what "looks" ok may not be. I would assume the heating was not uniform, another problem.

I would suspect all alloy parts., they are trash.

Just another Burning man prop.

RUN.. seems to me that if it was a Trek or anything other than a "magic Iti. -bike..this chat wouldn't exist ..crap is crap...Italian -made over priced toasted bikes are crap just the same..buy it for a dollar.. hang on the wall as a conversation piece. Hey..the present owner.. NO insurance ??

It would still be valid for me. My purpose (beyond just stirring the pot) was to see what people thought about a frame subjected to a housefire: how much heat would it take to compromise the Bronze (or) Silver brazing, and the steel to render a frame unsafe? (and the question applies to Italian and any other steel/lugged frames). I think our answer is that a housefire can easily reach 1500 (about 815C) degrees, and that's too much to leave a frame such as this in "sound condition". I'm sure the guy who's SELLING this thinks it's worth offering cause it's a Pinarello (or WAS) and that the market in SFBay might bear his fantasy...I know I was never considering it, and most of the BFers wouldn't offer him 20% of his asking price.
And HE didn't have fire insurance, he just dumpster dived for it...
I think we can let this thread die, now :)

Very amusing he would try to sell that for $100.. kinda sad too. I bet all the braze-ons would snap off once any minor pressure is applied to them, I bet the derailleur hanger would snap off too. Wether the frame and fork would hold up who knows.. but I know steel looses its strength and becomes brittle once its heated. I would offer $1 tops maybe just cause I like the charred look.

I bet that stem is stuck in the steerer!

I would definitely pay $20 for it but I would definitely not ride it. Even if it is safe, the characteristics of the frame that made it nice are probably forever altered by the heat and an inferior bike would probably perform better anyway.

There's probably someone who will pay $100, but I hope that someone doesn't plan to ride it.

Seems the toasted Pinarello story was the hook for his "new" Bottecchia:

http://sfbay.craigslist.org/sfc/bik/306250260.html

Some really go to an effort to paint a picture with the advertising copy. Does it work?

Hmmm, this guy writes way too much copy, and I'm one to talk!
Plus, it's a nice Bottecchia and all, but $975 for an Aelle-tubed/Victory-equipt bike? He's asking too much, Greg Lemond clippings or not.

Bear with me:
I saw an episode of Mythbusters recently (filmed in San Fran) where the were testing whether it was possible to make a hammer explode by hitting it against another hammer or an anvil. They had a difficult time until...
They heated them up to cherry red. This caused them to become brittle.
So even if the brazing is intact, the elasticity of the steel has been reduced making it much more likely to fail catastrophically.

TOAST