I don't think "collector's item" is the way to describe a le tour, no matter where it was made. And no le tours were "electro-forged", as per the Sheldon Brown link, they were all lugged construction, from the earliest (from the early '70's) to the ones made in the early nineties. The electro forged Schwinns are the Varsities, Continentals, etc............My understanding of the year or two that le tours were made in Chicago (very late '70's or very early '80's) is that they brought production to Chicago because the cost of labor in Japan had spiked quite a bit. Don't get me wrong, I really like Schwinn le tours, I ride one almost daily..........but a collector's item? Nope.