Kommisar89

Bianchigirll knows far more about Bianchis than I do but I suspect that date to be pretty acurate. I've also heard that they stopped using lugs about that same time but I'm not sure about that. What I believe is that at some point in the late 90's most Bianchi production moved offshore to Taiwan - and after that point anything made in Italy was branded "Reparto Corse". There is another site out there that provided some pretty detailed information about where bikes are made that IIRC seemed to be saying that Bianchi might have been welding aluminum frames and finishing/assembling carbon fiber frames in Italy but I don't remember if it mentioned anything about steel frames. When I bought mine in 2002, and I suspect for some years prior to that, the Taiwan frames were built from Reynolds tubing (520 or 631) and equipped with Shimano components while the "Made in Italy" frames were made of Dedacciai tubing and Campagnolo equipped. And labeled "Reparto Corse". Whether you consider that to be real or not I guess depends on how you define Reparto Corse. Clearly "Race Department" would no longer apply as there were any number of bikes pouring out of Bianchi's Italian facilities labeled "Reparto Corse" that were in no way intended as racing machines. I think where Tina and I disagreed was whether a 1997 or so TIG weld steel Dedacciai frame marked "Reparto Corse" is the real thing while a later extremely similar frame is not. AFAIK today they stopped producing anything below the "Hors Catagorie" bikes in Italy so you can't buy a Veloce level bike labeled "Made in Italy" or "Reparto Corse" like you could a few years ago so the issue resolved itself.