I bet you're right. Artisan frame builders seem to be staying in business (Columbine, Bilenky, Bohemian, etc). Tommasini still offers fully lugged frames, too.

If they built a retro styled bike as you suggest, AND did not equip it with modern shifters? They might sell three of them. Maybe.

Agreed.

I found a perfectly nice Veloce gruppo a few weeks ago.

Bought out a gentleman's garage full of Campy goodies.

This may be a frame that would work on, or maybe not.

I tracked one (Strada) down in Mpls. and I want to look at the frame in person.

Will do so tomorrow on our Sunday "stroll" through the the western Metro area.

I expect to find a Surly Pacer dressed up as a Masi Strada, and that's fine if the price is right.

My first thought. Turns out they're revamped Dia-Compes, complete with the practical - but not necessarily pretty - Q/R system of the C&V era:



https://www.wiggle.co.uk/dia-compe-dc...-brake-levers/

The overall look of the MASI is commendable (especially with the gum hoods) but I'm not entirely impressed with the lever. Who would have thought that Dia-Compe's lackluster design would have become the de-facto norm for a semi-budget, Italian (granted, in name only) road bike today?

Oh - and the combination of non-aero levers with a threadless stem is simply vulgar.

-Kurt

I agree completely. Masi should have opted for a 1" steerer and quill stem for this particular model.

Problem is, they likely don't care what we think.

They went down their "production" checklist and this is their product.

It's not like they had a focus group in for a chat!

They wanted to approximate a certain era and feel, and this is probably the best they could do at this point.

That one does look nice, apart from the horrible down tube decal (maybe it would peel off easily?)

On the contrary. To begin with these models wouldn't exist if Haro didn't believe the market could sustain sales of these neo-retro designs. Secondly, using non-aero, drop-bar brake levers on any production bike today is a huge flashing red light indicating form over function - those levers are going to be a significant sacrifice in braking power, even when paired with dual pivots. That "checklist" makes the chancy assumption that the target buyer for this MASI is willing to sacrifice said performance specifically for the classic non-aero, gum-hood look - folks like us.

Even a retrogrouch such as I (I still don't accept anything other than C-Record levers in the aero department) would have been very skeptical about that decision. If I were to market a new bike, it would be spec'ed with aero levers, regardless of the styling consequences. Safety and performance first when dealing with cheap suppliers from Japan, et. al.; in my opinion.

Heck, most of my flip bikes get converted to aero levers if I find the supplied Weinmann/Dia-Compe setup doesn't perform to my satisfaction. Likewise, all Raleigh Sports that I flip have their steel brakes swapped out for Tektro 800A's, if the original steel calipers refuse to center properly (offset wear on the return springs, generally).

-Kurt

You can't put downtube shifters on it, and it looks like any other mid-range, out-of-the-box lugged frame made today - complete with Soma fork.

Get a load of the "60" degree marking on the lower lug on the MASI site - they didn't even take 10 seconds to file that off the lug before painting. Nothing went into the build of this frame. No effort whatsoever. It would have been impossible to throw together a frame that would look half this good 30 years ago, if it weren't for investment cast lugs.

No, I take that back. Strip the paint off of this thing, and you'll find a modern Fuji S10-S.

-Kurt

My LBS stocked them but it's only special order now. They told me their delivery was spotty. The bikes themselves look great. The steel frame cyclocross bike looked great.

Would pimp...hard!

While the bike looks nice, the skinny fork tubes with the fat spacers don't look proportional. It should have a quill stem.

In the old days, most of the price of the bike was the bike and much of money ended up in the hands of people that touched the bike. These days, not the case. If Masi wants to retail that bike for $2,000 the frame had better be $15.00 or less at their production cost.

From where I stand, there is a market for simple bike designs. I built this for myself. I am going to replace it soon with a very compact aluminum frame and then with a lugged frame (might as well collect my own bikes too since I get them cheap)

I don't know a lot about the fitting part of bicycles. I really just figure out structural issues. The racer kids who buy most of my bikes thinks building this frame was a mistake from a style perspective. He figures it should have been fully compact with a sloping top tube or been much taller seat/head tube with a properly flat stem. I do love the Columbus nivacrome tube and the steel fork rides very nicely compared to carbon.

Just so you know, I don't think any of this new junk belongs in the C&V forum regardless of what it looks like. The one exception would be sympathetic reproduction items.

I put this up here, not as some type of contribution but for two simple reasons. (1) I like my pretty bike (2) People will see it and may want to buy one. Everyone gets to be bad once once in a while.







27 203 by frankthewelder, on Flickr

Nice bike.

...except you should flip the stem and lose the blue cages. Go chrome.....

Oops, wrong forum!