What cloth bar tape?
 

looking for a darker red that doesn't turn pink in a day. searching ebay for cloth tape, there's ...

- avenir's thick
- newbaum's
- serfas
- tressorex
- velox

what do you use and have good luck with? do you treat it or add shellac?

what cloth did mb put on their bars back in the day? this tape has a pretty sheen to it:

http://farm2.staticflickr.com/1342/9...2664856efd.jpg

Motobecane used a lot of faux cloth (plastic) tape BITD. That's possibly why it has a "sheen".
E.g.; this red tape on my '76 GJ below. (It's pretty color-fast though!)

I've used Newbaum's from time to time, specifically their eggplant and maroon - and I would say that those colors are very rich. The look and feel of the cloth is excellent, and they give you a couple of extra inches - but it's still a PITA to wrap.

I've used a lot of Tressostar tape but only in black white and brown. You have to be guarded when you wrap it or you'll come up short - but I still prefer wrapping Tressostar to Newbaums because you can wet it out, and get a much tighter wrap.

I don't use shellac because I don't like the FEEL of it!
Anyway, in your case, it's not going to help if you're looking for that bright red. - Shellac will only darken colors.

http://i254.photobucket.com/albums/h...ubilebarsa.jpg




http://i254.photobucket.com/albums/h...ubilebarsa.jpg

If you want cloth, you want cloth, but I would take a look at the brick red Fizik. Still has a pretty classic look, and the color is spot on. That said, I'm going to put black cloth tape on my Moto Grand Record, and am glad you started this thread.

thanks. your posts and a quick flickr search has weaned me from the shellac idea. it looks good from a distance...

yeah, brick red is hard to find in tape. it's all either red (on the way to pink) or maybe purple. i'm in the process of changing the gr from leather back to red ... somehow...

Yeah, and buying online makes it tough, what with camera's white balance, monitor calibration, etc. I thought I was getting a nice burnt orange from an eBay purchase, and it turned out '80s black-light day-glo valley girl lipstick neon orange. That was sort of a bummer. Not to jack your thread, but if anyone knows of a good darker orange tape (cloth or otherwise) that you've seen in person, maybe you could mention that in your recommendations when you reply to the OP. Good luck with the brick red. I only ever see the bright stuff.

I use Newbaums--because that's what my LBS has. I can't compare it to others, but it is pretty thick and takes shellac well. I don't use as much shellac as some others, I don't like it to become totally glossy.

Niagara Cycle Works has it;
http://www.niagaracycle.com/product_...ucts_id=804505
Newbaum's dark red;
http://www.niagaracycle.com/images/h...s/HDTP1412.jpg

http://www.niagaracycle.com/images/h...s/HDTP1412.jpg
That looks purple on my monitor.

Yeah, that is not "dark red," it's burgundy, and it does look more purple than red. Their regular red is nice, not super neon bright--and darkens with shellac.

Yeah i have that tape shown above, definitely not dark red.

I would recommend the Newbaums tape though, I'm going to use it on another bike as well

that 'dark' red looks pretty good. i bet it will fade better than the regular red.

i've been losing lately when betting though.

I am a bit of a cloth tape fan, myself. That said, the cloth tape used to be very inexpensive. Not anymore, however; I did get a bit lucky a month or so ago. Bought several sets of red, blue and black for $8.00 a set, shipped. I should have bought all that the fellow had. Stupid me...

http://www.mytenspeeds.com/My_TenSpe...andleBar_2.jpg

I have never tried wetting cloth tape, prior to installation. Is it really a good idea to do so? I would hate to ruin a set just to see what happens.

I don't wet it Randy, but I know Auchencrow likes to. I like Newbaum's too, but have only used a couple of colors. No red. It is a bit thicker than most other cloth tapes, which I like. Plus, it is longer. A big advantage in my view.

Perhaps Red 26303, although the Maroon does look like a dark red to me, but it's all subjective I guess.

Here's the colors off the Newbaum's website;

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_OW41hoDyNe...ewb_swatch.jpg

I just bought some tape from Green Grips:

http://www.greengrips.org/

It is nice tape- very cool colors, slightly wider than newbaums or velox. Seems high quality so far.

Wow, they do have a lot of different color choices.

thanks, newengland, for the green grips site -- excellent color choices there...

I tried some Green Grips. While I like their style, their M.O. , I'm afraid I didn't like their tape much. If it had a slightly wider band of adhesive on the back I think it would work better. Just my experience but, I found the narrow, quarter inch band of adhesive on the back served to let the rest of the rather wide, and quite thin, tape distort out of shape while stretching and wrapping. Found it very difficult to work with. They had the closest color to what I was looking for, however, which was very dark green, but I ended up removing it and using dyed Newbaum's. YMMV.

+1 ... :thumb:

Seriously! Whats up with that!?!

Man, all I need is two rolls of black cloth tape, and my LBS wants $4.95 a roll!!! :notamused:

I bought some red Serfas for my Frejus last fall and have been pleased with the color. Link to ebay seller. I didn't really check around price-wise, but his right now comes to about $5.35 a roll w/shipping. He claims it to be longer than a normal roll, but I didn't find that I had a lot extra when I was done.

I've had good luck wetting Tressostar, it gives the tape just enough stretch to keep the wrinkles out and doesnt seem to affect the adhesive at all. I use one of those spritz bottles and give it a fine mist every few inches.

+1 on the Fizik microtex tape ....colours are great and its very thin which IMHO looks better on vintage bars.

boy root, do tell us of this dying process in which you have perfected. chop chop.

$7.02??

We like the Fizik here, too.

I just used Newbaum's for the first time this weekend. I disagree about it being difficult to wrap with although I don't have any other cloth tape experience to compare it to. I felt that the Newbaum's was extremely forgiving (I had to unwrap half a bar and when I wrapped it back up again, all the glue held with no problems) and didn't bunch up, like my LBS said the others did. I agree with the others about it being a little longer. What a nice luxury to have!
Also, as an FYI, my LBS said that they only recommend black because every other color gets dirty extremely fast. I wanted gray or light blue but black worked just fine. I'll be getting shots of the wrap job within the next day or two and work on posting them here.