A well meaning friend recently asked me if I wanted "an old Raleigh Lenton", in her words. I said sure and was having visions of a wonderful old club racing style bike.

When it was finally dropped off, it was found to be a 1981 Raleigh step-thru 21" 5 speed with 26 inch wheels and lots of rust. I thanked her for thinking of me and graciously accepted it anyway. It did have an SR stem I needed and it does still ride and can be sold.

Have any other once proud names found their way onto lower end bikes?

Specialized Sirrus was this....



And became this.



Not a bad bike, but nothing like the original.

A lot of names were tossed around- for Schwinn- the Super Sport, Superior, Voyageur names have graced 'among the top of the line' frames and low end bikes.

Of course, there's also the Trek 720... The king of all touring bikes and the middle of the road hybrid.

I think some of it has to do with keeping ownership and trademark for the name. Aside from the familiarity of the name.

BIKES DIRECT! lol, I can't really complain, BD has decent stuff. And pretty much everything Pacific Cycles has gotten their hands on.

Very nice Sirrus. I think the Allez use to be top and now middle.

Yeah, don't google-image New Schwinn Voyageur unless you want to have a sadz

Trek 720 is another one. Two completely different bikes.

RRA (Raleigh Record Ace) might be the worst, with at least five completely different bikes over the years... Reynolds 531 or gaspipe; single speed (fixie), IGH, or derailleur; English, French, or Japanese components... The mind boggles.

Or a Specialized Expedition - much like the Trek, it is a cruel parody of what once was.

The old bike spoke to dreams of wide unrolling horizons, ending at the sea. The new sells no dreams, offers no visions. It's an appliance and while it maybe isn't a bad appliance, it colors all the previous images not with sepia, but with beige.

Masi Gran Criterium, then and now:





That fork is just... wrong.

Yeah the Expedition is the one that gets me. It's a grandma and grandpa hybrid bike now, not the sweet full on touring rig of lore. It's a great riding bike, don't get me wrong, but it is mystical no longer. There's been a million Voyageurs through the years, and they ranged from 40 pound gaspipers, to decent touring rigs with Deore. Whenever someone tells me they have a Voyageur they want to get rid of, it's almost always the lower end heavier models.,,,,BD

Looks the same to me. Unless you're talking about threadless.

The original has a graceful rake that extends all the way to the dropout; the modern version has an abrupt bend about midway up the blade with a long straight section leading to the dropout. Yeah, picky, I know, but it shows some care taken in the original and mass production in the modern one.

And the threadless headset is another thing...

Not to mention FSA and Shimano. Not that there's anything wrong with them, just NOT on a GC.,,,,BD

Look harder.......

+1 on the fork tapering midway, just so wrong.

Schwinn, Dawes, Motobecane (though some are still quite nice), Raleigh (ups and down's), Mongoose, Diamondback, Masi. Not to mention the trek assimilated brands that were either dumbed down or flat disappeared (Lemond, Gitane, Bontrager, etc). Seeing some of the crap at the LBS, Trek and Specialized make the list also. That's without even going into the genus or species.

It saddens me to see what has happened to Legnano.

Before:


After:

The horror...

Oh yeah! The 'Motobecane Vent Noir' springs immediately to mind; neither is it a true Motobecane, or a Vent Noir!

A friend of mine had one of these for a commuter and the ride was so harsh, he was actually glad when it got stolen off of his front porch.

Now he rides an old Triumph; it's not much of a bike, but it is pretty cool in a living dinosaur/ old Schwinn kind-of-way.

Shchwinn is the worst: Schwinn Volare went from this:


To this:

This is less offensive then a lot of the other new bikes with old pedigrees, at least it is lugged steel, conversely, most of the new "masi" bikes are truly hideous.

Yeah, I was wondering about the complaint, too. That modern Masi is a heck of a lot more attractive than a lot of it's current competition, and at least tries to play in the same ballpark as the vintage version. Sure, the components are what kills the look, but that's modern technology.

Raleigh Clubman

1949



to this




and now

I actually think the latest Clubman reboot is one of the classier attempts at re-use.

They've ruined the Voyageur name, too.

Do tell. I agree that they're fairly classy bikes. No longer a sport-bike, like the originals, but certainly one of my top commuter recommendations (for those times when friends ask me about taking up commuting by bike).

And while taste is a purely subjective matter, that Masi is actually a pretty sweet, thoroughly modern interpretation on the original. It would still look hot with a Campy gruppo on it; I wouldn't feel in any way awkward about riding one. That is, if I were into Masis.

As for the Voyager... is there a sigh that can truly convey such bourgeois disappointment?