the beef

So I've been playing around with all sorts of things lately in an effort to fit my bike to myself. I recently bit the bullet and traded stems with a Craigslister (My Forte Pro for his Deda Zero) to get a better angle. It's great now!

The problem is, it's silver! Woe is OCP!

At first, I was thinking about spray painting it black. But that would lose me major points, as well as a +6 in tackiness. That made me come up with an idea.. why not replace my bar tape? I could get a new color. I could even get white bar tape! Yeah! Or shiny metallic silver! I've got a white frame with silver components and a black fade near the head tube.

I did the only natural thing and took pictures to ask you guys. What do you think would look the best?
>>>>> Before just saying that it looks good already, think about what it might look like with the other colors. <<<<<



P.S. My mom came over today. I was explaining to her my dilemna about the need for color-coordinated-ness when she remarked "you bikers care about that stuff? what a bunch of women.."

dauphin

pics?

the beef

Just a few moments late! They're up now.

edit: put up a picture without flash. the one with flash sort of made everything shinier than actual.

***Butch***

Black.

hmai18

Stick with black tape, but get a silver seat post and ditch the black alloy spacers for silver ones as well.

the beef

Alloy spacers?!!!! I'm offended! These are full high-modulus monoweave carbon fibre spacers imported from the finest halls on the tallest mountains of Germany. The nerve of people these days..

dauphin

first of all...ditch the seat bag...and find a white garage door, for the love of god....

hmai18

Then send 'em back to the Fatherland and get white carbon spacers

dauphin

btw...you need something..anything...celeste on that thing...

the beef

Hah I know. Arg. This sticker on the fork is all I've got.

jyossarian

Ummm...I voted celeste w/o actually reading what you wrote. Now that I've seen the pics and read it, I'd say trade for a black stem.

And next time, put the chain on the big ring/small cog combo, remove the seat bag and put a cat somewhere in the pic.

dauphin

the cat would be a nice touch....

urbanknight

Black. Celeste would only look good if it had something matching elsewhere (saddle or tires maybe). I'm actually reducing my celeste on the green machine. I was going to wait 6 months until it was time to change the bar tape, but my recent crash pushed the date earlier. The tape will now be dark blue to match the saddle, and the tires are soon to be all black.

PhilThee

I'm gunna suggest a few changes.

Black stem to match the paint and spacers.
Silver seat post and clamp to match the paint.
Silver/gray bar tape.

To me the black tires on black rims is a bit too much black in one area.Especially when part of the frame and forks are black already.Maybe add some color there?
Perhaps go with the Gray Michelin PRO2 Race tires.

Dead Roman

One must first examine what is wrong with this picture.

While your pedals are at the correct angle for dicplaying a bicycle. Your seat bag is causing issues for many a viewer.

Also, your inner tube stems are not facing the same direction.

Your not on the big ring/small ring combo.

No bike should be displayed wiht platform pedals.


To defeat ones enemy, one must learn his ways to exploit his weaknesses.
Come to the dark side beef.

cyclezealot

TO some extent, depends on the color of the bike.

phantomcow2

I think that your bike looks nice with the creme and then black theme. If you could get creme colored tape, that would be cool. But I doubt you will find that, so then I would say stick to black/gray

deanp

Black stem.

baj32161

Also not to be hyper-critical....you could have taken a better photo. It is difficult to tell what colours are what in that photo.

EventServices

Yellow. or Orange.

Make a statement of your own.

the beef

Dammit, I was hoping nobody would notice those platforms! I even tried to make them blend in with the black chainstays to be less obvious..

I had them on because my commuter bike broke and I had to ride the italian steed to class for a few days.. but the LOOKs are back on now. Rest assured.

SkyeC

Worry much about your bike still being there when you came out?

Throw some celeste tape on there, what kind of Bianchi doesn't have more than a fork sticker's worth of celeste?

dekalbSTEEL

Check your seatpost. Isn't there a line of Celeste on there?

Coyote2

You're running a triple crankset and you're worried about the color of your bar tape? That's like a 400 pound man who gets hair plugs to make himself more attractive.

Nachoman

That's cold blooded.