John, I think you were absolutely justified and showed great restraint. If the seller thought you were mistaken, he could have continued. If he overreacted, that's his problem.
Regards,
Jerry Moos
John wrote:
> I was high bid on the Campy SR 1977 rear der NOS being offered on eBay.
>
> http://ebay.com/
>
> I then noticed Brad Stockwell's query to this group regarding the pulley cages, (Vol
> 1. #127 message #2) and I also heard from a couple of other experts with Campy- and
> the conclusion that I came up with was that the correct pulley cages for a 1977 Campy
> SR rear der should be the older Nuovo Record style with steel pulley cage bolts. This
> is all shown in Campy catalog #17.
>
> So, after coming to this conclusion, I retracted my bid- which is pretty serious
> stuff. eBay requires that the retractor give an explanation (it shows up on the bid
> history). I tried over and over again to compose a 80 character explanation that
> wouldn't screw the seller, and at the same time not make me look like a schmuck for
> bailing out. This wasn't easy. I ended up saying what I thought, "I believe that the
> pulley cages/bolts are incorrect".
>
> As a result of my retraction, the seller promptly canceled the auction claiming that I
> tainted it. Nine other bidders were then out of the action.
>
> I'd be pissed too, if I were the seller, but hey, there just seems to be too much
> question about what's correct here, and too often, I've seen someone "put together" a
> part that had something stolen from it years earlier. In bike shops this happens all
> the time. There's no malice, I can't pay collector prices for a part that has a
> questionable detail.
>
> On the flip side, I've been around long enough to know that there are lots of little
> Campy mysteries, so who knows, maybe they made some SR rear ders in '77 with late
> style cages, and '78 SR rears with early style cages...
>
> I'd appreciate it if I could hear from those of you who have experience with these
> '75, '76, '77 and '78 1st generation Campy SR rear ders. I'll leave it up to you if
> you want to post to the whole group or not. (If the consensus is that these came with
> both the early and late cages, I will go back to the seller and offer him my max bid
> <which is higher than the then-current high bid>)
>
> I'd also be interested if you think I was out of line by doing what I did... Or not.
> I can take it, let me have it if appropriate. I'm always learning.
>
> John Barron
> Minneapolis
> velostuf@uswest.net
> http://www.velostuf.com