[CR]1982 Team Miyata and Chrome

(Example: Framebuilders:Brian Baylis)

From: <Carb7008@cs.com>
Date: Sun, 16 Jul 2006 05:16:05 EDT
To: classicrendezvous@bikelist.org
Subject: [CR]1982 Team Miyata and Chrome

That was a very pretty Team Miyata. I esp liked the frameset color with matching bar tape. One thing I may have noticed was the lack of any visible chrome-plating except dropout faces. I'm getting the impression that by the early-80's, visible chrome-plating was no longer fashionable. My early-80's Bertoni has fully chromed frame and fork yet only DO faces and top of rt cstay shows. I'm sure others can cite where many bikes of this vintage still showed chrome but are my impressions generally correct? If yes, why was chrome no longer desirable...considered old-fashioned or not sporty or "professional"? I know environmental regulations were getting tighter but as I recall there were still a lot of plating shops in the early-80's. It has always struck me as bizarre that as less and less chrome showed, some of these same bikes had totally chromed frameset under paint. I figured it must have been just as easy to throw the whole thing in the tank as just the tips. Of course polishing for visible chrome would have probably been the main expense and if your just gonna paint over it no need to do much of that.

Jack Romans
Sacramento, California