Sunday, October 28, 2007 - 11:45 PM
said Harry, stirred by: "Charles Andrews" <chasds@mindspring.com>'s message of: Sunday 28 Oct 07 at 08:06 PM, On: [CR]re: davidson Impulse on ebay [echoed below, in part<=1] -oOo- someone wrote:
http://ebay.com/<blah> ssPageName=STRK:MEDW:IT&ih=006
Seems not. This 57mm bike sold, fully equipped, for <$336. And not because the wheels were sew ups.
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That is pretty sad...that bike was worth more. However, I'd argue that the paint-job (which I happen to find remarkably unattractive) was the problem. A more attractive paint-job and it might have fetched more.
I have a very nice davidson from the late 70s, a nice all-round touring bike, that I'll be selling soon, but if it doesn't fetch more than that, I'll keep it.
You miss my point, because I didn't make it well. There are uglier bikes 8-20 years older off Italian assembly lines and sweatshops that get more attention than the mature work of this and other surviving builders. A bike-ignorant but insistent Craiglister would have gotten $225 in his local market.
OK. So the paint scheme is dated. So is the hairstyle in your 1989 photo. Your partner's too. For $336 +$150 for new paint, the bike was worth noting. No new quality custom frame is being brazed today for less than $1500 with fork; and steel fork building skills are ever less practiced. It is little wonder, then, that many quality framemakers in the US have moved on to TIG welding titanium and aluminum, or left the business. Little appreciation for their mature craft, it seems.
I value the knowledge and insights here at CR, but if more contemporary bikes by master craftsmen and artisans in the US are not of note here--literally--I'll feast as my fortune allows on future Masi's, such as they are.
And HMV was heard earlier on this.
Harry Travis
DC USA