Dear List:
All of this, of course, has been debated several times, again and again on this list, live at Cirques and Velo Rendezvous-es, and at other meetings. The disagreement (mild) I have with the preservationists (thou shalt not touch that original finish) is that concentrating on the paint finish to such a degree distorts the purpose and function of the paint itself and the bike as a whole. The bike is a tool, and the paint's functional pur pose is to keep it from rusting. Once that functional aspect is compromi sed, the owner is fully justified in renewing the protective finish. Pai nt is a consumable item like tires and brake lever hoods: when they wear out, get new stuff.
Will the new paint be the same as the old paint? No. Why should it? That's not what paint is for. No builder intends a bike's finish to be eternal. If he did, he'd powder coat it. (Or blue it, maybe, in th e old days.)
And then this focus on the surface finish tends to emphasize what is to m e the least important aspect of a collectible bike. What's importa nt about a bike is how well it's designed to accomplish it's goal, how we ll it fits the rider, how well it's assembled and how the builder worked on the lugs. The paint finish is a very distant 5th, or even 6th or 7th once we consider parts selection and rider modification to suit his visio n. These are the soul of the bike. It's still there unchanged even if resprayed in Imron metallic.
Now, contrariwise, on the other hand, and playing devil's advocate, I do lo ve to look at old bikes that show their battle scars, where paint has fad ed, bar tape has frayed and saddles are well scuffed. I've got a '50's H oldsworth Sirocco I showed this year at Cirque that I probably won't touch even though most of the paint had faded and the top tube has transformed fr om the original green to a sandy brown. But the bike doesn't have signif icant rust issues. If it did, ooh, I don't know.
The closest analogy I can make, as it seems to me, would be like owning a collectible knife or tool with a cutting edge, and then refusing to reshar pen it after it grew dull on the grounds that it would alter the tool from the way it came from the original maker. That's not what the original intent was for this item.
Of course none of us on one side of this issue will change the minds of t he others, (I've seen the light! Glory Glory!) but we should all r espect each others opinion. Repainting is just as valid as not repaintin g. You may not do it or like it, but unless a bike is historically significant (Fausto's sweat created the rust on the TT brake guide), the ow ner should be free to do what she wishes, even if she is repainting because (horrors!) she want's a different color.
Tom Adams
Manhattan, KS, USA
From: gholl@optonline.net <gholl@optonline.net> Subject: Re: [CR]to restore or not, and how? the endlessly debatable questi on To: "Charles Andrews" <chasds@mindspring.com> Cc: "Classic Rendezvous" <classicrendezvous@bikelist.org> Date: Friday, July 18, 2008, 6:30 AM
Hi Charles:
When the rust/ "originality" ratio reaches a certain low point
it's time to call your painter-otherwise the "originality" factor
will fall quite low. Incidently, when does "originality" disappear?
Allowing a bike to deteriorate is simply an example of poor
stewardship-especially reprehensible if the bike is an important one.
Furthermore, I doubt whether anyone really loves rust, otherwise they
wouldn't invent euphemisms such as "patina" to describe it.
As is usual in such matters, I suspect the truth behind the bike repair iss
ue
are financial considerations not aesthetic ones.
When viewed through the lens of repair costs rust begins to look like patin
a,
however, the problem becomes in getting others to buy into the delusion.
It's the cycle collectors' version of the Emperor's New Clothes.
Regards,
George
George Hollenberg MD
> Dr. George wrote, followed by Kurt Sperry:
>
> > You carefully sidestep the question regarding what
> "information" would
> be lost by a proper repair. I submit that no "information" would
> be lost
> and the integrity of what remains would be preserved. If
> necessary,
> various photographic, chemical, and even X-Ray techniques could
> be used
> to document the bike before commencing repairs.
>
> What would be lost is the bike's originality- it's very essence
> as a
> historical object. Repainting a 60 or so year old bike with hand
> pinstriping using the paints and techniques available today can
> at the
> very best only reproduce a hollow facsimile of the original surface.
> Even if the painter gets the color exactly right, catalyzed
> epoxy will
> never look convincingly right and the modern pinstriping however
> artistic will never be more than a pale replication. Is it
> really a
> "proper repair" if the object's originality is irreversibly
lost?
>
> ***************
>
> And the BINGO! goes to Kurt Sperry, who has it exactly right.
> Repaint
> and rechrome that Herse, even in the most careful, expensive
> way, and it
> will not ever be as sheerly interesting as it is right now. not
> ever
> again. Now. If I could send it back to 1955, and have Herse
> himself
> supervise a full restoration, I'd consider that.
>
> But, since that's a fantasy, we're left with the possible.
>
> George, I guarantee you that if you were to have Peter Weigle
> himself
> restore that bike (and this is no slam to Peter), or Baylis, the
> result
> would be very, very nice, as good as you can get, but, it would
> not be
> what it is now. And if, as I do, one happens to LIKE the way it
> is now,
> in preference to anything else, then restoring it would just
> degrade it.
>
> There is no way to find an "objective" method of discussing
> this.
> Either you like it the way it is, or you like it some other way.
>
> Period. Totally subjective. I like it the way it is, and since
> originality is, in my mind, always to be preferred, preserving
> what's
> left of that originality is a no-brainer.
>
> These problems exist on a continuum though. A friend of mine
> who shall
> remain nameless, likes his original bikes, and rides them, even
> though
> they look like they spent the last 10 years at the bottom of the
> Marianas trench, and then were lightly scraped off. I'm
> exaggerating,
> but only a little. He likes them that way. I can't argue with
> it, but
> I can say I'd repaint the bikes he'd never touch. And, of
> course, there
> are people who would restore that Herse, but I'd never touch it.
>
> It is interesting to consider the possibility of a carefully
> aged
> repaint. CyclArt does this really well at their best. Their
> Velotique
> job. I've had a couple done, and was very satisfied with the
> results...
> likely I wouldn't do it again though, because, no matter how
> close you
> get to original, even to the point of fooling the emotional
> brain...you
> still know it's not real. Not original. And, anymore, that's
> all it
> takes for me.
>
> As a side-note, I will point out the auction I have on ebay for
> that
> Condor Pathracer. Note the pin-striping on that bike. You
> simply
> cannot get that kind of work anymore. Even if you could find
> someone to
> do it, and you were willing to pay for it (I'm sure some
> specialty
> automotive painters have stripers who could do that job and a
> lot more),
> the style would still not be the same. It just wouldn't. Those
> stripes
> were applied very quickly, by people who were doing it over and
> over
> every day. Those people, and that style, just don't exist
> anymore. So,
> such things are worth preserving even when they're very, very faded..
>
> As for whether it's somehow "wrong" not to repaint bikes
with a
> lot of
> wear--as in, "the maker would never have approved of leaving the
> bike
> that way" all I can say is that the maker doesn't own the bike.
> I do.
>
> Charles Andrews
> Los Angeles
>
> "Somebody has to be tireless...
> or the fast buck operators would
> asphalt the entire coast, fill every
> bay and slay every living thing
> incapable of carrying a wallet."
>
> --John D. MacDonald
>
>
> _______________________________________________
>
George Hollenberg MD
CT, USA