Record vs Chorus ?: Bikefanclub.com

There was a time when a "whole" group or a monocoque-kit, if you will, (or what I would disdainfully call the IKEA-plug-in kit, with all due apologies to IKEA who make stuff that is far better, more interesting, and useful than, say, plug-in rear carbon stays or, dare I say?, carbon forks with little tire clearance and limited rakes that force the design of the bike from the fork to the frame, precisely the wrong direction) was never part of cycling. Campagnolo introduced the notion many moons ago but even into the early 1990s there were plenty of mixes and matches on OEM bicycles. Bridgestone comes to mind because Grant Petersen (who was doing the specs) was looking for value and performance---and he got it with Nitto posts, Ritchey stems, Dia-Compe brakes, and other bits that didn't "match" the whole, rarely to the delight of the Big Guys who want only their stuff on your bike, with all the commensurate threats about non-compatibility and risk and other complete nonsense that means to scare you into conformity. Bikes, like American life (gratuitous philosophical insert), has become more and more about such fears, comformities, fashion dictates, and the perception that difference is itself "odd" and even unwelcome. I personally never build a bike with one group or one kit and this has never been the cause of a diminished resale value, no matter how long I keep the bike. Put on what you like, what suits your aesthetic sense, and be darned to corporate conformity. Bike shops will often tell you that this doesn't work with that---not because they actually know from experience because they rarely build mix and match bikes, they mostly build what comes out of their boxes or what the manuals tell them---and that makes you, the not-necessarily-experienced mechanic who doesn't want to risk or waste money---go along with their "expert" recommendation. Of course, there are a lot of surviving great old bike shops where someone knows that you can mix up all sorts of indexing bits without the slightest problem. I make a point of putting things together that aren't supposed to work to see how easy it is to get them to work perfectly. Answer: about 95% of the time we are being corporately hookwinked.

As for Record and Chorus, there is no compelling reason to spend the premium for Record in terms of performance, longevity, or, nowadays since it's all carbon (and therefore ugly to my eye) in aesthetics. Since this year's Chorus has been last year's record for the longest time, the extra expense is a great deal for very little in "improvement." The bicycle industry needs you and me and others to believe that things are new and improved all the time. We are being _sold_ stuff and this sort of debate is just the sort of thing that gets the "gotta have the best" or "might as well have the 'best'" issue out front, so it's not a completely pointless "debate." But what it's about is marketing, advertising, and our collective sense of ourselves---for high-end bikes are like cars, watches, clothes, you name it, they are a way we put ourselves to a fashion identity and then buy it for the sake of feeling better. It's got little to do with quality, performance, or value.

dbrk
not angry about anything, just trying to be candid...