Vintages

[Tom]

How prevalent would you guys say it is to be a bit 'creative' when it comes to listing the vintage of a bike for sale? Right now there are two XR 250's on mocyc.com and one XR 400 on bahtsold.com, all listed as being from 2006. To the best of my knowledge both of these models were discontinued in 2004.
I know that a lot of people list the year of the green book for plated bikes, even though this only relates to when the bike was registered, not when it was made. And, of course, for those bikes that have had their frame-number changed - which I would guess is uncommon on unplated bikes - it comes down to knowing the model in question, in order to tell whether someone is trying to bamboozle you.

 

[Hassman]

I would say it is very common, some sellers may not actually know themselves what year the bike is if they bought it second hand in Thailand.
As you say with the dodgy green books and re-stamped frames there is no saying what real year the bike is, one has to do due diligence before buying.

 

[Tom]

All very true. I have dealt with a fair few bikes here and know the different pitfalls with regards to books, frame-numbers etc. But down here in Phuket we don't really see unplated bikes - at least not ones that are intended to stay that way - as they tend to get 'nicked' by the BiB pretty quick. Up north the situation is different, and I was just wondering if re-stamping the frame number occurs on these bikes. I wouldn't think so, since there isn't really anything to gain by doing it if the bike is not going to be registered anyway, but maybe someone knows different. At any rate, if the frame-number has not been tampered with, you can always find out what year a bike is, rather than going by what the seller tells you (regardless of whether he actually believes what he's telling you or not).
BTW, given the interest I gather you have in bikes from yesteryear, you probably thought this was about something completely different, didn't you :d ?

 

[Hassman]

BTW, given the interest I gather you have in bikes from yesteryear, you probably thought this was about something completely different, didn't you :d ?

Quite right, I was wildly disappointed... :cry