You still haven't told us what bike you have. Since you and PansyBob seem to think that a Paramount is some sort of rare and desirable bike I can only imagine that you believe them all to have been manufactured by Waterford. But according to PansyBob if a company didn't pay their own employees to build it then it wasn't actually a Schwinn - it was a Waterford. I wonder how he deals with DeRosa or Pinarello.
I wonder how you deal with being such an idiot?
If you have a Paramount, what year is it then I can tell who made it...but this all sort of stupid since all you have to do is look it up on the internet.
The classic era for Paramount was from 1958 till 1979. Schwinn hired a young designer and builder named Marc Muller sometime in the 70's to take over the building of the Paramount bike; when Schwinn went bankrupt in the 80's Marc Muller moved the Paramount production to Waterford. In 1993 Marc Muller and Richard Schwinn bought the Paramount factory and renamed it Water Precision Cycles, that line of Paramounts ended in 1994 and didn't resume again until 1988 when they made the 50th Anniversary model. Starting in 1989 the PDG version of Paramount began production and lasted till 1994; the only composite built with this name was actually built by Kestrel, all of the Series models came from Asian sources except for the 9C. That ended production of the Paramount until 2013 when one year of Paramounts were made once again to celebrate 75 years...which is sort of an odd celebration since in reality Paramounts were not made for 75 years straight, but that was a way for Waterford to make a ton of money on a limited edition bike that did indeed sell out very fast just as the 50th one did. They will restore any year of Paramount bike. Waterford like Giant for example makes other brands as well, Waterford makes Gunnar, Fleet Velo, Boulder Bikes, Rivendell and the Milwaukee Bicycle company, as well as Waterford of course. Muller and Schwinn still own Waterford to this day so technically Waterford is the modern day Schwinn but they could not use the name Schwinn anymore because due to the bankruptcy the brand name was sold for assets. SO now do you believe that all Paramounts after 1993 were all made under the Waterford flag?
And De Rosa bikes are still made in Italy as far as I know. As a side note the 5 time TDF winner Eddy Merckx who raced on De Rosa bikes learned how to build frames from De Rosa.
ALL Pinarello carbon fiber bikes are made in Taiwan using highly regarded carbon fiber made in Japan, the rest of the Pinarellos are made in Italy, with fakes coming out of China. Once the factory in Taiwan completes a frame they send it back to Pinarello in Italy where paint and decals are applied, including a decal that says: made in Italy. Now how can they say made in Italy when the frame isn't? Because once a certain percentage of the value of the bike is made in a particular area, Italy in this case, and since paint, decals, components and labor is greater than the cost of the frame, they can legally put made in Italy on the bike.
And yes I have told you what bikes I have on other posts...go back to the post where Bob, you and myself had that engaging conversation about titanium, plus there were other posts in the past that I mention. If you're too lazy to go back here is my current list as of today including history on both which will explain how I got them:
2013 Lynskey Peloton with a mostly 105 except I did the following swaps: the rear derailleur is Ultegra, Enve 2.0 fork, Cane Creek 110 headset, and DA9000 cables. This one I bought brand new on a introductory sale.
1988 Giant Rincon with all XT which was **** back then, the XT rear derailleur has been nothing but problems. I bought this new on a end of the year closeout sale.
1985 Schwinn Le Tour Luxe with Suntour Mountech transmission. Bought this used for $60 about 7 years ago in factory original mint condition because it was only ridden about 250 miles back in 85 before it was stored under a pile of blankets. That's the bike I currently tour on and it's decked out with fenders, and I use the original factory equipped rear pannier rack for my panniers.
1984 Trek 660 with all Suntour Superbe components, I bought the frame and fork brand new and then bought the Superbe group box, I also bought spare rear and front derailleurs which I still have brand new never used, this was my last bike I raced on, the paint and especially the decals are faded due to the S Calif sun.
1984 Schwinn Voyageur with Deore Deerhead; this bike I found in a dumpster covered in some sort of grayish sticky goo, it didn't glow so I assume it was non toxic, upon cleaning it several times this bike is really good shape except it needs cables which is no big deal, but it too is factory correct and came with the original factory rear pannier rack, this bike is a bit tall for me so I may sell it this spring.
1984 Fuji Club with Suntour ARX also all factory equipped original components, I bought this for $40 at a garage sale about 5 years ago it only had 5 miles on it! he stored it in an attic all those years, it's a fantastic riding bike, the best steel bike I've ridden.
1987 Dawes Galaxy; basically just a frame and fork with few components on it, another dumpster find, the frame and fork are in above average condition, not sure what little components are on it are factory correct or not.
And today I just got back an old 1988 Miyata 512 that I fixed up for a friend about 4 years ago and gave it to him, he bought new bike with that end of the year pricing and gave me back the 512. So I guess now I'll keep it for my grandson to ride when he gets bigger, it's a tad small for me. The guy knew I had a grandkid so he wanted to make sure he got it in 2 or 3 more years. That 512 I found setting on a curb after I saw the guy just dump it there, I asked him why he was dumping there and he told me I could have it, so I took it of course!
Due to my touring ambitions I may sell ALL the bikes except for the Miyata because that's going to the grandson, the Fuji and the Lynskey and use the money to buy a MASI Giramondo, the top tube slopes down a bit more than most sloping down tube touring bikes do which will help me to dismount the bike easier when heavily loaded vs the Le Tour Luxe, I'm 65 so my flexibility isn't what it use to be, plus it has fantastic front and rear racks, and the gearing range was the best for climbing grades while heavily packed of all the touring bikes I researched for the price. So this spring there will probably be a big sell off then I'll get the MASI from the same place I got the Lynskey!
