It's Here!

The Turbo re-issue finally landed last Friday and here are some pics, along with a nearly NOS 1989 version of this venerable saddle.

Here's a pic of the 1989 Turbo with a white saddle cover. This one's been kickin around in a parts box for a while it was patiently waiting to be mounted on my '87 Allez.


The date code on the underside confirms the year of manufacture as 89.


And now the re-issue! It's kind of disappointing that a saddle with such a great history now comes zip-tied on a display card instead of in a box.
On a side note, notice the weight is listed on the card. Kinda funny - for anyone interested in this saddle, weight is probably the least important criteria in making a purchasing decision.





A side-by-side comparison. The padding in the re-issue is definitely firmer than the original. The synthetic leather cover isn't as cheap as I had imagined and actually has a nice textured feel to it.




You can see in the photos that the re-issue, while staying true to the overall shape of the original, is slightly less bulky, presumably due to the denser foam padding.
I won't have a chance to mount this baby and ride it for a while, but it should look great on one of the restored Allez's.

Pic credit

Selle Italia Turbo Re-Issue! Part Deux

November's here and it's time to batten down the hatches and get ready for cold weather - or at least what Californians call cold weather. So I'm on Nashbar's site to look for some cold-weather clothing and figure I may as well look for some other stuff I need that are marked down. (On a side note, how many of you, valued blog readers, had your credit card number stolen while shopping at the Nashbar site this past year?)
Anyway, I'm browsing through the site, adding the usual impulse buys to my cart - tubes, patch kits, ball bearings, and I come across the Selle Italia Turbo re-issue for $49.99! Your choice of colors, as long as it's black. Well, it can't hurt to have a spare on of these around, even if it's synthetic leather.
It should be arriving on Saturday so I'll get some pictures posted and let y'all know what I think. Get yours while you can - the website indicates they're running low on inventory, and oh yeah, use a credit card you won't mind canceling in case they haven't fixed all their security holes yet.

UPDATE: 11/06/2009
Well folks, hope you jumped on your chance to get one of the Turbos at Nashbar cuz they're all gone now.
I checked the site this morning and it's no longer listed. No telling when or if they'll be back. A couple of the other online shops have been perpetually out of stock since this summer.

Selle Italia Turbo Re-Issue!

Apparently, Selle Italia has re-issued what is arguably their most well-known and beloved models, the Turbo. And it comes in white too!!
I didn't find any information on Selle Italia's website regarding the re-issue, but maybe I didn't look hard enough. Doing a search, there seem to be more than a few sellers of these babies at a fairly reasonable $49.95 - at least compared to NOS prices on ripmeBay.
On the one hand, I love that Selle Italia did the right thing for all us classic and vintage guys. On the other hand, the covering seems to be vinyl and not leather. Ack!
I dunno, maybe the lack of animal products on the re-issue might not be a huge deal function-wise, but I can be kind of a purist about these things aesthetically speaking.

Anyway, here's a blog post I found of some pics and comments on the new-old Turbo.

And while we're on the subject of vintage saddle re-issues, here's some pics of the Selle San Marco Concor Supercorsa re-issue I picked up a while back.

If you've managed to get your hands on one of these Turbos let me know what you think! As a big 80's collector, you can never have too many of these...


UPDATE: Actually, considering how scarce the Concor re-issues can be, I might just pick one of these up, synthetic hide and all.