Mystery Viner

[fullbasement]

Hi from New Zealand. I picked up this Viner the other day and the decals are not the same as what I have seen of other Viners, including the other one that I own. Can anyone shed any light on why the decals, especially the head tube one, is different. The frame says Viner on the tops of the seat stays and there are star cutouts in the lugs, the frame is also badged Professional.

 

[Nob]

Does it have a star cut out under the BB?

 

[SteelNipple]

Does the fork crown have star cutouts? But like Nob said it should have the star cutout on the BB.
The bike looks like a 78-81 Viner Special Professional, but I've never seen that type of decals.

From what I've seen Viner did only a few different models in three "price ranges" Course, Corsa and Professional.
The cheaper ones were called Viner Special Course and had no star cutouts and were build with lesser tubing and had cheaper components. There were Course strada and pista models, but at some point they also made a step-through version of the strada.
The Course strada was build with most likely Columbus Zeta and later in the 80s with Columbus Aelle Tretubi, these had custom sticker that looked like the typical Columbus sticker that read "tubi speciali in acciaio, made in Italy".
The Course pista was build with Reynolds 531 and maybe some Columbus tubing.
Next in line was the Corsa models. These had cross (x) cutouts and were build with Reynolds 531. I don't know about the components these had and I think these were made only in the 70s.
The high-end models were called Special Professional and there were again both strada and pista models. These had star cutouts and sometimes seat stays were engraved with "Viner". These were build with Columbus SL (maybe SP) and later SLX etc. high-end tubing and usually had Campagnolo components.

 

[SteelNipple]

Weird that the letters in the Viner are not in capital. Maybe it has been repainted (and professionally by the looks of it)?

 

[juvela]

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shall look forward to reading how the collective mind sorts this one...

all examples of Nerozzi production have had the opportunity to view or work with have come from the period between the mid-seventies and the early eighties and have na'er before seen these transfers

this makes me think it would be wise to keep open the possibility of a respray...


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[fullbasement]

Does it have a star cut out under the BB?

Hi Nob, It does have a star cutout. Cannot seem to find a serial number though. I don't know if the fork is original or possibly been part of the original build spec.

 

[Nob]

Hi Nob, It does have a star cutout. Cannot seem to find a serial number though. I don't know if the fork is original or possibly been part of the original build spec.

Then it’s probably a genuine Viner that’s more than likely had a respray & some customer custom decals added in its life. Looks to be a late 70’s early 80’s frameset & looks well made. If you remove the fork they’ll be stamping on the steerer tube thst usually matches up to the frame number stamped on the frame. You may want to check that.

 

[fullbasement]

Thanks for that Nob. I'll have a look in the next day or two and also make a comparison with my other Viner. It was built for a local here in New Zealand and I picked it up from the second owner who did alot of touring in Europe on it. It had a broken chain stay and when I had it repaired professionally, I was told the frame had been built with SLX tube.

 

[Nob]

I think Viner Professionals from this era like yours are Columbus SL tubing