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We often get questions on bicycles.stackexchange about identifying a bicycles manufacturer, model, make, and year. Often these questions are downvoted or closed -- usually with a comment attached to them that it's not necessary to know the exact model/make/year of a bicycle if you want to fix, repair, or ride your bike.

Why should owners not care about the model/make/year of their bicycle?

Especially when it comes to less expensive bikes (aka BSOs) and BMX bicycles?

This is intended as a canonical question that we can point closed questions to.

Also see

Criggie
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RoboKaren
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    I appreciate the thought and logic behind this question, but fear it is significantly opinion based. – Argenti Apparatus Feb 02 '18 at 21:09
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    I vacillated between making this a meta question (which we could also link to) or a main question. We’re getting flooded by identify my rando BMX questions and we need some way of telling folks that it just doesn’t matter if you don’t know the exact year model and make. – RoboKaren Feb 02 '18 at 21:13
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    I've been pondering creating a canonical 'is it possible to identify an older generic bike (or frame) with no identifying marks?' question (answer: no, `fraid not), which could also address why it does not matter. – Argenti Apparatus Feb 02 '18 at 21:18
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    This is a good question, but is more appropriate for Bicycles Meta – Rider_X Feb 02 '18 at 22:32
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    @Rider_X - I think its appropriate here - the audience for this question are the ones flooding us with "Identify my bike" who would not visit Meta. Meta has https://bicycles.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/881/are-identify-my-bike-postings-on-topic-here for further discussion on if we should accept these questions or not. – mattnz Feb 03 '18 at 02:17
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    I too think that the premise behind this question is wrong. There is no reason why it's wrong to be interested in the make/model/year, the problem is that most of the questions are unanswerable. – ojs Feb 03 '18 at 10:03
  • I'm on the fence on this one. On one hand its a "canonical answer" to put those impossible-to-answer questions against. But it is completely opinion which is also off topic. Perhaps we should start a meta conversation about "identify my bike" questions ? – Criggie Feb 10 '18 at 07:44
  • Ban the damn question! If people want help related to parts and standards for a certain frame, they should ask that question. Logged in for the first time in months today, there are just too many trash questions/same old questions to filter through when looking for anything interesting to answer. –  May 25 '18 at 23:12
  • @Purr - I think the meta is the best place to express this opinion. We’ve had this discussion before and it’s worth having again. – RoboKaren May 25 '18 at 23:33

3 Answers3

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The problem with the question is not the owner's interest in the answer - it is clearly there. The problem is that the answer has almost no value for the community of this site:

  • most generic bikes are hard to identify to begin with
  • most successful identification will be based on a photo which cannot be used to answer the same question again because questions and answers are centred around searchable text and tags.

In total, there is too little to gain from answers for the community in the short and in the long run to make them worthwhile. Hence, they should be banned in my opinion.

Christian Lindig
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    I agree but this doesn't answer the question. The question is "Why shouldn't owners care about the make of their bike?" not "Why shouldn't we answer 'what make is this bike?' questions?" – David Richerby Feb 03 '18 at 01:53
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    Christian did answer the question perfectly "it is clearly there" => they should care! It's just the community who doesn't care. – Francisco Presencia Feb 03 '18 at 03:49
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    @FranciscoPresencia the community would certainly answer if one were available. Its definitely about bicycles, just very hard to give a good answer. Perhaps this info should be added to the [tour]? – Criggie Feb 03 '18 at 04:58
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    @FranciscoPresencia No, the question is "Why shouldn't they care?" (emphasis mine); "But they do care!" isn't an answer to that (though "They should care because XYZ" probably would be). We know that people care; the question is about how to educate people so they stop caring about irrelevancies. This answer is about what kind of questions should and should not be posted to the site, and that belongs on meta, not here on the main site: it's an answer about Bicycles.SE, not an answer about actual bicycles. – David Richerby Feb 03 '18 at 11:25
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    Like @ojs noted, the premise of the question is flawed. You can't convince people to not care about a question because you can only speculate about their motivation to ask it. I am no saying that the question is pointless but I am arguing that this is not the right place to find answers about the identity of a bike. – Christian Lindig Feb 03 '18 at 11:36
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    Looks like someone flagged this answer as "low quality because its length and content". Anyone want to admit and explain? – ojs Feb 03 '18 at 23:36
  • @ojs I flagged as "not an answer" for the reason I explained in my comment. – David Richerby Feb 04 '18 at 11:42
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    @ChristianLindig "You can't convince people to not care [...]" So what? The question is why they shouldn't care, not whether it's possible to make them not care. – David Richerby Feb 04 '18 at 11:43
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    @DavidRicherby I think it should be obvious that "not an answer" and "low quality" are different flags. Not an answer is somewhat justifiable here, but the question itself contains a false premise so it can't have a good answer. – ojs Feb 04 '18 at 12:10
  • @ojs They both end up in the same review queue, don't they? – David Richerby Feb 04 '18 at 12:13
  • The low quality queue is different from the close vote queue. Of course I don't know if SE changes not an answer to low quality behind the scenes, but "low quality because its length and content" are the exact words I saw. – ojs Feb 04 '18 at 13:11
  • @ojs I wasn't talking about the close queue -- that doesn't apply here because the close queue is for questions and this is an answer. My understanding is that flagging as "not an answer" and "low quality" both put the post in the low quality queue, and that everything in that queue has the generic "low quality because of its length and content" banner at the top. – David Richerby Mar 09 '18 at 10:59
  • I'm dismayed to see this answer has gotten many upvotes as it clearly is not an answer to the original question, but has spawned a discussion about the legitimacy of the question. That discussion should be on bicycles.meta.stackexchange.com, perhaps as an answer to Are questions on identifying bike via a picture on topic here? – Argenti Apparatus Sep 23 '20 at 14:31
  • Or Why do we keep closing bike identification questions as duplicate of “Why shouldn't I care what model/make/year my bicycle is?” – Argenti Apparatus Sep 23 '20 at 14:38
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    @ArgentiApparatus I think not answering the question is fair game here, since the while point of this question is to close questions that are not duplicates as duplicates. – ojs Sep 23 '20 at 14:42
  • @ArgentiApparatus My answer includes a link to bicycles.meta.stackexchange.com where I bring forward arguments why this question should be banned. – Christian Lindig Sep 24 '20 at 15:11
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Most questions are based on a need for knowledge about what parts to use or curiosity. The latter do not make suitable questions for SE sites and will normally be closed.

For the former, fortunately the bicycle industry is fairly standardized (even if there are many and evolving standards), so knowledge of the bike make/model/manufacturer is rarely helpful in determining any maintenance issues and parts requirements. Ultimately the industry is dominated by a few parts manufacturers and a very large number of "Bike manufacturers", who largely build a frame to the standards of the day and attach components.

In most cases, a better question that will lead to more practical answers for the community should revolve around the specific problem that needs to be addressed. Photos of areas of a problem are almost always all that is needed to identify what components and work is required. In rare cases its helps to know the bike manufacturer and model as some parts are very specific (e.g. Bottom bracket widths)

In cases of vintage bikes and none traditional bikes, knowing the bike manufacturer/make/model and year can help track down old and obsolete parts, and the real problem is solved by knowing this information. These are valid "Identify my bike" questions.

mattnz
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    I think there is a third reason: popular culture has convinced us that any old comic book, bike or anything could be a valuable collectible if you can just identify it and find the right buyer. Most vintage BMXes are not, but in the asker's mind there is just a slight chance this one was on screen in E.T. or Stranger Things and just lost and ended up in someone's garage sale, and asking is free anyway. – ojs Feb 03 '18 at 09:57
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I think an owner should care more about what generation their bike and groupset are from.

I've successfully fitted a 2000's 105 groupset to a 1980s steel 10 speed, mostly because the groupset was moved over complete. Had I been mixing an 80s deraileur with a 2000 shifter, that would have been less successful.

So there are two motivations for "what year is it?" questions

  1. Compatibility with stuff
  2. Thinking of their bike like a car, where the year model is more related to monetary value.

So to the asker - you should care more that your bike is

  • Safe to ride
  • Comfortable to ride (fewer aches)
  • Reliable (breaks down less)
  • Functions well (no misshifts etc)

...rather than nailing down what year each part is from.

Argenti Apparatus
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Criggie
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    They're usually BMXes. Do single-speed and one-piece cranks count as a groupset? :-) – David Richerby Feb 03 '18 at 11:26
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    The cranks can be Ashtabula or euro with different sized pedal threads, freewheel can be ISO vs other thread vs cassette driver, etc... – ojs Feb 03 '18 at 23:32