Originally Posted by Duane Behrens

Thanks for that. Enjoyed your account of the rebuild shop. Hope the owner accepts your offer to help organize. He'll benefit, and you may find a treasure.

I've never applied Velocal decals to a bike before. I expect it's a one-shot deal, so I'm a little nervous about it. The directions recommend AGAINST clear coating over the decal once it's on. Not sure why. They didn't have a "Sport" decal that I could see, so I guess the top tube will just run naked. Any thoughts or advice on this step are appreciated.

Also, I picked up a new Shimano FD yesterday to replace the ruined original. $29 in the box. Hate to spend the money but I just don't have time to look around for a good used one. The old derailleur was a "high-normal." This one, as all FDs are now, is a "low-normal," in which the spring is oriented toward bringing the chain down to the small chain ring. (Apparently, the "high-normal" was tried for a while to make the shifters operate in the same direction to upshift and downshift.) Anyway, I hope I can suss out how to mount this "alternate" system. Thanks.