Mercy! Nice wheels! Great post! Thank you! I'm inspired... I guess you could have gone for actual chrome plating but that gets murderously expensive. Although looking at that bike it would seem that money was not so much of an issue. I tried aircraft stripper from the auto parts store on my frame and it did not work. Maybe it was too chilly in the garage...

The powder coat company here in the Twin Cities does a lot of bikes so it's not that I think they don't know what they are doing. They may just think I'm looking for perfection. They can take a frame and bead blast it for 70bucks and then it's 120 to coat it. I guess there's no telling what the frame will look like after the blasting and with a clear coat, that final look is what you get. At least you know that the frame will be as clean as they can get it. I'm not so sure I'm up for all the work you did to keep it clean right up to the moment it went in the booth. But still, it sure looks nice! How did that bike start out in life?

I kinda like the look of that Rivendell a couple posts back. With the darker natural look to the steel, the golden braze stands out a little better. My frame is 80% stripped. The guy says at that point he can reduce the price to just blast the tight areas around the lugs and such but then I'd get areas that look different. Maybe I'll just have the whole thing blasted and then go and have a look see. It might look cool and then I'd just have to talk him into a clear coat. If it looked crappy they have a rainbow of colors... I just could not decide! That's why the natural look appealed to me.

Anyway, thanks for the great comments everyone. It's fun in the winter to have stuff to keep us busy. It keeps us from jonesing for open road although many like me, continue to commute. That's an ongoing winter project too... Keeping the bike clean! My winter commuter is an old Ross MTB with a chrome frame. Now there's a finish that laughs at snow, sand and salt but things still get pretty rasty... The guy that owns the coin operated car wash? I'm putting his kids through college!