Researching eBay a little bit, apparently old-school 5-7sp pulleys were generally 10tooth, unlike modern 11tooth; having taken mine apart, they look _exactly_ like these (except they say "Suntour" instead of "Shimano", and they had only one metal side-plate per pulley, the circular groove on the other side rode a circular rail in the black plastic inner cage). Might these be quieter?

fietsbob, when you say after-market metal pulleys, are you talking about like this? That pink would look pretty good to go with the bike's black/hot pink color scheme, but they're pretty pricey ($13.50 for ONE pulley?), and if they're going to still be noisy there's no point! (However they say "Special teeth shape designed to minimize the noise of the chains during pedaling")