Originally Posted by
Contigo
And you're just the person I was hoping to hear from.
Yeah, my Montello is from 1986. Mine came with a SL-type decal on the fork blades (i.e., blue background rather than red as with the SLX). My frame was SLX, or so the decal says, which seemed a little odd for a 63 cm. But on the other hand, my complete bike weighs in at just a hair under 21.5 lbs on a digital scale with ordinary parts, so perhaps they chose not to use SPX despite the larger size?
See any reason this wouldn't be suitable? Fork rake remained the same, for instance? And would this have come from a Montello based on the crown, etc., or can you tell?
Columbus issued the blue bordered fork decal with all SLX and SPX tubesets from 1984-1987. Columbus changed the fork decals for SLX and SPX to the red border for the 1988 model year. Reportedly, there were customers complaining about their frames not being full SLX and SPX. Most consumers didn't realize that these sets used the same fork blades as SL and SP. The easiest way for Columbus to eliminate the complaints was to issue a matching fork decal.
Assuming the decal is OEM, it would have come from a Montello or Gavia (TSX). I'm not aware of the fork geometry for these models having changed. I'd have no qualms about using that fork, unless you're going to enter it in a concours event at a bicycle show.