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Old 12-15-08, 05:18 PM
  #25  
unterhausen
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I think the obsession with clean lug shorelines was pretty much invented in the U.S. in the '70s. And it didn't start catching on until later. The Raleigh shown above is fairly clean if you consider they didn't touch it with a file after it was brazed. And it really doesn't affect the utility of the frame at all. The way the seatstay caps are done is not all that easy to do considering you can't clean it up afterwards. A belt sander covers up a lot of sins on caps like that, Raleigh couldn't use a belt sander on theirs.

My memory of the Treks I brazed up was that the lugs went out from the factory in a fairly clean state, although much of the work finishing the dropouts was very poorly done. That still causes me heartburn. Lugs can be brazed cleanly leaving fairly little cleanup, it's difficult to do that with dropouts the way Trek did them. Most of the cleanup was done with Dynabrade hand-held belt sanders, which are marvelous devices -- in the right hands.
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