"OP" means "original poster," i.e. you, in this case.

I agree with Pastorbob - please do not fixie-ize that frame. At a minimum, under no circumstances hack off anything from the frame. Please, for the love of Ignaz, do nothing to that frame that cannot be undone.

To get a better idea of what you have, find the serial number and then check out this page of the Waterford website: http://waterfordbikes.com/now/home.p...aramountdating. That should at least give you the month and year it was built.

Paramounts, for most and perhaps all of their existence, were made separately from the rest of Schwinn's bike production. Even when Paramounts were made in the same Chicago factory as most other Schwinns, they were made in a separate fenced-off enclosure, known as The Cage. Eventually (meaning the late 1980's or thereabouts), Paramount production moved to its own home in Waterford, Wisconsin. (There were also other Paramounts, called "Paramount PDG's," that were not built in Waterford but rather Taiwan, I think, which are fine frames but do not have the cache of a Waterford-built Paramount or the older, Chicago-built ones.) Finally, the Paramount works were spun off from Schwinn to become Waterford Precision Cycles USA, which is completely independent from Schwinn or any other builder. Today's Waterfords are the direct lineal descendants of the Paramounts of yore (including yours) and they are the keepers of the Paramount flame. In fact, Richard Schwinn, the direct descendant of founder Ignaz Schwinn, is one of the shakers and movers at Waterford.

I may have a detail or two wrong here (if so, I'm sure someone will correct me) but I'm confident that I have been accurate enough to give a fair-to-middlin' start on your Paramount education. There are a number of folks who are very into these fine bikes, adn in my experience they are very giving of their time and knowledge. Take advantage of their knowledge.

And yes, $25 is beyond ridiculous for that bike. You scored - big-time.