Before he ever mentioned the chain, I brought it up to save him the bother of discovering the problem for himself. Especially if you read the OP and understand that Gene pretty much asked if he can simply swap in the 7 speed freewheel - which sounds exactly like possibly leaving the original chain alone.

To which you opined that "I shouldn't be giving out advice on a cycling forum."

You really shouldn't be giving advice out on the C&V forum, Jeff. You are not only wrong, you added confusion to a subject everyone else was totally clear on and told someone being helpful to shut up.

Dumb.

You’re not comprehending what I wrote - and you’re also confirming it.
Not that I see any point in arguing.
Hope my comment helped clarify things for those who are looking to understand.

Relja

i've worked with half the bands in those stacks. ran stage monitors for them. :)the Jesus and Mary Chain gig was the most memorable... some scalper fool sold 500 bogus tickets to the gig... several fights erupted at the door. The show was fun.
Bruce Cockburn was a really nice guy... great show too!
Sadly, Sonic Youth were all too young.,, they sucked back then. I watched a live show vid a few years ago... they've improved with age.

I'd bet that lots of us would enjoy other stories from those days if you started a Foo thread.

One related second-hand story: throughout the '80's, a friend of mine was the stage manager for a major Motown star. At one venue, he told the local rig manager that one lighting truss looked too insecure and asked him to redo it. The local guy swore that it was plenty strong and, to prove it, hung from it with his full weight.

The truss collapsed, falling on and breaking both his legs.

Epilogue:

I took it out for a ride, and I was not really satisfied with the shifting. It was hard to do a simple gear change without either overshifting, or worse, having the chain skate on the top of the teeth, especially when shifting to smaller cogs.

Back home on the stand, I noticed that the knuckles of the derailleur were not springing back as well as they should. So I took them apart, cleaned and regreased them, and then put them back together - which was tricky because somehow the threads on the inner cage, where the B-knuckle bolt threads in, had gotten messed up so that the bolt wouldn't thread in easily. So I took it all apart and spent a good 5-10 minute threading the bolt all the way in, undoing it all the way, and threading it in again, repeatedly, till it worked right - the poor man's thread chasing. Then I put it all back together, got it back on the bike, reinstalled the chain, and now that it is both taking up the slack and keeping the upper jockey wheel closer to the cogs, it shifts much better. I confirmed this on the road. Much easier to shift - usually just a flick of the lever, not even requiring an overshift and backing off. Still skated on the teeth once or twice, but nothing like the first ride.

I can't wait to take it for a long ride with some climbing!.

Seems like the older Shimano pantograph derailleurs had fairly strong B springs that could tend to pull the derailleur back when not working perfectly. Glad you were able to fix it up.