I'll be getting a walmart/craigslist bike for college. No way am I letting my Fuji or Merlin see campus life. I ordered decals from bikesdecals.com. They're a newer style and I think it'll look much nicer.

Dude...you have a Merlin. Decals? Bahhh...if you want different ones later, it'll be easy. You have a ti Merlin!

I had to wait until my 30s for my Merlin

I'm not going there.
Expensive paint.
Lube.
Good riding.
Curvy parts.

Nope, not going there.

Um, you got the bike free. You're killin' us. Wanna buy some used tubes?

You are definitely from the road forum. Did someone leave the door unlocked again?

JK.

$30 is a good threshold, since yours are in decent shape.

My Ti bike has zero decals, zero headbadge, and I liked it that way.
You might like it with them completely off, just a headbadge to make it known.
I've never liked the decals on Merlins, anyway. I like that frame clean.

I didn't really pay attention to the decals and just today, I noticed there was a decal on the NDS chainstay that says "Geometry by Tom Kellogg" so I called him again and he happily obliged to send me a new one. I promised him I'd send him pictures of the project

I feel honored to have spoken with the man who designed my bike frame!

Before I apply the decals I bought, I'll see what I think of the "naked" look. I'm definitely NEVER taking off the headbadge, it's quite beautiful.

Also, I haven't entered into the road forum for ages. I'm usually a bicycle mechanics forum guy.

After sanding part of one of the seatstays and realizing that the scratches are deep enough to go through to the carbon weave, I started doing some research. After said research, I went to Home depot and picked up a can of Minwax Helmsman clear gloss spar urethane. It has UV protection in it. I also got some 150 and 600 grit sandpaper and painter's tape. I stripped the frame down and masked off the Ti, leaving just the CF exposed. Tomorrow, I'll sand both seatstays down to bare carbon with the 150 grit sandpaper and then go over it with 600 grit sandpaper. Then, once the weather warms up, I'll hit them with the spar urethane. I'll be doing the same to the fork, but I have to be super careful because there's a black fade paint job and Merlin logo under the clearcoat.

Here are some pics for you guys!



And masked off:

+1 about not parking a nice bike on a campus

Having recently left campus, I did fine with my nice roadies and vintage bikes in my room, got some
odd looks from roommates and female guests for commuting around town I had some old three speeds locked outside (we had a sort of collective fleet) and a beater fixie, with a huge lock. I parked in the hall during nights however.

Sounds like a good plan on the Merle.
The more I think about it, the more I think you'll like it with no TT or DT decals.
The headbadge is elegant; the minor decals on the ST are relevant and in good shape.
Making the TT and DT "clean" will move the eyes to other details.
You've got black on the front/rear at the same level.
Black accents elsewhere would be cool.

Let's the metal speak for itself, and on unpainted Merlins, it generally does.

I can't find any pics of mine, but I had no decals on anything, wheels included
I even rubbed off the logo on the stem, saddle, and CF seatpost.
It was a custom frame, and most people ignored it, a few would stop and look and ask.
A 58cm TT killed it for me, so I traded it for a NIB Kestrel 200SCi frameset.
I miss it.

Well I really like showy bikes, so I'll probably end up putting decals on.

Keep us informed, sounds cool.

No problem with frame decals here, but I like my components devoid of noisy lettering, the chief vice of our age.

I'm done sanding the CF. Now I just gotta wait for the weather to warm up.. It'll look awful if I spray clearcoat on it while it's snowing...

Yeah, wait for a very dry day if you don't have special facilities. Don't ask me how i know

Just to give you guys an update, I applied my first layers of spar urethane on Sunday. It's been 72 hours, so I sanded it down, cleaned the surface, and gave it a really thick layer of spar urethane. Of course, it's forming drips. So I'll wait another 72 hours, sand the drips off, and polish the surface. I don't think it'll need any more spar urethane after this process, but if it does, I'll skip the polishing and apply a thin layer of it.

Since I know you all like pictures, here you go!

The decals arrived! The work on the cf seatstays is far from done, but I was so excited that I just had to unmask the frame, remove the old decals, and apply the new ones!

Looks really good in my opinion.



Old vs new:

Prefer the old by a wide margin to be honest.

Well I guess that's where our opinions diverge. I love decals that are in your face and shout "LOOK AT ME! LOVE ME! COVET ME!"

Great score!

I've always wanted a Ti Merlin.
Looks like you have been putting in a lot of hard work restoring it .Can't wait to see the finished product. Do you have close ups of the work on the carbon (before and after?)

What you love is all the matters. If the newer decals have you really excited about this awesome bike then rock on.

i suspect most in C&V will prefer classic decals.. the new ones are too new looking for my taste but clearly AlphaDogg is stoked

I also like old ones. I want to strip the decals off my litespeed. Decals shouldn't take away from the beauty of a clean TI frame IMO, but whatever floats your boat.

+1 - part of the beauty of ti is the minimalism and natural beauty. I don't want the $25 decal taking attention away from the frame. The old Merlin decals weren't too intrusive IMO...they had some simple grace. That new one looks like it belongs on CF with SRAM Red