Rick, re this:
"As an aside, has anyone noticed how nice the Waterfords, with their lugged frames, classic proportions, and understated paint schemes are?"
Yes, indeed! Unfortunately the webmeister may complain if we talk about modern traditional bikes - though Ive tried to make the case to add this thread to the permissables on at least two occasions with Dale.
Would much rather be discussing Richards (Sachs and Moon), Brian B, Albert Eisentraut, Peter Weigle, Waterfords - even and a merging of good available parts of any era with them then whether aluminum bikes belong on the list or why some old part is better than a new one even though the writer has never used the new one.
Its Dales list to own and manage ......... But I remember what happened to the game when the kid who owned the baseball bat tried to control the rules of play. Tom Rawson