I spent most of the day on my latest project, a '79 J.P. Weigle Sport Tourer. I had been detailing it out after some touch up and appreciating its' many unique features. It has a really different sort of cable routing set up on the down tube,and a nice heart shaped cutout on top of the bottom bracket lug (along with several other neat heart shaped cut outs in other places) was already known to be there, but imagine my surprise when looking on the other side of the bracket the rear derailleur guide had a sort of Kilroy face on it! It has a neat back brake bridge, too. It's a fun bike to work on.
I had noticed that it looked that someone had either painted the headset with a flat black paint or it had been anodized black or smoked like some later Campy parts. I took a few swipes at it and none of it came off. Looking at it more closely I saw that it is an Omas headset. It sure surprised me, I had encountered their bottom brackets before but had not actually seen a headset. I see from the archives that they came in different colored anodized finishes.
Now I am looking at it and wondering what to do. It looks like it's just dirty right now and sort of crummy. Should I seek to reblacken it and, if so, how? Should I try to remove the black and make it shiny? I like shiny on bikes. For now, I am leaving it alone until I get some feedback on what others might think. It sure isn't hurting anything, but it does not look like I want it to, either.
Any suggestions folks?
If anyone would like detailed pics of the bike, I have just re-sized some for E-mailing.
Tom Sanders
Lansing, Mi