First I want to thank all of you for the many thoughtful responses you sent regarding the Carpenter frame I won on ebay. I found them all very insightful in different ways, and they helped to clarify my thinking.
Opinions were about evenly split between repaint, or just clean up and ride. This bike will mostly be on show, but all my bikes are potential riders (except for one), so it will be ridden too.
I went back to the photos of the frame on the auction, and looked at them very carefully. It appears that the frame has been badly touched-up, and, in particular, the fork has been completely repainted--badly--in a color slightly different than the rest of the frame.
Normally, these days, after paying for many restorations, I lean toward *never* repainting, unless a frame has been tampered with beyond toleration. In this case, the Carpenter is beyond my toleration. So, it'll get repainted.
British frames were resprayed regularly as a matter of
course by careful owners..so, I have less trouble repainting
a UK frame like this--particularly one with minimal
graphics--and the graphics are available from Lloyd's.
Also, I can have it repainted in the UK, and the job, by
definition to my thinking, will be more authentic. If I go
with
Mercian, for instance, I'll get a very traditional sort of
job. Not superhumanly perfect, but a nice clean job at a
reasonable price. Which is exactly what some UK owner would
have expected 30 years ago. I sympathize with Doug Fattic's
position. The temptation of an over-the-top job is always
there.
But, to me, such a job would be less rewarding than one that
would be in the style of a typical UK paint-job of the
period. Purely
a matter of personal taste. To me, a typical UK job of
today on the
frame seems more authentic. And it will look very nice.
Take
a gander at this Gillot Pathracer. Argos
did the job, and it turned out pretty nicely:
http://www.wooljersey.com/
This bike is stunning. Matt G. put it together in flawless period style. So, that restoration worked well.
Any frame restoration is a crapshoot--as in craps, if you lay your bets wisely you can do ok--and I hate to lose the original mojo of any frame. But, in the case of this Carpenter, it seems to me the builder would have wanted the frame to look its best, all his lovely handwork displayed to maximum effect. That is impossible in its current state.
So, the frame will be restored. My only question goes out to our UK members (or anyone else who had used UK painters)...who do you guys like for the job? I've used Argos with good results. As I mentioned in an earlier post, their free-hand lining of the seat-stay caps was crummy, but everything else was first-rate. Mercian is tempting for their traditional methods and long experience with this kind of thing..and their lining will probably be better. I'd welcome input from any UK member who has an opinion about the matter.
Thanks again to everyone for your help. Note that this subject will be discussed in greater detail during the Saturday presentations at the Cirque. Be there or be square..
Oh...a call for subject frames and bikes for the presentation will be going out to the list shortly.
Charles Andrews SoCal
"The deeper I go in considering the vanities of popular reasoning, the lighter and more foolish I find them."
--Galileo Galilei