Hi Dennis,
The '72 Fuji USA catalog shows this model, in the same color/graphics, as the "Track Racer Model TRS." 21" size only, double-butted hi-ten steel tubes, "brazed-up lugs and cut away shells." Despite the "brazed-up lug" callout, the frame looks lugless. Chromed head lugs and front/rear dropouts---probably a pretty nice mid-level club/starter track bike. It appeared in orange in the '73 catalog, then disappeared for a few years. A higher-spec Intermediate Track model appeared in the late '70s.
The seller is including a rear brake, but from the US catalog pics it doesn't look like the fork or rear brake bridge was drilled for brakes. Hmmm.....
As an aside, in the early '80s Fuji imported an interesting Nitto reversible handlebar stem. The quill was relatively short, mounted in the steer tube with a standard wedge/bolt, and had a square cross-section on top. The stem extension was angled, fit over the square quill and bolted in place. Used in a standard configuration it had a steep track-like drop of 40-deg or so; flipped upwards it looked like many an off-topic high-rise threadless ATB stem. It was aluminum, and despite a somewhat bizzare look was beautiful.
I was told it was designed for home-market keirin riders commuting to the track. They'd ride to the track with their bars turned upside-down to navigate traffic safely, then would flip 'em back to deep-drop for the track. The story may have even included that it wasn't legal for them to ride in traffic with deep-drop bars (with on-road tandems illegal in all but two prefectures, anything's possible...). I never got to confirm this with anybody at Nitto, and during the time I spent in Japan whenever I saw keirin riders on the road they always had their bars rightside-down.
I used one of these stems for a while in a losing effort to squeeze myself onto a too-small Fuji Professional frame. It was before Technomic stems were available in the US, and I couldn't get the bars up high enough....Anybody ever see one of these?
Cheers,
PB
On Sun, 16 Mar 2003 03:55:43 -0800, Dennis Young
<mail@woodworkingboy.com> wrote:
>Lugless Fuji pista at the Japanese auction. Has anyone seen these before,
>and have a idea of age? Photos at the bottom of the page. Thanks.
>
>http://page2.auctions.yahoo.co.jp/jp/auction/b34746972
>
>Dennis Young
>Hotaka, Japan
Paul C. Brodek
Hillsdale, N.J. U.S.A.
E-mail: pcb@skyweb.net