Charles,
I just looked at my '70 anf my '74 for lug gutout shape. The early bike has the "slimmer" club with the flat bottom to the stem. The '74 has the "puffy" club with the rounded bottom. I conclude that when the stopped doing 3 lug cutouts in '73 they changed to the puffy style cutout in the bottom headlug only. I'm still in favor of late '74 on this one only on account of the crown. Does anyone have what is positively a '75 with original paint and decals? My guess there: crown with club and "Colnago" on top, small oval in BB shell, fork tang is a crapshoot but I say a small club in most. Anyone? There is a funny decal "snafu" that appears on frames from about 1973 we can talk about later.
Brian Baylis
La Mesa, CA
>
> Brian Baylis wrote, in part:
>
> "Perhaps the
> frame is later in '74 as opposed to earlier. I wouldn't be
> surprised if
> the '75's all had the oval. I'm still in favor of '74."
>
> I think this frame is later than that, for one reason: the
> flower cut-out on the dt lug is smaller, less fluffy shape
> commonly seen around 1977 or 1978. Also, note that the
> flower stamp on the *fork* IS the fluffier shape. This
> suggests any number of things. The fork may be a
> replacement...but I think it's more likely that when this
> frame was built, forks with both varieties of crown were
> available, and the frame was simply assembled with the
> earlier fork-crown.
>
> Although the picture is fuzzy, there's no doubt in my mind
> that the flower cut-out in the dt lug is the later style.
> There was a period of a couple of years in the late 70s when
> Colnagos were made with the older long-point lugs, but the
> later, smaller, cutout. This transition seems to have
> ended by 1981 or so, when the medium-point lugs were
> standard, and the cutout itself may have gotten even
> smaller. But I haven't checked that latter fact, I'm
> relying on memory.
>
> Charles "Colnago nut" Andrews
> SoCal