My strong opinion:
Unless you're willing to repaint, live with the shifter braze-ons. Don't mess with them. Life is a compromise. Make them work. You might learn to love bar-ends. If you must remove the braze-ons, have a pro do it right, and then pay a bunch of money for paint done right. Need some bar-ends? I've got three-four pair. By the way -- old-style bar-ends can be set up under the bar tape, a la modern Ergo cables. Very satisfactory, and arguably cleaner than an installation where the cables pop out of the bars below the brake levers. Use Ergo/STI housing.
I think the dropout eyelets are more negotiable. I assume that the eyelets are mild steel (I assume, since I don't know what they are, if they really were added), but we know the drops are nice, soft, forgiving, mild steel. The eyelets will grind off easily, with no danger of tube damage. If you must delete them, grind them off carefully with a Dremel (I'd use a cutting wheel in my Dremel, not a grinding wheel), and then touch up the paint. Should be relatively subtle.
However, I think the frame should be respected. Just let it be. Build it, admire it, accept its idiocyncracies, and ride it. It'll be cool. Let it be. No, it's not possible to remove braze-ons w/o damage to the finish.
Peter Bridge sdcausa
In a message dated 7/30/2005 12:31:52 PM Pacific Daylight Time, chris_arkell@msn.com writes:
First, the downtube has no shifter bosses. Instead, it has looped cable-end guides such as you see in contemporary framesets with STI-style shifters. Obviously, this bike was set-up originally with bar-end shift levers. I would like to utilize conventional Campy NR downtube shift levers.
Second, the frame appears to have pannier rack touring eyelets added to the rear Campy drop-outs (despite definitely being a racing geometry). The eyelets are super thick and don't look as though they are part of the original Campy pieces.
My question is this; Is is possible to remove these braze-on's without inflicting damage to the original finish?