George,
I remain skeptical regarding the pantographing. The picture of the brake levers is blurry, so I can't see whether it has a club or spade panto, but at least the color scheme matches that of the bike. The color scheme of the seatpost does not, and it appears to be the same panto pattern seen on circa 1972-73 Colnago Pantografata. That's clearly not a full set of matched panto parts based on the colors alone - why use club panto parts (at least as original equipment) when the frame is covered in spades? Your own post reinforces my skepticism about the sale. You state that the seller had a good idea of the bike's value, which you put at $9-11,000. Yet according to the listing someone paid between 20 and 50 percent more than the bike was worth - unnecessarily, if the seller understood it's value and was obviously willing to accept less. That's the source of my "red flag," not the bike itself, as I generally don't participate in "why did someone pay so much for that?" type discussions. There may be some explanation, but in the absence of that explanation, the way the sale went down still to me seems strange.
Ed Granger Lancaster, Pennsylvania, USA
____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ "Ed, It will interest you to know that the seller had a good idea of the value of what he was selling. And the bike certainly is in the $9-$11,000 range. I would have bought it in a heartbeat, if I didn't already own several Confentes. As a famous antique dealer once said to me," ask a high price, there's always time to come down." The seller actually solicited offers by through his add. In fact, if you find that it's unsold and available at a much lower price, I'll buy it forthwith. If one likes pantography, the bike was very nicely pantographed ( probably by John Grant)-Colnago never had a copyright on this iteration of cloverleaf pattern shown.? As you well know, the use of playing card symbols goes way back in bike decoration. Some aficionados also, perhaps rightfully, found fault with the bland white color, the thickness of the paint, etc. but, as the Spanish say, "it never rains to everyone's satisfaction." Best regards, George George Hollenberg MD"