Depending on how nice of a paint job they tried to do you may be in a bit of luck.
Sometimes household paint comes off pretty easily just by giving it a bit of scrubbing with mineral spirits and paper towels. Barring that, putting on a light bit of paint remover and wiping it off much sooner than called for in the directions - Like nearly right away- will remove just the top layer, leaving what was original underneath mostly undisturbed. I have a CCM that I'm very slowly working on that way. Silver paint over the original black, but I'm recovering the decaled parts and the pinstriping pretty well.
Of course if they sanded the decals off in hopes of doing a decent job of the painting there may not be anything to find. But you'll find that out pretty quickly, and still be no worse off than you are now.
At best, you'll find the decals, and maybe some not so awful original paint.
Steve Birmingham Lowell, Massachusetts USA
Message: 4 Date: Thu, 6 Aug 2009 19:58:59 +0100 From: Peter Brown <peterg.brown@ntlworld.com> Subject: [CR] Witcomb Cycles and E A Boult transfer help To: <classicrendezvous@bikelist.org> Message-ID: <DB4B53FC88044AE4AC64F000FB81586D@nonefpfvwek4mv> Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
A few months ago I acquired a frameset which the owner from new told me was a c1950 E A Boult. It is built with nicely tweaked Oscar Egg lugs and the tubing size and weight leads me to believe 531 tubing Unfortunately, a few years ago, the owner hand painted the frame with household gloss paint and the transfers have totally disappeared. I have now been offered a second E A Boult frame which is in a very similar state. I would like to restore the frames but I am unable to start the process due to a lack of transfers. I know of the link between E A Boult and Witcomd Cycles of London and contacted Witcomb earlier in the year through their website to enquire about Boult transfers. They informed me that they had some originals, but that they were packed up ready for moving premises which would be completed by June. I have now tried to contact them several times by telephone and email and have not had replies to either, and their website just says to be re-launched later in 2009. Does anyone know the current whereabouts/ status of Witcomb? I have been told that they may have actually gone out of business altogether.
I could reproduce the Boult transfers myself and have them professionally printed onto vinyl - if only I knew what they looked like! As an alternative therefore to information about Witcomb does anyone have a frame with original Boult transfers, or any illustration of them of any kind. All I would need would be a full-on photograph, scan or trace and dimensions, and they would then be available for anyone else needing them.
Peter Brown, Lincolnshire, England