John wrote: "Well then, this will have to remain forever a mystery. I know what I saw and now I wish I'd taken delivery of the bike with those original rims just because of their rarity. I only ever saw another one like it at the time in Mike Barry's shop in Toronto. Perhaps Nishiki had originally speced the bike with Campagnolo rims that were promised, but didn't materialize, so they resorted to stickers. Everything is Campagnolo or 3TTT, except the Japanese bottle cage and toeclips."
This will not remain a mystery at all, you simply have mistaken recall as to what was fitted to the bike that you saw in Woodstock. Mike Barry, Mike Brown and all other people working at Bicyclesport at the time can confirm beyond a shadow of a doubt that no Nishiki with Campagnolo rims ever passed through the shop in the On-Topic period. I say this based upon personal experience as I worked at Bicyclesport for virtually all of the first half of the 80's and remember the bike in question. It did not have Campagnolo rims. If I am not mistaken, I believe they were Super Champion clincher rims. Nishiki at the time was little more than a marketing name and the bikes sold in Canada were often quite different from those found in other markets like the US. If I am not mistaken the same bike in the US was sold as the Professional SL or something like that. Likewise, I have a high end "Nishiki" BMX frame made out of full chro-moly from either 1978 or 1979. The same frame model, with almost identical serial numbers, was sold in the US as the top of the line Redline, so alternate and fanciful decals were used quite haphazardly.
All documents, first hand knowledge and logic preclude that a Nishiki could be fitted with Campagnolo clincher rims in 1981-82 as no mention or evidence of their existence (even in prototype form) exists before 1983. I would be more than happy to be proven wrong, but until you can come up with something more concrete than a fleeting glance close to 30 years ago, I feel very confident when I state that all Campagnolo clincher rims were made in the off-topic period. As Chas has stated, it would not at all be far-fetched that someone got carried away and put Campagnolo decals of the rims. This was indeed quite common in the day. I can state that I personally always removed all wheel decals from my bikes and replaced them with reflective Canadian Flag decals (still have many of those wheels).
Steven Maasland
Moorestown, NJ
USA