As I collect more and more of my favorite bikes I still run up against the same question. To restore or not to restore. One line of thinking is,if it still looks like a bike ,leave it alone. There is that cute little catchy phrase ....I'TS ONLY ORIGINAL ONCE. Following that same idea then one should leave those nos fenders ,nos torrington pedals ,and all the other nos parts alone. The bike should be left as is, as found. I guess the only option would be to leave the original rotten split stock tires on it and use it as wall art. The only reason for whipping this dead horse , is my inner turmoil of maybe destroying all the peices of history that are being bestowed in my custody. For sure its mine and I can cut it up with a torch if I so desire. What if I stumbled into King Tut's tomb ...find the coffin and decide to spray it flat black because it looked so rat. There are some truths in life.....oil will eventually run out and so will old barn find bikes. Should we as custodians of the bike past ,change our ways ,and only put old bikes back like they were, with the parts we have available .Choosing to rat only the newer junk China bikes, that God willing , will never be collectable . We should search inside ourselves and decide if we are in fact wiping out a large part of history with our hobby as it is now. I have decided to turn over a new leaf and stop desecrating any old bike. Ol Tut's coffin would have looked cool with a spotlight and maybe some flames. :roll: