Sent this email today:
Mr Turnbull:
I live in Seattle and I recently bought a used Franklin Frame. I’ve built it up (with a Rholoff hub) and next week I’m off to ride it from Golmud in China to Lhasa in Tibet. I know that I’m going to get questions about the bike and I wonder if you could help me with a couple of things:
1) the serial number is hard to make out under the paint, but it appears to be either 072 or 012 on the top line and 08 underneath. Does that give you enough so that you can you tell me how old of a frame I’ve got?
2) the frame came with S&S couplers, an eccentric bottom bracket, and instead of cable stops it had a cable guide running out the right chainstay to a derailleur hanger. Can you give me an idea what that design was intended to accommodate? In particular, why the eccentric if the set-up anticipated a derailleur?
Thanks so much.
Jerry Scott
We’ll see.