KFC

Hello, I have come into a 1982 Team Fuji that has been sitting in a barn (literally!) for the last 40 years. It had very few miles on it when it was laid up and, except for a water bottle cage, is completely original. Everything works, albeit sluggishly. I would like to keep it in as original condition as possible and use it for casual riding on paved bike paths. The paint is generally in good condition with the exception of a few areas at the rear of the chain stays, the area where the top tube joins the seat tube and the cross member between the chain stays near the bottom bracket, where there is serious enough to obliterate the paint, but not so severe as to cause structural problems.

My question is - how do I deal with the rust spots? Should I use a rust converter? Any suggestions would be very much appreciated.

MrGastrognome

Congrats on deciding to bring your '82 Team Fuji back to the rolling. I too have an '82 Team Fuji that was a barn find which I fixed up over the winter. While I am certain there are members here with more experience restoring frames than I, here's what worked for me; WD-40 and a carpenter's pencil! This might be unconventional for bike restoration but hear me out.... I was restoring a few of my grandfather's carbon steel knives a few years ago and I was reading this English sword restorer's blog who said that pencil "lead" (graphite) was just abrasive enough to remove oxidation without removing patina from carbon steel. This method worked well on the knives and so I figured why not give it a shot on the rust spots on the Fuji. It cleaned up great, especially the chrome fork lugs. YMMV if the oxidation has gotten really deep and pitted the surface the results will be less impressive but for surface rust it worked like a charm.

Fun bike, I 650b swapped mine and upgraded to a 9 speed cassette swapped the 53/42 for a 44/30. It's an absolute blast to ride and gets lots of compliments.

Soody

Lets see some pictures!

You can do rust converter and touch up the paint. Care that rust converter dries black and will darken any colour you put over it. I personally like the look of janky paint touchups. Adds charm. So If you go that route i wouldn't worrk too much about having it look indistinguishable.
If the rust is not so bad and as you say you want to use it gently then simply scouring it off and waxing the frame should be enough. Turtle wax. Just scrub it with wd40 and a scotch pad. Aluminium foil can clean it off chrome without scratching.
Also consider treating the stays internally with lps-1, fish oil, framesaver or similiar.

I would consider more importantly the condition the wheels are in. Are the hub surfaces pitted, can you find replacement cones, cups etc, if they are, are the brake tracks good, any broken spokes. If the wheels are bad then i would probably throw out the notion of keeping it original and treat it as a custom build.

AdventureManCO 

Excited to see pictures. Regarding rust spots, a treatment of OA (oxalic acid) or Evaporust tend to work well if you soak a small piece of paper towel over the area, then cover with cling wrap. I've used the 'rust converter' type stuff but it has left me unimpressed. cudak888 has good working experience with OA on a gorgeous Huffy project of his, and can tell you more about it. Hee hee

KFC

Many Thanks - I will give it a try. The wheels are anodized a lovely brown color, and are in excellent condition. The spokes are not stainless. The front spokes look good, but a few of the rear spokes are rusted. Both wheels run true and spoke tension feels consistent. I doubt the bike has been ridden much more than 50 miles, and the original owner's son agrees. So cleaned and re-packed both wheel bearings, bottom bracket bearings and form bearings. All bearing are in excellent condition. They were caked in 40-year-old dried-up grease. Both brake hood had literally melted, and I was unable to save the original cloth bar ****. I still need to clean up the brakes and replace all the cables. Thanks again - I really appreciate your advice.

KFC

Many Thanks - I will give it a shot. Should I try to cover the treated area with some sort of f clear coat? Some has said that clear nail polish is good.

Thanks Again.

candango

KFC noted that the gum rubber brake hoods had melted due to the extreme summertime heat in the barn. They did, and the melting rubber destroyed the cloth bar tape. I cleaned the levers and searched for replacement hoods for the Dia Compe levers. I suspect the ones I found might be for a different model Dia Compe lever. Is there any way to tell which model lever I have? Are the lever bodies marked in any way? Thanks in advance

jet sanchEz

I've been on the hunt for one of these because they're well built and they have fender mounts

And the brown paint looks super cool

jamesdak 

Velobase.com is a good source for identifying parts.

https://velobase.com/ListComponents....8-b72b4ad94936


Also the spec list in the catalog may help.