HA! $200- Are you trying to steal it? I think maybe the sophistication of Cabe collector opinion is snobbish here. On the other hand there aren't many of us old pharts around to place a value on it and the kids have been dumbed down somehow- I'd at least try for $350 or $400. If you put the head badge on and bought a set of decals, even more. The dilemma is: how much effort do you want to put into it? If you sold it piece by piece on ebay it might clear a grand.....
An older Paramount is never "toasted" if it's not bent up or rusted.
Here's an amusing situation I've thought about writing of on this forum and this might be the place for it.
Apparently- I'm guessing, but fairly sure- my old '74 Paramount track bike has been for sale on ebay the past several months at least- currently ended, but I've seen it relisted several times now- they want WAAAY too much- and even though it has some sentimental value, I probably would not buy it back unless I was flushing dollars down the toilet-
http://rover.ebay.com/rover/1/711-5...0001&campid=5335809022&icep_item=123703459136
My parents gave me this bike on my 21st birthday in February 1975- a 22" silver mist paramount that retailed at the time for about $350. Although we had no track then in Indiana for hundreds of miles, and I was mostly a climber I wanted a track bike and convinced I need some track experience. By then I had been racing about four years and though mostly an "A" or "B" category senior rider, I rode a "C" race up at Northbrook that first summer, where I got caught in a huge wreck and trashed the deep steel drop bars that came on it, on a metal rope support, before taking another support in my back. And after that it just sported an alloy stem and alloy drops. I never got a lot of track time, but rode it in the foothills of the Rockies at Colorado Springs on a fixed gear when the snow was so thick it froze our derailleurs. And I rode at Detroit and Encino and once at Trexlertown and at the Olympic Velodrome at Dominguez Hills- where I retired in 1984 and sold the track bike- I knew I'd never lug it through an unsettled life- on consignment at a bike shop in Carson CA near the velodrome- I think for about $250 or 300.
So a couple months ago I came across this ad of the old ride on ebay and in a place hailing from Pasadena. I'm just really calculated guessing that even in a city like L/A. there can''t be that many silver mist track Paramounts that size- although there are changes-
the front fork has been changed- probably crashed- and replaced with one all chrome, with less rake not indigenous to 1974- the wheels also now have flat spokes I never had or used back when- and the aero Campy seatpost is a later item from the early 80's. The hideously drilled out chainring is not the original Campy, but I also often used a Sugino knockoff I won at some race with 168 arms instead of 165 and a smaller ring. I can't recall how it was set up when I sold it 35 years ago. Arc en Ciel sew up rims were fairly heavy and mostly for training or rough road races so I don't think those were on it, although I was street riding it at the end, so who knows? The stem is slightly shorter, but the Alfredo Binda toe straps look very familiar and what I used mostly toward the end, beautiful friends.
Anyway- there it is- I can hardly ride at all anymore without electric assist (hypertension, crashes and beatings) and no room either.
My mother passed on in 2011 but my old man is 94 and will be here Friday passing through. Time flies and life goes on. That black Paramount is probably worth more than $200 but how bad do you need it?
Here I am on the Major Taylor Velodrome in Indianapolis at the very first event before they painted lines on the track circa 1980/81