They Need It Like A Hole In The....

A few years ago, it seemed that "drillium" might make a comeback.  A few companies, including Velo Orange, were offering drilled-out versions of  chainrings and other components. Some still are. VO's drilled-out chainrings are actually pretty:  They seemed  seemed to be covered with pindots.  I'd actually put them on one or two of my bikes.

Back in the heyday of drillium, it seemed that anything and everything that could take a drill--and a few things that couldn't--got the treatment.  In addition to chainrings, shift levers and brake lever handles commonly got drilled.  When I first began to work in a bike shop, one of the jokes about Lambert/Viscount bikes was that they came with drilled-out tires and water bottles.

Seriously, though, some cyclists were manic with drills.  I saw toe clips and other kinds of clips--for brake cables and water bottle cages--perforated, ostensibly in the name of saving weight.  Sometimes, components that really didn't need to be any lighter were riddled with pockmarks, like the Huret Jubilee, still the lightest (and to my eye, prettiest) rear derailleur ever made.  Or this derailleur I saw on eBay:

The first-generation SunTour Cyclone might be the second-lightest rear derailleur ever made.  It's certainly lighter than any made today.  Oh, and I think the silver version with the black inset is the second-prettiest derailleur ever made:  all the more reason it shouldn't be defaced with a drill!

When Does Width Matter?

The importance of tire width is one of the cycling world's long-running debates.

Because I came of age in the aftermath of the '70's Bike Boom, I was inculcated with the notion that, in the immortal words of Robert Browning, "less is more".  That meant, among other things, that a lighter bike is always a better bike.  Not surprisingly, the minimalist aesthetic ruled:  What other decade could have brought us the Huret Jubilee or SunTour Cyclone (first version) rear derailleurs--or drillium?

(The Jubilee is so minimalist that the version with drilled-out cages almost seems extreme.  Talk about "less is more"!)

So, it makes sense that I would also grow up with the idea that narrower tires would make your bike faster.  All other things being equal, they do, because less rubber on the road means less resistance.  But I've since come to learn that riding too narrow a tire for your purpose can actually slow you down if it's making you ride more cautiously--or simply wearing you out with the extra shock and vibrations it transmits.

If a very narrow tire can defeat the a cyclist's purpose in riding it, then I think it's fair to ask whether too wide a tire can do the same.  Or, more precisely, is there a point at which any additional tire width doesn't add traction, resiliency or durability?

Over the years, I've come to the conclusion that on loose, powdery snow, a tire's tread or compound makes more difference than its width.  On the other hand, on deep, heavier-packed snow, knobby mountain bike tires are a better idea.  

But what about ice?  My guess, based on limited experience, is that a wider rear tire might help with initially gaining traction, but once the bike is moving, whether you slip or fall isn't going to have much to do whether you're riding 700X23 or 26"x2.5 tires.  If anything, I think having studs or spikes on your tires will do more than anything else to help you across a glacial expanse.  

From Jonny Cycles

Hmm...It looks like someone might have actually tested my hypotheis.  I wonder what his conclusion might be.

Paint...I Mean, Anodize...It Black

To many bicycle enthusiasts, “classic” components come in a spectrum of colors ranging from silver mist to gleaming chrome.  Some purists—or pedants who fancy themselves as such—believe that all components worth using are polished, preferably to a mirror finish.  Cranksets like the Stronglight 93, 63 and 49, Specialites TA Pro Vis (a.k.a. Cyclotouriste) or Nervar Star are among the preferred components of those with such aesthetic preferences.  So do Maxicar hubs, Huret Jubilee derailleurs and old-style 3TTT bars and stems.  

Stronglight 93 crankset in its natural habitat:  on a Peugeot PX-10.

 They’re all lovely pieces and perfectly valid on modern as well as classic bikes.  And, oh, yes, Campagnolo Gran Sport and Record stuff made until 1985 or so.  They had a more buffed finish but took on a nice sheen that looked great on just about any bike, especially a silver Cinelli.

Huret Jubilee in its natural habitat:  a Rene Herse

 

But not all components made before the lava field of carbon fiber oozed across, and blanketed, the cycling landscape looked like they were chromed or polished so that you could use them for shaving or putting on your makeup.  A couple of years before I started taking rides of more than a few miles—a year or two after the ‘70’s Bike Boom ended—a cult of sorts developed around black anodized parts.  

Original Campagnolo Super Record rear derailleur, circa 1974

It seems to have started when, in the middle of the decade, Campagnolo introduced its Super Record line.  It was identical to the Record line (which included the Nuovo Record rear derailleur) but included titanium bolts and bottom bracket and pedal axles.  And, to distinguish it visually from the Record line, the knuckles of the rear derailleur were anodized black.  So were the pedal cages and chainrings.  

(The hubs and brakes were the same as those in the Record line.  The brake levers had drilled-out handles and, ironically, weighed two grams (!) more than the non-drilled levers.  Apparently, the handles were made of thicker metal to compensate for the drilling.)

Sugino Mighty crankset, circa 1975

Maillard 700 pedals.  Don't you just love rhe red dust caps?

Once Campagnolo introduced its Super Record components, other companies got onto the black-anodized bandwagon.  Stronglight, Shimano, Sugino and other chainrings were available in noir versions.  Lyotard, Maillard, Mikashima (MKS) and Kyokuto (KKT)—the leading pedal makers, along with Campagnolo, at that time—offered black-caged and all-black versions of their products.  And, once 3TTT and Cinelli started selling black handlebars and stems, Phillipe and Pivo of France as well as Nitto and Sakae Ringyo of Japan followed suit.

SunTour Cyclone rear derailleur, circa 1975

SunTour and Shimano, naturally, offered several models of their derailleurs with black knuckles, like Campagnolo, or all-black versions.  I think the SunTour Cyclone silver rear derailleur with black accents is the prettiest shifting mechanism, besides the Huret Jubilee, ever made.  

Shimano Dura Ace hub, circa 1976

And Shimano went as far as to offer all-black versions of its Dura Ace components.  I think their hubs, with bright silver oil hole covers and axle nuts, looked particularly nice.  Their silver crankset with black rings was also nice.

Original Jim Blackburn rack on a Dawes Galaxy:  verrry '70's!

When those black components—and Jim Blackburn racks and water bottle cages—found their way to the market, I—like most novitiate cyclists of the time—had never seen anything like them before.  But a very few longtime riders—like Fred DeLong, the long-serving technical editor of Bicycling! Magazine—had seen an earlier fad for black anodized components in the years before World War II.  DeLong mentioned it in one of his columns.  And he—or some other bicycle writer of the time—mentioned a still-earlier time, around the turn from the 19^th to the 20^th Century, when black parts were all the rage.

The mid-70s mini-craze for black parts lasted a few years.  Then, most component makers quietly dropped them.  About a decade later, black chainrings and, later, other parts, started to appear on mountain bikes.  Road bikes reverted to the polished- (or buffed-) silver look in parts.  That wasn’t all bad, especially if said components were from SunTour’s Superbe Pro line.

SunTour Superbe Pro track hub

That aesthetic—and SunTour itself—disappeared around the time carbon-fiber bikes and parts reached the mass market.   The past few years, though, have seen something of a resurgence of shiny silver stuff as cyclists (mainly non-racers) are discovering (or re-discovering) the versatility, durability, beauty and ride quality of classic steel frames, or modern frames inspired by them. 

The Man Who Made--And Broke-- SunTour

Writing about SunTour yesterday got me, as Kurt Vonnegut wrote in Breakfast of Champions, "woozy with deja vu".  (How can you not love that phrase?)

You see, I started to take long rides as the '70's Bike Boom was gaining force.  That was also almost the exact time that American cyclists began to glom onto SunTour derailleurs.  

Although SunTour's wares would have dominated the North American (and other) cycling markets on their own merits, the fact that, around 1980, more bikes were equipped with the Japanese company's derailleurs, shifters and freewheels--and more of those parts were sold as replacements--than all of the other component manufacturers combined, is the result, at least in part, of the work of one person.

 


I'm talking about Frank Berto.  If you're a bit younger than I am, you probably think of him as the author of The Dancing Chain, a book for gear geeks if there ever was one. (It's an engaging read nonetheless.)  But for those of us who were around in the prehistoric days of cycling, when all bike manuals were written in Latin (OK, Italian and sometimes French and English), he will be forever known as the technical editor of Bicycling magazine.

Now, I know some of you (again, who weren't around in those times) might be scratching your heads and saying, "Bicycling had a technical editor"?  Those of you who are a bit younger might not believe that magazines had technical editors.  And, if you're younger still, you might not believe that magazines existed.

Trust me, they did.  And Bicycling--as much as I and others complained about it--was actually something more than the advertising vehicle or lifestyle tab it's been for at least two decades. 

As he tells it on his website,  Frank Berto bought a secondhand Schwinn Varsity in 1971, when he became involved with his sons' Boy Scout troop.  He was then a 42-year-old mechanical engineer who, until that time, hadn't been on a bike in more than two decades.  On his first ride with his son's troop, all of the young whippersnappers blew past him on a long and winding hill that would be his Road to Damascus."If I had a bigger sprocket in the back, I could pedal up this lousy hill," he thought.  Shortly thereafter, he rode to his local bike shop and bought a SunTour 14-34 freewheel (Varsities came with 14-28) and a SunTour VGT rear derailleur.  

He tried to install them himself, but realized he had no clue as to what to do.  Nor, as it turned out, did the shop that sold him the parts.  None of the bicycle-related books (remember those?) in his local library were of any help.

His yearlong odyssey to lower the gears on that tank called the Varsity ended with him writing, first for Bike World and, not long afterward, for Bicycling.  After mining his own experiences, he conducted a series of tests and published his ratings of derailleurs that were available at the time.  The message of much of his work from that time can be more or less summed up with this sentence: "If you are unhappy with your shifting, the SunTour VGT is your best prescription".

The thing is, he was right.  The VGT, which cost about $10 at the time, could handle the freewheel he installed on the Varsity--and more.  And, because of its design, it shifted more easily and accurately on smaller racing freewheels than even the derailleurs supposedly designed for them.  Those derailleurs from Campagnolo and Huret cost four times as much.  Even the SunTour Cyclone, which came out a year or two after Berto made his pronouncement, cost less than half as much as those European derailleurs--and was lighter (and prettier) than any except the Huret Jubilee.

Ironically, for all that he did to build SunTour's reputation, he may have unwittingly contributed to its undoing.  When Huret came out with the Duopar touring derailleur in the late 1970's, he enthused about it. Up to that time, SunTour's shifting--especially on wide-range touring gears--was light-years ahead of everyone else's.  That anyone could make something better, even if only marginally so, seemed inconceivable.   And for Frank Berto to say so was like the CEO of the Bank of America endorsing socialism.

By that time, the folks working for SunTour were paying as much attention to Berto's articles as Anna Wintour does to fashion shows.  They panicked and made some ill-advised changes to some of their products.  

A few years after that, Berto praised one of the results of SunTour's changes:  the Superbe Tech derailleur.  He praised it even more lavishly than he did any previous SunTour product--or the Duopar.  It shifted as well as he said, and was beautiful.  But it also had some fatal design flaws--as did the Duopar--that truncated its lifespan to about 3000 km.  By that time, SunTour's patents had expired, and Shimano had adopted SunTour's most salient feature--the slant parallelogram--even faster than President Bush signed the Patriot Act after 9/11.  

Oh, how I miss SunTour.  And Bicycling magazine, when it had a technical editor.