Post 100 - how did that happen? and an analysis of a missed opportunity

This is my 100th post since starting this blog at the end of 2012, how did that happen? In honor of this milestone I have posted a shot above of the Shimano Arabesque shifters that came on the Miyata 912 I found for $25 at a garage sale.  The coolest component on any bike I have worked on. Its been fun and I hope I have another 100 posts in me.  Its kind of odd many of the blogs that inspired me have gone dark or at least dormant; Ecovelo, Hugh's bike blog, , Old 10 speed gallery , My Ten Speeds  and some have scaled back Trailer Park Cyclist but I am still plugging away -not smart enough to know when to move on lol.




Montreal express

I also thought I would take you through an opportunity that got away from me.  As you know I have been a bit obsessive about Craigslist lately and one morning as I am checking for new listings -a Peugeot for $15.00 pops up.  Now the 2 pictures were pretty crappy and neither took in the whole bike but I was intrigued by a couple of things:

• $15 a good place to start, old Mt bikes aren't as popular (yet) as road bikes but unless its total trash I could make a profit starting there
• Although the photos were crappy I could see what appeared to be a "garage queen" -barely ridden, paint and graphics looked good an ideal rebuild candidate
• I have been interested in finding a lugged steel MT bike to work on and I think they would make an excellent bullet proof commuter.
• Based on the catalog description on the internets the Montreal express although near the bottom of the line still had some solid components so it would probably be worth $15 just for the Sugino cranks, Shimano thumb-shifters etc.

So I dropped them an email that morning, no response, I texted, no response.  I wasn't too surprised based on the price my assumption was it went fast but a week later the ad is still there on CL! Again I assume that they are just to lazy to take it down but I email anyway, nada.

$155 on CL

Then I see this ad today on CL, and while I can't say for sure its the same bike based on the fact its in the same neighborhood as the first sale and its the same model and color I am 97.2% sure its the same bike.  The new CL ad has the following description:

• Peugeot Montreal Express
• Would make a great commuter or city bike (Yeah!)
• Nice easy rolling street tires (New tires - nice job)
• 18 speed gearing (3x6) with new cables and thumb shifters (replacing not just wiping down -nice)
• Big comfortable seat and a rear rack (the original had a rack)

So they did exactly what I would have done and if they sell it at this price, not unreasonable, that is an easy $50-75 profit after the new parts (not the labor of course) and a clean up. 

I suspect that the seller replaced the original thumb-shifters with the inexpensive SunRace ones pictured, I have used them and they work great, so they could keep or sell the nicer 80's thumb-shifters that came with the bike, and comfort saddles are a dime a dozen.  The new tires are a nice and probably necessary touch, I might have gone with some nicer cruiser pedals rather than the resin ones but that's just nit-picking.

I am guessing the seller got the bike because A) they were checking, B) were in the same neighborhood and C) unlike me could probably go right away rather than after work.  A & B are why I got the Nishiki in the previous post.  It would have been a sweet get but that's the way it goes, chapeau to my fellow old bike refurbisher.

are you mocking me?



Until next time...Ride.Smile.Repeat



Market Run

West Seattle Farmers market

When my schedule allows on Sundays I like to go to my local Farmers market and that means riding the bike.  Its a paltry 10 block round trip but it gets me turning the pedals and puts a smile on my face.  By turns I am embarrassed its the only riding I am doing  of late and happy that I am getting out at all.  Congrats to any of you who participated in bike to work day last week.  I have participated a number of times but not this year.

In addition to the usual assortment of fresh organic fruits and veggies I got a very pleasant surprise when I found strawberries today.  We had a fairly warm spring which has put the strawberries about 2 weeks ahead of schedule, I'm not complaining.



One of the many things I like about riding or walking around my neighborhood is getting to see so many vintage bikes.  I am not sure if my area has more old bikes riding around or if its just my finely tuned bike geek radar but I see them all over, especially when the sun comes out.

Today I saw a nice blue Nishiki in classic 10 speed configuration.

A few weeks I saw a lovely Peugeot mixte - a fairly common sight- with city bars

And a much less common Lotus Odyssey touring bike

I see alot of bikes, like the Peugeot mixte above that have been adapted for use as city bikes.

A nice Bridgestone with milk crate rear rack.

A Miyata adapted with city bars with gorgeous Ergon grips.

A Fuji Sports 10 with north-road riser bars.

And then of course like the Nishiki up top you get some classic 10 speeds relativity unchanged.

A mid 80s Raleigh sporting bamboo fenders, not sure of the model but based on the down tube shifters and drilled brake levers its probably a super course or above.

Univega Viva Sport.

A red  Trek 720 a mid 80s touring bike with 531 tubing and canti brakes.

And it is possible to park your bike for too long....

Well I am going to go juice some of that lovely produce.  As always.

Ride. Smile. Repeat.

Le Mixte Français Part Deux

Hello friends! after a long hiatus I am finally posting.  I got this PH18L Peugeot Mixte back in March because I had Mixtes on the brain (curse you Mixte Heaven) and it was a great price and I thought I could build it up as a nice ladies city bike.  I then recalled that my daughter had outgrown her bike and the grandparents had promised a bike as a birthday present (January).  Since this was a small size I asked the girl if she liked it, she did, and checked the size, it fit, and then checked to see if the grandparents had done anything about a new bike, they hadn't, and if they were interested in financing the bike and new parts if I supplied the labor, they were.  So with all that settled I ordered some parts and then promptly did nothing.

The bike had serviceable tires one it but they showed their age and had kind of a ugly mustard brown sidewall so I asked the girl what kind of tire she wanted showing her a variety of options, she chose the Schwable Delta cruiser white walls.  Very nice.

The cables were also serviceable but were a fraying mismash of blue housing that matched the bike color (probably original) and basic black so once again I showed the girl a variety of options and she went with the Jagwire gold braided.  She has style that girl and she will be my consultant on all future mixte builds.

The original saddle was also serviceable but tired and it had a tear in it so the girl picked out this basic Selle Royale city cruiser saddle.

As I said this bike sat for months for reasons I don't quite understand myself but it dawned on me that A) summer was slipping away, B) the grandparents were asking how the bike was coming along and C) I didn't have to do a complete tear down (gasp) I just needed to make it rideable for the summer.  So that is my dirty little secret on this bike, I am doing it backwards, I hung all the pretty new parts so it can be ridden now and when the dark, damp winter comes I will do the hidden work on bearings and the like.

Now even though I took a "short cut" to get this bike on the road while the sun is still high in the sky I did put in some work;

• Seat post removed and greased
• Stem removed and greased
• frame wiped down with armor all wipes
• checked headset for play
• hubs checked for smoothness, wheels checked for true
• crank checked for smoothness and pedals for spin
• new shift and brake cables and housing and adjustments
• checked chain for wear then cleaned and lubed it, checked freewheel for wear
• new saddle
• new tires and tubes

This winter I will rebuild all the main bearings, give it a 3 step wax job and rebuild the pedals and maybe put on a new freewheel and chain but it was great to see the smile on my girls face when she saw the finished product today and got to ride it it around.

it actually works!

In profile

Front view

rear view

I half jokingly told her that she is my rolling billboard and that if any ladies compliment her on the bike she can tell them that her dad can build them one.  Now I just need to ride my own bike and then I can go for a spin with my girl.  Then I can take my own advice and ride, smile and repeat.

Le Mixte Français

Lately I have been visiting Mixte Heaven on Facebook way too often and it has put Mixtes on my brain, especially the cool split tube european kind.  So there I was looking through Craigslist at Mixtes I didn't really need, and I came across a lovely blue Peugeot at a reasonable price.

Even at a good price it survived the weekend and I was able to pick it up during the week.  Turns out this bike is not just a Peugeot but a made for the french market one that came to Seattle with a French family who is going back to France and didn't want to lug a 30 lb. Mixte with them.

I haven't nailed down the exact model or year but its similar to the "all weather" UE-18 style bike.  Peugeot had different components for bikes in different markets.  This bike has 700c wheels rather than 27 inch and presta value tubes rather than schrader for instance.  Instead of center-pull brakes it has some entry level side pull brakes.  And I guess instead of north road handlebars these are Le Rue Nord.

I really like that this bike came standard with fenders and a cool integrated rear rack painted to match the frame,

unfortunately the bike didn't come with a front lamp although based on the bracket holes in the front fender it had one originally.  Another cool feature is the Peugeot branded bell which I understand are rare and expensive, I looked on ebay and one was for sale in the UK for $60, which is about what I paid for the entire bike.

The bike does have the standard 70s Peugeot drive-train, Simplex of course.

downtube Derlin simplex shifters

And now I really need to stop acquiring project bikes! although for this one I could probably do a "flip" if I really wanted to as its in nice shape to start.  I would like to give it the full treatment, however, and with spring coming and perhaps the addition of a basket I think it will fetch a good price.  On the other hand my daughter continues to sprout up and has outgrown her last bike and she likes the look of this one so maybe I will build it up for her.

Until next time ride, smile and repeat.

1979 Peugeot Sports (UO-8) part III- Finished

In my last post I had walked away from a frustrating session with this bike, but with some time and contemplation I walked back and was able to get a 5 speed free wheel on the rear hub to work with the new derailleur.  After dialing in the shifting I was finally able to move onto to running new brake cables and housing.

neat and tidy with cable end cap

And cleaning up the shift cables by cutting off the excess and crimping the cable ends.

This is definitely more of a "franken-bike" than I am used to building up but I decided early on I was going for a functional beater bike and I think thats what I ended up with.  It has mismatched wheels (700c rear, 27 inch front) and used but functional tires.  Not one piece of the original drive train remains; a new Shimano RD and vintage SunTour FD and stem shifters replacing broken or non-existent Simplex pieces.  As I mentioned in the last post the front and rear brakes are mismatched to accommodate the funky wheel-set.  The pedals are scavenged from my parts bin.  I did however put work into the bike to make it sound functional transport;

• New rear derailleur
• New shift cables and housing
• New brake cables and housing
• New Chain
• New bar tape
• Headset rebuilt
• brakes and shifting adjusted
• Seat-post and stem removed, cleaned, lubed and reset.

Overall I think it turned out alright and its now on Craigslist where I have been honest in my description and fair, I think, in my pricing so we will see if it gets snapped up.

Now that my work stand is free,  I have my Nieces Raleigh mixte to build up and I also have a few new bits for the Motobecance Grand Touring, so I should have plenty to keep me busy on the upcoming long weekend.  Until next time ride.smile.repeat.

1979 Peugeot Sports (UO-8) Part II-.....sometimes you just have to walk away

Earlier this month I revisited the Peugeot Sports.  While I knew I had money coming in from the new job it hadn't made through all the channels to me at that point so I thought I could quickly turn around the "Sports" and get some cash in my pocket.  I should have know better.   As I mentioned I got this bike relatively cheaply knowing it had some issues, and I thought, incorrectly, that I had all those issues covered.  You would think after doing the number of old 10 speed rehabs I have done that I would have a sharper eye for issues but I guess there is always room for learning and for humility.

At first things went pretty well; Pedals went on, the headset got rebuilt, I cleaned up, greased and reinstalled the seat-post and stem.  I got the original broken down Simplex stem shifters off the bike and replaced them with intact SunTour power ratchets.

The one armed bandit wouldn't work for a 10 speed

And then I got the old dried up bar tape off so I could clean up the bars.

When I got the bike it had no front derailleur and I had planned for that but before the day was through I would have issues with both the front and rear derailleurs.  I got the front mounted and thought I was well on my way.

Later, however when I thought I was ready to mount the chain I realized I had an issue with the front derailleur.

An "open" system doesn't work so well went you want to be able to shift your chain from small to large ring...lol.  I was able to fix this with some parts from the bin, but my troubles weren't over.  The rear derailleur which I thought was fine presented an issue when I started to run the shift cables.

The pivot in the middle of the picture above is supposed to to have a cable guide running through it but the part where the cable housing is supposed to run into was sheared off.  Fortunately I had a new Shimano 6 speed RD on hand that was intact.

Problem solved...no, but more on that in a bit.  Now I was ready to move onto the wheels.  Since I was building this up as a low cost commuter I was going to use some low mileage Specialized Tri-sport black walls 27 X 1/4" tires I had left over from the Peugeot sports.  The front wheel went off with out a hitch but when I got to the rear I realized I had over-looked something kind of important.

Yep the front wheel was 27" but the rear was 700c, they are close in size but not identical with a ISO sizing of 630 and 622 respectively.  I had other tires that could work and the different wheel sizes wouldn't materially affect how the bike worked but it did pose another issue, brake reach.  The Peugeot branded rear brake that came with the bike didn't have a long enough reach to hit the 700c rims-which might explain why it was missing a brake pad.

Once again the parts bin came through as I realized that I had a longer reach Weinmann center pull squirreled away that would accommodate the reach I needed.

my what long legs you have

Now that I had both derailleurs and the rear brake issues resolved it was time to run some shifter cables and mount the chain....and run into more issues! The free-wheel on this bike was a wide range 5 speed and the new long cage Shimano RD should have worked with it, but it didn't.  When I tried to move it into the low gear (largest cog) the whole system would jam up.  I thought I could fix that with a smaller range free-wheel so I mounted a six speed FW I had available to try it out only to realize that the extra gear meant the chain didn't have the frame clearance it needed in the smallest cog.

Not enough spacers to give the chain clearance on the smallest cog

That was the last straw and the point at which I decided it was time to walk away, so I could come back another day with no frustration, renewed energy, a fresh perspective and without the desire to break something.

With a few days away I realized I had another 5 speed FW with a smaller range cog set that might solve the issues I had experienced.

Original wide range 5 speed FW on right smaller range 5 speed on the left

Now might be a good time to share a couple tricks I have come across that can make getting a 30 year-old freewheel removed from the rear hub less of a headache.  First its important to note that there are a number of different freewheel removers out there to work with all the different manufacturers of Free-Wheels who each used a different interface to mount/remove their FW.  Standards anyone?  I have tools for Shimano, Falcon, Atom/Regina, SunTour, Maillard, and a few others and still run into FW I don't have the right tool for.  You will notice that in the shot above both FW use a two tooth interface, others use a spline some use 4 tooth and it goes on.  So step one is make sure you have the right tool, if you don't your local bike shop probably does.  Now even if you have the right tool sometimes it seems like you need to have as many arms as  Kali to hold the tool in place, secure the wheel and use a crescent wrench to apply pressure to the loosen the FW.  I find that using the quick release to hold the tool in place helps immensely, you want to tighten it enough to hold the tool firmly to the FW but loose enough so the FW can come unscrewed when you apply pressure.

The other issue is that since the chain moves clockwise it is constantly tightening the FW to the hub.  In the normal course of operating the bike thats a good thing as you don't want your FW coming loose while riding, however, when you want to remove the FW that means its on there tight!   This where the breaker bar is your friend.  I don't recall how much I paid for a length of pipe to slip over the end of my crescent wrench, it wasn't much but it was worth every damn penny.  So far no FW has been able to resist the added foot in leverage I get from this pipe.

I am close to the finish line on the Sports and hope to be able to report success in my next post.  Until then Happy Summer and remember to ride, smile and repeat.