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.

1979 Peugeot "Sports" (UO-8) project

I recently went to my favorite used bike haunt, bike-works, seeking a serviceable 27" rear wheel.  I wanted a complete wheel-set for a early 70s  Motobecane Mirage Frame-set that I think I have enough spare parts to build up and sell.  When I looked closely at the rear wheel I had in the parts pile I realized that in addition to broken spokes and surface rust that the inside of the rim had rampant rust and a nasty looking hole that nominated the whole wheel for the recycle bin.

I am rentus maximus destroyer of tubes! 

Another item on the agenda was looking to see if there were any complete bike projects that I could turn around into a serviceable bike to sell.  I have a more than a few frame-sets and as mentioned think I can make a serviceable Motobecane but I was looking for something a bit more straightforward.  To that end a Peugeot Sports caught my eye.

Peugeot Sports "As is"

It was listed for the modest sum of $25 in "as is" condition, so after a quick inspection I snapped it up.  The "as is" part meant the following no; pedals, chain, front derailleur or front shifter.  I am pretty sure I can pick all those missing pieces out of the parts bin and/or I would have replaced them anyway so this was the equivalent of the "mechanics special".  One thing that puzzled me was that the decals, and use of the name "Sports", indicated to me that it was a late 70s or early 80s model and yet it had cottered cranks!? Had someone retrofitted this French steed in its 35 year lifetime?   A little research on http://www.retropeugeot.com/ confirmed the date, 1979, and the fact that the entry level Peugeots, AO-8 & UO-8, still came with cottered cranks into the twilight of the 70s.

1979 Catalog shot for the Sports

Something unique about this bike is that after all the Peugeots I have worked on this is my first black model, I've done white, blue and yellow but never black which seems odd as I would assume it was a pretty standard color.  I still intend to finish its flasher big brother the UO-10 aka "Course" before I start on the sports but thought I would share its "as is" condition before I get started on it.  I have a nice a set of low mileage specialized black walled tires that came with the course that I plan to use on this bike, not my usual choice but I am going to try and keeps costs down on this build.

I have a nice set of stem mounted Sun Tour power shifters to take the place of these beat up and incomplete Simplex shifters.

I also scavenged a Sun Tour front derailleur at bike works to replace the missing one which I assume was a simplex with a plastic body that failed as so many of them did.

hmm something seems to be missing....

I think, hope, every thing else can be either rehabbed/rebuilt or can be found in the parts bin.  I find it interesting to have two different Peugeot models from roughly the same year, while they both share the same Carbolite 103 frame-set they differ significantly in how they were outfitted.  I might have to do a post about how the two compare.

Peugeots proprietary 103 tubing- CroMo.

Now that some decent weather has come, temporarily, to the Northwest I hope to make some progress on the "course" and get it up on Craigslist and here of course.  Until next time ride.smile.repeat.

Oh the Humanity! or What did they do to you little Peugeot? (May 2012)

Last May,  I went to my usual old bike haunt, BikeWorks, looking for parts but of course couldn't help but go look at what they had in the warehouse for project bikes. As it turned out they had a big line of bikes all leaned together that they hadn't sorted yet.  I was looking through them somewhat distractedly " Road bike, Mountain bike, Mixte, Hybrid, Stingray, Road bike..wait..what the HELL!" and then I took another look at what I had thought was a old Schwinn Sting Ray and then did a double take worthy of a bugs bunny cartoon- some ingenious and blasphemous bastard had taken a 70′s Peugeot UO-8 road bike and equipped it with Ape Hanger handle bars and Banana seat effectively turning it into a Schwinn Sting Ray. I was stunned, impressed and horrified all at once. Is it a Peug-winn, a Schwin-geot or a UO-Ray8?

What the hell happened?

And then the bike spoke to me in heavily accented English; Pleeze Monsieur, HELP!, remove my shame, Merde! undo what zey did to moi, I want to be ze road bike again. Lets Allez!  How could I possibly walk away?  When one of the other customers overheard me telling the wrench I was getting the bike solely to restore it to its natural state, he offered to take the ape hangers and banana seat off my hands for $10,  since the bike was only $25 I was able to take on another bike project I didn't need for a net of $15 bucks.


 Once I stopped shaking my head over the absurdity of what had been done to this former road bike,

I realized that except for the saddle,  handle bars and brake levers I had a pretty complete road bike and in fact it didn't take much digging around the garage to mock up a road bike once I had stripped the offending ape hangers and banana seat off.

And although it was "only" a lowly entry level UO-8 it still had its charms...

classic 70s head badge

Atax stem with made in France flourish and non plastic Simplex stem shifters

Once I got down to business cleaning it up, replacing all the standard pieces and cleaning and rebuilding the bearings it all came together pretty nicely.

Once I had it back to its 70′s entry level road bike glory, it sold in a day on Craigslist to a nice young lady who teaches science to kids.

Ride.Smile.Repeat.

1974 Peugeot UO-8 Blue (November 2011)

Make: Peugeot
Model: UO-8
Year:  1974 (best guess)
Obtained: Sept 2011
Found: Bike Works co-op
Paid: $5.00 (Frame-set plus a few parts)

Once upon a time there was a frame-set, languishing in the corner of the local bike co-op, when the amateur 10 speed refurbisher asked “How much for the tall Peugeot frame”  the wrench said           “5 bucks,  please take it I am sick of looking at it!”.   And thus another frame-set rebuild made its way into my hands.

In just one bike I violated two of my "'guidelines for a beginner old 10 speed wrench"  don't get just a frame and avoid the French bikes.  It was however a good learning experience and although a bit tall (25") the frame, paint and decals were all in good shape.  With some help from the Late Great Sheldon Brown, and Randy's vast experience with Peugeot's over at mytenspeeds.I was able to muddle through and get this bike back up and running.  Thanks again to retro Peugeot for helping me pin down the approximate year of the bike -1974 catalog shot below.

As a combination of frame only and French bike I had a few big issues I needed to tackle; 1) there was no bottom bracket with this bike and 2) while it a had a stem it was unfortunately one of the dreaded AVA "death stems" so I could not in good conscience use it.  In addition to that it was missing wheels, derailleurs, crank-set and saddle.  On the plus side it did have the original simplex shifters which was good because the down tube shifter setup on a Peugeot is unique, I don't have a picture but the band and shifters attach in way that is much different than the Japanese or Italian approach.  Anyway that was one issue I didn't have to address.  Next time I tackle a Peugeot I will try to get a shot of the down tube shifter set up for reference. UPDATE go here to find more info on the Peugeot down tube shifters.

Hey Handsome

If you are smart you get a complete French bike including bottom bracket, because the bottom bracket shell uses French threading a standard English BB will not work, mon Dieu!. If your me and you buy just a frame like a lug-head then, if money is not object, you can buy a very nice French threaded bottom bracket from Velo Orange for 50 bucks, its an excellent component but paying 10 times the price of the frame for a BB seemed a bit much for this UO-8 so I took a different tact.   Amazon offers a nice set of French threaded BB cups with bearings and lock ring from Action for 10 bucks (here).  And I recalled reading on Sheldon's site that you could use a 70 mm (Italian) spindle if you wanted to convert your old French bike from cottered crank to cotterless(here),  another 5 bucks for a spindle (plus end bolts) and I was golden on the BB issue.  The death stem resolution was pretty straight forward, I took a 22.2 diameter Pivo Stem and patiently sanded it until it fit the 22.0 French standard head-set/threaded fork.  If you are going to work on French bikes I would seriously recommend reading what both Sheldon (here) and Randy (here) have to say about the issues you might encounter, it could save you some tears.  That is not to scare anyone away old Peugeot's they are wonderful bikes with some great ride qualities but as they say forewarned is forearmed.(NOTE: after about 1980 most French bikes adopted English standard sizing and threading)

Although it thankfully doesn't look it, underneath the shiny paint and new parts this Peugeot ended up being a bit of a "frankenbike".  The frame-set, front wheel, front derailleur, shifters and handlebars are all original/period correct and everything else is cobbled together.  The rear derailleur is a Shimano 7 speed that goes with a Japanese cotterless crank, parts bin pedals and a used but modern slotted Selle Italia saddle.

I went with white cables because that is what the catalog shows the bike came with originally and I  liked how the blue paint cleaned up after a wash and wax. I think this UO-8 while not 100% vintage turned out pretty good for being a bit of a mish mash.  It got sold to a nice tall UW student.

Ride.Smile.Repeat.

1975 Peugeot UO-8 White 25" (December 2011)

Make: Peugeot
Model: UO-8
Year:  1975
Obtained: July 2011
Found: Bike Works 
Paid: $35.00

In the spring of 2010 I was in the university district of Seattle and a fixed up old 10 speed caught my eye, as they tend to, upon closer inspection it turned out to be a 70's Peugeot UO-8 in white with red accents.  I was really taken with the look and filed it away in my brain for later use.  In July of 2011 at the same time I found the 74 Grand Prix that I have written about I also found a 1975 white Peugeot UO-8 -now I could do my own red on white rebuild!

It was the usual story, musty, dusty and dirty but with some funky Mafac "half hood" brake levers, Racer brakes, "Aztec" lug cut outs and a head badge that reminded me of the buttons on a cigarette machine from the late 60s, you know the ones that were in the lobby of every restaurant in the US at the time.

Anyway I was really looking forward to working on this French beauty but after the debacle with the cottered crank on the Grand Prix I decided I would leave this alone until I had a proper tool to address the cotters.  As a result I didn't get to working on this bike until November. (1974 Catalog shot below couldn't find a 75)

I had initially though this might be a keeper but like the Takara it was a 25 inch frame and just too big for me.  Finally I had the proper tool and the time in November to tackle this beauty; I removed the "all original" (and pretty useless after 35 years) cables, housing, brake pads, dry rotted tires and tubes. And then got to work cleaning and waxing the frame, rebuilding the main bearings and getting the bike back to road worthiness.  Peugeot bikes of this era had simplex derailleurs and shifters, usually the front derailleur fails due to the use of a plastic clamp but in the case of this UO-8 the FD was fine, it was rear that would not work properly.  That was really the only real issue I had with the bike and it was solved with a vintage Shimano Titlist in nice shape and of about the same era.

With my new Cotter press the cotters practically fell over themselves getting out of the crank so I could rebuild the bottom bracket and clean up the crankset.

With some gentle scrubbing and cleaning the rubber half hoods and lever protectors came out very nice.

And my vision of a white Peugeot UO-8 with red accents became a reality.

The red walled tires might have been a bit over the top but what the heck I liked the look and the bike sold fast to a nice tall young man at the UW.  A really good resource for old Peugeot info, especially dating them, is http://retropeugeot.com/.   By dating I mean figuring out when the bike was made, because taking a bike out on a date would be just wrong and odd....right? 

Little did I know that this purchase was only the first in what would be a long line of UO-8's for me.  Allez Allez!

Ride.Smile.Repeat.