jbkirby

Well, it has been a blast riding both of my bikes this spring, summer and fall, but I decided to go forth with my original plan of setting up the 1971 with more hill-oriented gearing. I replaced the Campy Nuovo record RD with a later Campy Rally (with slant parallelogram), the 14-24 freewheel with a 14-34, and a new chain, and now I have a hill-climber. Now, I have to find some hills...

The Fleet:



1972 Setup:



New Setup on 1971:

SteveSGP

Beautiful bikes!

I think I might have to switch out my freewheel for something with more hill friendly gearing.

randyjawa 

There was a time when I looked, with what might be a perverted sense of love, at my straight block freewheels, always liking the airy look that less adds, to a vintage road bike(opinion). However...

I am getting a bit older, now, and have started looking, with even more appreciation, at the Granny gearing idea, and perhaps our generation can rename it Senior gearing, so as not to offend anyone of any gender(this one could go both ways, in my opinion). Seriously, I truly appreciate greater gear range, and so does my right knee. Even more seriously, there are some pretty darn fit grannies out there.

My regular ride, a Specialized Allez Junker II is geared lowest of all my bikes, and ridden the most...


Come to think of it, the second most ridden is this dump found Motobécane Grand Jubileé...

afvn72

Hills you say? May I suggest Pittsburgh, next month. https://www.WQED.org/TV/watch/series/...gh/2011-01-26/

afvn72

The link messed up when I posted. Try again https://www.WQED.org/TV/watch/series/...gh/2011-01-26/

afvn72

Strange. The part between series/ and /2011 should be its-Pittsburgh Gets my post count up anyway.

jbkirby

I took a thirteen-mile shakedown ride in the drizzly, cool weather tonight and I couldn't be more pleased with the shifting and the ease of climbing steep grades. It shifts even more smoothly than my other bike, the only real way you know which bike you are riding is the big jump in ratios from gear to gear. At age 55, I can appreciate the lower gearing, but I will stick to the old-fashion road gearing of my 1972 for local rides. Now, I need to find those hills...

jbkirby

You have a bum right knee, too? No fun, is it?

John E

In 1974 I built my wife a custom bike from a bare Peugeot UO-8 frame, a TA Professional crankset, and the original SunTour VG-T derailleur and Sunshine-Araya wheelset from my Nishiki Competition. Being too cheap to replace the 52-42 ringset, I devised a 1.5-step + granny freewheel for her: 16-18-21-24-32, which is the then-common 14-16-18-21-24 with top gear deleted and the granny added. It gave her a great hill-climbing granny and an adequate 88 gear-inch top, with a decently tight progression through the middle and upper ranges. Years later, Shimano introduced megarange freewheels w/ a similar 24-32 or 24-34 drop at the bottom. My setup always shifted very well, thanks to the SunTour slant planograph design.

pastorbobnlnh 

Having driven through Dothan many, many times, on my way from Atlanta to Panama City Beach, I can attest that your quest to find any significant hills will be a challenge. I suppose you could go down to the FL pan handle, but even then the hills are easy to moderate, at best.

Time for you to take a trip to North AL, or if you want a real long hill climb, head to Cherokee, NC and head north on the Blue Ridge Parkway. There you will experience about 10 miles of pure climbing before reaching a descent.

Isn't interesting how we each desire what the other has? I have to look hard for a semi-flat ride, one which has less than 200-300 feet of difference in altitude over the course of 20 or so miles. On Saturday I rode 40 miles along the NH coast between ME and MA and back. The elevation change was probably less than 30 feet. I was amazed by the pace I was able to keep.

Michael Angelo 

Hills?? WHat the heck are hills??

Barchettaman

Not C&V, but I swapped out the 52/40 Biopace II crankset on my Jan Ullrich winter bike for a 50/36 FSA Gossamer compact crank last night. An enjoyable 50km this morning round the rolling hills north of Frankfurt told me that I like the compact crank, a LOT.

The bike is running 12-25 9-speed I think.

The FSA crankset is square taper so just bolted straight on to the BB. It seemed quite a bit lighter than the Shimano crankset it repaced and only cost €23 from eBay.de

Grand Bois

Campy Rallys don't have slant parallelograms. They have drop parallelograms. There's a big difference. Look at the Suntour Cyclone above. Notice the tilt? That's a slant parallelogram and the design was protected by patent.

jbkirby

Ah! Thank you for the clarification! I am still catching up on forty years of technical jargon!

ClemY

I have to confess my first 10 spd bike was a RaleighInternational in 1971. I had read Sloan’s book and was looking for somethingwith a 531 frame and Campy parts. The International was the closest thing Icould find that I could afford. It worked well, but the sewups were toofragile. I still have boxes of old parts that include Campy NR and Rallyderailleurs and bar con shifters. When I went with Shimano indexed shifting 20yrs ago I parked that stuff and haven’t used it since.

jbkirby

I wanted an International when I was in college but the price was equivalent to just over two quarters of Auburn University tuition, so I had to wait, but I still feel the wait of 36 years was worth it. I have never ridden an aluminum or carbon fiber-frame bike, never experienced indexed shifters or any other technology invented in the past forty years with the exception of the equipment I have put on my bike such as lights, etc.. Both of my bikes are retrofitted with clinchers: The 1971 has 27x1 1/8 Bontragers (inexpensive and hard-riding) and the 1972 has 700X23C Continental Gatorskins (not too expensive and even with higher pressure, a better ride than the Bontragers), both on respective Weinmann Concave rims so I have not had the pleasure of a tubular-tired bike, either. What I do have is the extreme pleasure of riding bicycles from which I extract great joy with every mile. I grew up in the most mountainous part of Alabama and used to ride to Mt. Cheaha just to experience the ride back down. To go anywhere in my hometown of Anniston involved climbing large hills thus my purchase of the Schwinn Sports Tourer (I still have it) so I could climb trees if necessary. The stock gearing of the 1972 International is fine for the flat terrain around Dothan and it is set up perfectly for sprints into surrounding counties or into Florida and back just for the fun of it, but I do miss gaining altitude riding up the mountains...and the ride back down! I hope I can get my 1971 to Anniston and ride up the new bypass that is a 6% grade gaining 300 feet in elevation. That doesn't sound like much, but the view is spectacular and it isn't a US highway...yet, but upon completion it will become US 431. And there is that ride back down...

jbkirby

I would love to swap terrain with you! One of my best friends hails from Exeter (the 1960's UFO hoax capital of the nation...my friend made sure of that with a washtub and Christmas lights...) and he also got to experience riding in Anniston!

753proguy

That still doesn't work, but are you talking about the Dirty Dozen ride? My brother-in-law does that every year. He sometimes rides with Dan Chew, who rode RAAM, iirc. The DD ride is getting awfully big, though, and that is beginning to cause some logistical issues....