SpeedofLite 

Articles/columns included in this post are:
LETTERS
TECHNICAL Q and A
"A Very Special Christmas"

The following articles from this issue were included in past posts:
"All About Cranksets" (Equipment/Product Review (1978) All About 5/6-Speed Era Cranksets)
BICYCLE WORKSHOP Rating the Sidepull Brakes (Equipment/Product Review (1978) New Sidepull Brakes)

Otherwise, let me know if you'd like to see something else listed in the ToC and I'll add it in a reply to this post or as a link to a pdf.

repechage

Note the Merz advert for 31 tooth Campagnolo triple crank arms. When 36 just is too big. Campagnolo back then made triples while kicking and screaming.

Kabuki12

The Austro Daimler ad is making a statement with a full page color ad without mentioning Campagnolo components( Super Record !), interesting. Also seeing cables in front of the bars on an advertisement seems contrary , to me.

13velos

Thanks for posting! I bought my first decent road bike in 1978 so hits home for me.Wow, I’ll take some of those Clement Del Mondo seta tubulars for $24.75.

Rick_D

Bet the headlights they review are something else, pondering the hiking/ climbing lighting options of the era. Probably outride the beam at about 7mph.

Hard to name a relevant technology that has come further, since then.

Robvolz 

just found one for my triple.
tolerances tighter than Campy!!

repechage

those did skyrocket in price, four years earlier they were under half that. Blame the Ultima cartel, I mean Italian trade group.

RCMoeur 

I remember how hard it was back then to scrape together $24.75. Hence my long-term love affair with CyclePro nylon tubulars for a lot less.

RCMoeur 

The letter to the editor complaining about Ultra-7 vaporware is interesting. I remember them routinely stocked on shop shelves by 1981, although I didn't get my first 7-speed freewheel until nearly 1990 or so. But it would be fun to send a message back in time to tell the correspondents that the lowest-of-the-low department store bikes in the 21st century are almost universally equipped with 7-speed freewheels.

AdventureManCO 

SpeedofLite Any chance you've got that Sept 1978 article mentioned in the comments on dept store bikes? That one might be of particular interest to me (hee hee). Thanks!

SpeedofLite 

Sure, I can do that, but it depends on what you mean. If you are referring to Gary Wright's letter ("The Used Bike Alternative") in the Readers' Letter section, what he is referring to is not an article, but a letter from C.R. Walker, Jr published in the September 1978 issue. Since I didn't include the Readers' Letters section in that 45 Years Ago... post (https://www.bikeforums.net/classic-v...-magazine.html), I'll include it below:





But if what you ultimately want to read is what got Mr Walker all riled up, then you can see Frank Berto's article, "Buying Your First Bike" here: https://www.bikeforums.net/classic-v...-magazine.html

repechage

The Wilshire West advert reminds me of an attempt to adopt the Bikeology mail order model. A decent shop, Jim Holly ran his frame building out of there for a short while. Not enough capital to challenge Alan Goldsmith who was short circuiting the old model and being his own importer and distributor from Japan too, the Niko line. Reasonably appointed bikes that for a while keyed off on Centurions.

MaxKatt

It would be interesting to get Clayton Curtis to reflect on his thoughts that dedicated bike lanes in America might be "impossible" now that there's been a sea change on that front.

Googling, was 76 and still riding as of 2015. Sadly lost wife/daughter to cancer and most recent stories have him riding for causes related to that.

Closer to Free Cancer Survivor Rides in Memory of Wife and Daughter Clayton Curtiss' wife and daughter both passed just months apart after battles with cancer. By Justin Schecker • Published August 8, 2018

AdventureManCO 

This is fantastic, thank you! And yes, you understood better than me - in response to a letter, not an article. But I do appreciate the original article in the chain of events, and will read through it. And fascinating to see what seems like the life's journey of this same person years later.

Bad Lag

Quality Sew Ups
21613 Talisman
Torrence, Ca 90503

This is/was a private residence which is still there.

Oddly, Talisman is a street which runs in a generally north-south direction and should be an avenue. It is paralleled by avenues and it crosses multiple streets. Weird, I never noticed that before.

Torrance is misspelled. This is old enough the use of CA, as opposed to Ca, was not yet a thing.

As time passes, these articles become almost archaeological in significance.

Many, many thanks to SpeedofLite for bringing so many of these to us.

Robvolz 

Is it possible to post “all about cranks” and “Merckx in America”?

SpeedofLite 

Yes it is.
"All About Cranks" spanned 3 different months of Bicycling, but only a single page of a multi-page table was in the December 1978 issue.
I included a link to the entire article in Post #1 of this thread. It is still active.
As for "Merckx in America", here ya go.

repechage

Way back the French national team for two years running while participating in the Grand Prix of the United States used our Sunday club ride as a warm up for that days racing at Encino.
‘after the first year, word got out and I think the ride was twice as big the second year.
The most interesting takeaway? French track racers were not afraid of climbing. The second most? Daniel Morelon can easily outsprint a crazed German Shepard.
‘Oh, their coach Rode with them!

Chuck M 

This made me google Takara i love it t-shirt. I would never fit into one of the Cheap Trick or Rush t-shirts I wore back in the day. But this would be cool to wear on the MUP going to get coffee on a Saturday morning.

SpeedofLite 

Ha! Even cooler would be for you and your whole family to each wear that t-shirt and ride your bikes together on the MUP to get coffee Saturday morning.
And we'll want a photo.

Chuck M 

If I could find a Takara for everyone in the family, I'd recreate this photo

Alan K

Has it been that long!
[Time is fun when you are having flies… Kermit!]

I recall headlight for my bicycle in the 1978-79 weighing like a lead brick… it was a sealed gel lead acid battery so no surprise there. The triangular amber rear light used 3 actual strobes and you could hear the capacitors building up the charge and the pop of the discharge- the cycle took a while, probably more than a second. The brightness of headlight improved a couple years later when HID bulbs became available, costing $$$ and burning out quickly. The good old days…

​​​​​​​Thank god for the alien technology of LEDs and Li polymer batteries.