oneclick 

Searching for a few last puzzle-pieces, looking for skewers for a few sets of wheels.

And some wheels-yet-to-be-built will no doubt need new innards, so also looking for hollow axles and/or cones (good).

Ferrouscious 

As pedestrian as they are, the Maillard QR skewers are my favourite. Never had one slip and pretty affordable.

oneclick 

There are essentially three styles (as far as I know); the centre-mounted lever with a cone-shaped wingnut, the side-mounted L-shaped levers with steel nuts, and the side-mounted L-shaped with domed plastic wingnuts.

Any or all are fine, I have bits and pieces and singles of all of them.

verktyg 

The snap-over-center levers are most likely Simplex Quick Releases on Normandy.

For what ever reason, from the mid 60's to the early 70's, Peugeot used these Simplex QRs with Normandy Sport and Normandy Luxe Competition hubs on everything from U08 to PX10 bikes.

They where produced with black or white plastic covers over the levers.




When a customer brought a bike in with these Simplex QRs, we tried to talk them into replacing them with Atom levers for $5.00.

There were 2 reasons for this:

1. many inexperienced riders tightened these QRs buy spinning the lever until somewhat tight rather than using the snap-over-center feature. When used this way, the QRs occasionally or frequently came loose while riding depending on the cyclist's hand strength.

2. the original Simplex QRs had steel levers. In the early 70's Simplex started using some kind of cast pot metal or aluminum levers. They frequently failed at the center pin at the base of the lever !!! We threw away the ones we replaced.


Normandy/Atom provided these all metal "cam lock" QRs on their hubs from the mid 60's until about 19973-74. The Levers were stamped M. M. ATOM. They worked exceptionally well and rarely slipped on the rear wheel.




About 1974-75 they changed the adjusting nuts from round knurled metal to this style with plastic "wings" molded onto the metal nuts.


A few years later the design changed to these.



The last version from the 80's looked like this.



Post CPSC levers from the late 70's on were curved. They were stamped Maillard, Sachs Maillard or sometimes Spidel.



Normandy Sport hubs had metric threads: Front hollow QR axles - 9mm x 1mm, Rear hollow QR axles - 10mm x 1mm.

The original French Standard OLN (Over Lock Nut) width was 96mm Front and 100mm Rear. By the mid 80's 100mm Front and 120mm or 126mm Rear became standard.

The older Normandy Sport axles were not very strong and bent or broke easily. Shimano, Suntour, Sanshin or other Japanese axles are usually better quality and will interchange. Also, Wheels Mfg. makes alloy steel axles with metric threads.

Back in the mid 70's we were importing built up wheels from France with Atom or Normandy QR hubs, stainless spokes and Super Champion Mod 58 alloy rims for $6.00 USD our cost. That should give you an idea of the quality of those Normandy hubs. The cones were case hardened as machined and quickly wore out.



We bought replacement Normandy cones in bags of 50 for about $0.05 each. After inspecting each bag we discarded up to half of them for defects in the ball track areas. We sold the good ones wholesale and retail for $0.50 each so it was worth or time.

Here's an example of a common defect in a Normand cone. When the balls roll over that spot you get a click.



To sum things up, I wouldn't put too much effort into Normandy Sport hubs, they don't last that long....

verktyg

polymorphself 

They could use an hour soaking in evaporust but work fine otherwise. If these will be good for you how about $25 shipped?

randyjawa 

Very good deal. Those little plastic end caps are hard to find in good shape. The rubber hoods are also hard to find. Put another way, good deal and those should clean up great (my opinion, of course).

ADDED: I should add that I sold a set, just like the black hooded set, for a hundred dollars US + cost to ship, several years ago. Still got a set tucked away, though. Might even have a nice set of Atom skewers - would have to look next time I go to the lake cottage.

polymorphself 

I took a quick look on eBay before posting these and was a little surprised at the high prices. I was expecting maybe $50 or so for a set but see some selling for closer to $100 like you mention. Can’t bring myself to sell them here for that much (but will definitely be heading there with a higher price if they don’t sell here )

rustystrings61 

FWIW, I have been using this model M.M. Atom skewer with a hollow axle on a Surly fixed/fixed rear hub on my Mercian for several years now with great success. It's simple, durable, reliable and it does not slip. I've used just about every version of the Maillard/Atom skewer and liked them.

Simplex later made a similar skewer, and I need to fish mine out and get pix.

verktyg 

In 1972, Simplex abandoned the Ralph Nader style lock over center levers and switched to a conventional cam style.





By 1973 the old lever style QRs that dated back to the early 50's were gone from most new bike boom models. Perhaps it was to fend off lawyers....

A caveat on the old style levers.

Avoid using these old QRs without chrome plated steel levers. The plain dull gray levers that look like aluminum are made of pot metal or something similar.They cracked at the point shown by the arrow below. When in doubt check them with a magnet.



verktyg

MB33 

Why were Simplex QR's more prone to misuse than any other QR? Because the lever is flat?

verktyg 

Why ask why???

They were provided on a lot of Peugeots plus some other French marques during the Bike Boom FAD. By the end of the Boom in 1974, they'd disappeared from new bikes.

In the early 70's very few folks in the US had much understanding of derailleur equipped bikes and related components (myself included - until I started working at a bike shop).

I saw many folks at bike shops spin tighten those QRs. They dropped their jaws when shown the proper use of the snap over center feature. DOH!

Spin tightened QRs could and did vibrate loose...

verktyg