1982 Peugeot PH12E Centenary Model

I was recently very kindly given a Peugeot frame – a PH12E Centenary model with some of the original parts still fitted. Unlike a lot of the similar survivors on the internet, this example has been used and obviously had an active life. Paintwork is tired and transfers are rubbed. The question arises, is it worth restoring? My answer is a resounding “Yes”, firstly because the bike rather than been put away, “because it is a centenary model and might be worth something”, was actually ridden as intended. It has a history of use and shows signs of that use. Secondly, Peugeot embraced the 'aerodynamic' culture of the time and fitted some now rare parts to the bike. The great French rider Bernard Hinault, 5 times winner of the Tour de France had ridden a specially built Reynolds tubed aerodynamic Gitane time trial bike in the late 1970s. Cycling Weekly (UK) coverage of the time featured riders in skinsuits riding time trials which was to lead to the development of low profile time trial bikes with smaller front wheels. These would see use in the professional peloton time trials, until banned by the UCI. Greg Lemond pioneered the use of Tri-bars to obtain a more rider aerodynamic position in the professional peloton. Shimano produced it's 'aero' AX600 and AX Dura Ace between 1981 and 1984 according to the Velobase website.

The frame I was given was missing the wheels, Simplex SLJ6600 rear mech and the top mounted down tube levers. The orginal parts fitted would obviously stay, but could I find the correct replacement parts? The most serious challenge would be the Simplex rear mech. I believe the SLJ6600 was introduced in 1982 and was the first mech to to have an angled parallogram like Suntour and Shimano. The original rear mech was branded 'aérodynamic'. Apart from the scarcity of the mechs, the other factor would be price and condition. According to to Disraeli Gears page entry for the Simplex SLJ6600, the springs lost tension very quickly rendering the mech less than effective. This probably explains why the original rear mech was missing. A search on French ebay over several weeks identified a few examples for sale. Some were the later 'SPIDEL' branded version and other examples looked to be in poor condition from the seller's photographs, but not reflected in their asking price. I eventually located what appeared to be a good example and managed to secure it by auction including delivery for a fraction of some of the asking prices on ebay in the UK. Probably one of the biggest hurdles in terms of sourcing original parts had been overcome. I was also gifted boxes of parts along with the Peugeot frame. During the sorting process, I came across a set of Maeda Suntour top mounting down tube levers carefully bagged up. A quick check proved these were off the Peugeot, so another major headache in terms of original parts, was thankfully overcome.

The Peugeot PH12 model was usually made from steel Carbolite tubing, the frame having the appearance of being lugless, but in fact the lugs are internal. Whilst a carbolite tubed frame is not as light as one built with Reynolds or Columbus tubing, fitted with a decent set of wheels, these Peugeot bikes ride very well indeed. Probably a lot to do with the French frame geometry. The 1982 Carbolite tubed Centenary PH12E has an 'aero' seat tube and down tube. The gear cables are routed internally through the down tube from the top mounted friction levers. The other significant thing is, the down tube friction levers and chainset are Japanese, not French. The chainset is an alloy SR Custom model with detachable alloy chainrings, a change from the usual Stronglight alloy crank with swaged steel chainrings.

The 'aero' style seat tube means the seatpin, from necessity, is very short. The top of the seat tube is round to accept the seatpin, but as the seat tube quickly changes profile, the seatpin has to be much shorter than would be found on a bicycle with a full round seat tube. Again, Peugeot use a much smaller diameter seatpin than found on other bicycles. The original seat post is a plain model, necked in at the top, the original saddle being retained by a steel seat clamp bolt arrangement. In amongst, the various store of parts within the Springhill Cycle Collection, there was an alloy one piece seatpin with an integral seat clamp. It has been in the store for a number of years and although not original to the Peugeot it will be used on the bike as a nice finishing touch. It is an unusual and certainly period correct part. The upshot of all this is, the 57cm frame will not suit a tall rider because of the short seatpin. 

It is my intention to restore the bike as close as I can using period correct parts. I still have to source the correct Mavic rims and a small flange Q/R rear hub with a 1982 date code to complete the wheels.  The fact some parts are missing may have more to do with their lack of durability/suitability as the bike was heavily used. I will probably fit a pre-owned Concor saddle and replace the Lyotard flat steel touring pedals that have been fitted in lieu of the 'aero' type pedals that were original to the bike. Although the Shimano PD-1050 105 are 5 years later than the bike, they will make a reasonable substitute. They are in keeping with the 'aero' theme and could represent a likely modification during the bike's working life. The Springhill Cycle Collection is happy to restore the bike in an as used condition. It means the collection now holds a 1982 Peugeot Centenary model along with a similar, used, 1987 Raleigh Centenary edition bike.

V-CC Rides 2016

As the summer slips past and cooler shorter days take hold it gives time to reflect on the years rides with the Veteran-Cycle Club. This is not a cycling club, although many members are cyclists. The club is for people interested in old cycles and encourages members to meet and ride these old machines. I was not able to attend all local section rides this year, but I did make the effort to attend as many as I could.  The summer in this part of the world has been wet and often windy.

Events take place across the province of Ulster, the last ride of the summer season was in County Donegal on the Fanad Peninsular. The route afforded some spectacular views of Lough Swilly on reasonably lightly trafficked roads starting and finishing on the quayside at Ramelton. There are buildings on the quayside with a date stone above the door 'L & L S R 1864'. The interesting thing is the Londonderry & Lough Swilly Railway never had a station at Ramelton!

The route went via Rathmullan on the shores of Lough Swilly. A short detour was made to Rathmullan House, now a country hotel. This 18^th Century house was bought by Robert Batt who was the youngest son of Narcissus Batt (1760 – 1840) , a founder of the Belfast Bank. The Batt family had property at Ozier Hill, in Co. Wexford and at Purdysburn, Co. Down. Rathmullan House was part of a 4,377 acre estate in 1876. Robert Batt purchased Rathmullan House in 1837 and it remained in family ownership through the generations until 1939. The associated land was bought by the tenant farmers under the various land acts passed by the Liberal Government between 1870 and 1906.

Rathmullan is also notable for seeing the end of the Gaelic Order with the 'flight of the Earls' to the continent of Europe. There is a statue on the foreshore below the Victorian Coastguard cottages at Rathmullan, to commemorate the event.

One of joys of taking part in the V-CC rides is to see a newly restored machine make it's debut back on the road.  Cycles which made an appearance this year are a Sunbeam roadster, Claud Butler Lady's bike and an early Leader of Croydon.

The weather was kind for the last summer run and the food bought in Rathmullan was excellent.  A pleasant ride back to the start followed as the clouds cleared. The tide had come in at Ramelton by the time of our return.  The run ended with a lovely sunset to round off a great day.

Winter Bike

As the evenings draw down and the days shorten, thoughts turn to unearthing the winter bike. We have not had much of a summer here, generally very wet. The trees started losing their leaves at the end of July, to the point, a maple in the garden is nearly in winter mode apart from the seeds still on the tree.

I suppose it is a left over of my cycling apprenticeship of decades ago, where you had a heavier winter, or hack bike, equipped with mudguards, on which to maintain fitness, keeping your prize machine in good trim for the following racing season. The other reason was using your heavier hack bike would give you an advantage when you changed to your lighter race bike at the start of the new race season.

I started off my cycling career a Hi-Ten Raleigh sports bike and covered thousands of miles on this humble machine. My winter bike was purchased secondhand in the 1980s as a complete bike. Bike was stripped and frame painted by hand. It was a cheap sports bike, confirmed when I stripped the frame to reveal seamed frame tubes. It has had a number of repaints since and still going strong. The bike originally was fitted with a double chainset and Suntour derailleur gears. I had the frame professionally re-enamelled by Bob Jackson years ago, taking advantage of their £50 re-enamelling offer. I chose to have the frame painted black with a maroon headtube, reminiscent of the 1930s BSA Sports.

Around 2009 I rebuilt the bike as a fixed gear machine. It rode well enough in this trim except for the fact my arthritic knees protested at the fixed gear. I liked the fact there was no derailleur gears and freewheel block to attract road dirt and the workings affected by winter road salt. I needed a freewheel to ease the workload on my knees and would like a few gears, but keeping the simple drive train. The solution suggested itself when I rescued a 1960s Sturmey-Archer AW3 wheel dumped in a local bog. The challenge was, could I strip it down and get it going again? I managed to achieve the first and following a thorough clean achieved the second, however the left hand ball cup was badly worn. The hub was the Mk3 with the pressed in ball cup and the bottom gear would never work. I aimed to have a middle gear of around 60 inches, with a top gear under 80 inches. Sturmey-Archer 3 speed hubs tended to be fitted to bikes with too high a gear in my opinion. I ended up fitting a 22T sprocket to my hub gear.

I also took the opportunity when converting the bike to hub gear operation, to build a new front wheel too, incorporating a Novatec hub dynamo. These were getting long in the tooth when I bought mine and could be bought cheaply on ebay. The downside of the hub was the resistance in the dynamo when riding with lights off. It is not actually such a drawback riding with the lights permanently on as the short days and overcast weather mean you are more easily noticed by motor vehicles. Whether they actually make room for you on the road is another matter…..

I used Busch and Muller LED lights on the bike and routed the twin wire cables on the outside of the plastic mudguards. I used pieces of plastic tube glued to the mudguard with epoxy to retain the wires. The tubing came from used liquid soap bottles, being the bottom part of the soap dispenser assembly. Not very elegant, but it works and is in keeping with my bargain basement ethos for my winter bike. I still have the adapted Ever Ready plastic rear light fitted to my old 1970s Carradice Nelson longflap saddlebag. The light was fitted to a custom made aluminium bracket which fits into the offside side pocket of the saddlebag. I always found it useful to have a rear light on the offside of the bike as well as the central rear light. No excuse for a motor vehicle not to give you enough room when passing.

The parts fitted to my bike have all been cascaded down from other bikes over the years, except the wheels and mudguards. The seatpost is an old alloy SR Laprade fluted model. The headset is an old 'Red S' sold by Freewheel in their mail order catalogue. It was actually a Stronglight A9 needle bearing alloy and plastic copy. The cranks are odd cranks, the right being an SR Custom fitted with a single chain ring and the left a Stronglight. They are the same length though! Bars were a modern replacement 44cm for the old narrow SR bars. The stem is 3T. The saddle is an old Cinelli off my MKM racing bike and is now worth too much to leave it on my bike. I have an old Brooks B17 to replace it with. The Cinelli will be re-used in a restoration.

I always like the idea of the old Sturmey-Archer 3 speed quadrant lever mounted on the top tube of bikes in the 1930s. I couldn't get any modern lever to fit onto the top tube of my bike. Instead I used a lever designed for use on 22mm handlebars on the handlebar stem of my bike, with a cable stop on the top tube and the cable routed via a pulley wheel down the seat stay to the dropout. An old fashioned idea, which works well and looks neat on the bike. I will rebuild the back wheel with a new Sturmey-Archer 3 speed hub gear in the next few weeks, so the bike will be ready for when BST ends.

Custom Bike?

A friend of mine often relates his experiences of meeting the modern breed of cyclist who normally greet him with “What are you riding that oul thing for?”, referring to his custom built Mercian bike.  He then explains the difficulty in trying to get the modern 'expert' to understand that his bicycle was custom built, i.e. made to measure for him.  The usual response is “Mine is custom built”, the tyro meaning, he got what bits he wanted, hung on his small, medium, or large size, carbon frame.  Ask the tyro about frame angles, chainstay length, fork rake and bottom bracket height and he is lost.  Does not compute at all, as rarely if ever covered in the UK cycling press, and besides it's all about the decals on the frame, x is better than y, irrespective that they are all made in the same huge factory in Taiwan.  Style and image are paramount. 

It was all once so very much different.   On joining a club as an impecunious teenager, some of the older members would take you aside when you turned up on your Hi-Ten 'gas pipe' tubed bike and offer the advice, “You need to get a good pair of wheels son”.  No criticism was offered of your bike. The order of upgrade, to make your machine more user friendly to cover miles, was wheels, saddle and gearing.  It was recognised that to have a custom made frame took money.  Fitness was as important as the bike.  If you were lucky, someone would help you out with bits for your bike.   A promising rider may have been given an old lightweight frame or given the opportunity to purchase a secondhand lightweight bike. 

A new frame was a significant and important purchase.   Firstly which framebuilder to use? What wheel size, frame angles and fork rake?  Do you want a square frame?, i.e. seat tube and top tube the same length.  Was it to be a track bike, pure road race bike or would it have to be used for touring/general riding as well, so mudguard clearance was necessary.  If you specified the old British 27”/630 wheel size there was plenty of clearance for 700C race wheels.   What about braze ons?  Campagnolo lever bosses, bottle cage bosses, cable guides on top tube?   What tubeset to use?  Reynolds 531 plain gauge, 531 double butted, 531 Superlight or that new Reynolds 753?  More exotic tubesets were available from Ron Kitching, listed in 'Everything Cycling', Columbus or Ishiwata.  What colour and finish do you want, flat enamel, metallic or pearl?  Any chrome plating to frame?  This will slow the delivery.  You could reasonably expect to wait for 4 to 6 months for your custom frame. Thought would have to be given to choice of headset.  The obvious preference would be for continental kit, Campagnolo or Stronglight.   Reality was you couldn't often afford it, so more likely the British made TDC or the Japanese Tange-Seiki was used instead.

The debate amongst cyclists was which was the better frame builder, especially where hand cut lugs were concerned, and what was the best frame geometry for the ideal bike?  Was it better to have the head and seat tube angles parallel?  72 or 73 degrees or have the head angle steeper than the seat tube angle – 74/73 for track, 73/72 for road.   Some argued this made the bike more comfortable but responsive when compared to a parallel frame.   Others advocated that the seat tube angle was steeper than the head tube, so 73/74, 72/73. 

The steeper head angle also brought the front wheel back towards the bottom bracket, so toe overlap could be a problem.   Fork rake could also be a factor here as well.  Fork rake for road bikes was generally in the range 1 3/4” (1.75”) to 2 1/2” (2.5”).  The fork rake for touring bikes was in the 2- 2.5” range.  Forks with less than 1.75” rake were generally fitted to track bikes, the shorter fork rake being more useful on a banked track and a more generous fork rake for grass track racing.  A further consideration was the shape of your fork blades, round (preferred for track frames), D to round, or oval.  Some riders wanted round forks for their road bikes in the early 1950s as they believed the forks were stronger.  Then there was the fork crown, double plate, square shouldered or semi sloping Italian?

How were the seat stays to be fitted to the seat lug?  Were the seat stays to be attached to the side of seat lug and finished off with a seat stay caps of  various kinds, or go for wrapover seat lugs which some alleged were much stronger?  Another important factor in the ride of a bike is the wheelbase.  Some advocated keeping the chainstays as short as possible to reduce 'frame whip' and to improve the power transmission.   The pre WW2 Baines Brothers V37 'Flying Gate', the Saxon Twin Tube and Sun Manx TT were all examples of this.  The significant thing is that up until the Second World War, most racing was time trials and frame design reflected this.  The fact that riders were not allowed to show any kind of advertising meant that some frame builders created unique designs which were readily identifiable in a photograph via the cycling press of the day without the need to see any decals.  The harsh draconian 'amateur' status was rigidly policed and enforced by the sports officials of the day.  Other attempts to increase the rigidity of steel frames and reduce frame whip from before WW2 was the Bates Brothers 'Cantiflex' tubing and 'Diadrant' forks and Bill Ewing's & Percy Dean's (Granby) 1925 patented 'Taper Tube' method of construction.  Maurice Selbach and Claud Butler also built frames using this tubing.  The Granby Taperlight tubing had the seat tube and down tube increasing in size towards the bottom bracket to increase frame stiffness.  The chainstays changed from round section just aft of the bottom bracket to square section before reverting back to round section towards the dropouts.  Granby also patented a design of bottom bracket and rear dropout.   A similar concept of frame using pressed steel for utility roadster bicycles was produced by New Hudson of Birmingham in 1936 as their 'Empire Roadster' model.  The Bates design had always been a topic of discussion with many dismissing the tubing and concept as a gimmick.  A frame was tested in the early 1990s by the UK National Physics Laboratory which confirmed the Cantiflex tubing and frame was stiffer than conventional Reynolds 531.

So a shorter wheelbase was advocated for a livelier ride.  Track bikes tended to have a shorter wheelbase than road bikes because of the shorter fork rake, steeper frame angles and rear facing rear dropouts.  Latterly track bikes were used solely on the track, so mudguards were not needed.  The influence here was track riding was less popular and increasing affluence meant people could afford more than one bike, so pure race and track machines were developed really from the late 1960s/1970s, a change from what had gone before when one bike had to do everything.  I had a road race frame built which had 74 degree parallel angles with a short fork rake for racing on short road circuits (kermesses) and time trialling.  The bike certainly felt much livelier than my other road race bike, but the trade off was comfort.  It transmitted a lot more road vibration and riding it in the Irish 50 mile TT championship event on the Navan Road proved to be an uncomfortable and unforgettable experience.  One which I never repeated.  It was one of the reasons that professional racing cyclists had a variety of bikes, some with different angles and gearing setups for the various stages they rode.  As an amateur you rode what you could afford.

Once you received your frame then the next job was to build it up.  The preferred choice of equipment by the 1970s was Campagnolo, but again it was available in 3 different price ranges, Gran Sport, Nuovo Record and Super Record.   The French did not produce 'a gruppo' like Campagnolo, but did make some really good kit. Maxicar hubs and the TA 5 bolt Cyclotourist chainsets were expensive but very good.  French derailleurs were not popular except on budget sports bikes, but Maeda Suntour were much cheaper than Campagnolo and very good.  The Suntour Superbe professional quality parts have now attained nearly legendary status.  The recourse for the financially challenged club cyclist was Ron Kitching's 'Milremo' range of parts, mostly of French or Italian manufacture but cheaper than their branded relations.  Most club cyclists bought what they could afford and would upgrade parts on their prize machine, with the removed parts cascading down onto your hack bike or part exchanged for some other bit of kit you wanted from a clubmate.  Once you had your bike in the trim you desired then any changes to be made were considered.   If it wasn't broken then it didn't need fixing.  It was acknowledged that the tubular tyre fitted to your racing sprints could have a big impact.   Ron Kitching's 'Lion' brand GT30 or slightly better GT28 were the staple fare for many.  Getting a really good pair of wheels, Campagnolo Nuovo Record Hubs laced into Mavic GP4 sprint rims built by Pete Matthews and shod with Clement 'Criterium' tubular tyres was the best pair of race wheels I ever owned and with which I did some of my best racing performances. 

I knew exactly what kit I wanted on my bike and built it up myself.   If it didn't work then you only had yourself to blame, but equally I wouldn't let anyone else tinker with my bike.  Your hand made, made to measure frame was an investment which could be repaired if you crashed and damaged it.  It was built to last and do what it was built to do.  That is not say that frames didn't break because of poor workmanship, stress risers created in the manufacture causing frame failure, or too much heat used when brazing causing similar tube failures.   Not having the frame 'bonderized' or treated with Jenolite before painting, poor paint finishing and neglect by the owner of the paint damage could lead to a frame breaking through corrosion.  But steel would often give some warning of it's impending failure unlike aluminium, which would fail without much warning.  It was also readily repairable at a garage, where gas brazing was available.  The running repair would enable you finish your ride and get home, before getting the frame permanently repaired.

Self employed framebuilders putting their own name on the frame tended to be better.  Your best advert was your work.   If you built too many lemons you went out of business.  Some of the bigger operations struggled with quality of workmanship from time to time. (I have seen a new frame which was out of track).   It is why you can have two frames from the same source with apparently similar or identical geometry which ride completely differently.  One's a peach and the other a lemon.  Framebuilders bikes I remember seeing at that time were, Bates, Hetchins, Maclean, Viking, Harry Quinn, Ron Kitching, Witcomb, Holdsworth, Claud Butler, Charles Roberts, Stan Pike, Ken Bird, Harry Hall, Hill Special, Carlton, Wes Mason, Bob Jackson, Mercian, Woodrup, Wester Ross, Flying Scot, Jack Hearne.  Local Northern Ireland framebuilders I remember being raced, was Tommy Donaldson – Lurgan, County Armagh and Gordon Brothers – Hillsborough, County Down. The list is not prescriptive as there were many others.