My little brother is fourteen, and has never ridden a lightweight
bicycle. He has constantly been bugging me to ride, but his Huffy
weighs a ton, and it's a real chore for anything more than a quick
trip around town. He's just finished the eighth grade, and I wished I
could get him a reasonable road bike as a sort of graduation present.
Of course, I haven't got the cash to make a whole new bike work.
God, however, acting through the quick thinking and generous spirit of
my friend Peter came through. A neighbour of this friend of mine was
about to throw out an old bike. "It kind of looks like your tourer,"
said Peter, who isn't really a bikie. "Do you want to have a look at
it?"
It's a Follis. Made in France. Lugged steel, pretty lugs, blue
paint. A real headbadge. Simplex derailleurs. Stem-shifters.
Randonneur handlebars (still with the original white plastic bar
wrap). Mafac Racer centerpull brakes. 700C Mavic clincher rims,
drilled for Schraeder tubes. And, most importantly for our purposes,
it's 53 cm center-to-center, with 175mm (cottered) cranks. It's a
great fit for my younger brother.
Age and grime cover it, and there's some damage, which I'll go over in
detail below. From what I can tell, it wasn't ridden for many
miles--the tread on the tires isn't worn down much, the handlebar wrap
is in excellent shape. The braking surface of the rims shows few
abrasions, just regular crosshatches--I guess these were machined into
the rim to improve braking? It would appear that it was ridden seldom,
had one part failure, and simply languished on a hook for twenty
years. I say that, because the bikeshop sticker on it is for a shop
in Blacksburg (Va), and still shows Blacksburg in the 703 area code.
That must have been a LONG time ago.
It is of course a fixer-upper. The tires and tubes will want
replacement--the dry rot and neglect have reduced them to goo.
Probably new rim strips, while I'm about it as well.
The front derailleur has somehow snapped off at the clamp, so that
will have to go. I can't simply swap over the derailleur from my old
Raleigh, since this is a clamp-on jobbie, and the Raleigh used a
braze-on front derailleur. Would it be all right if I just removed
the front derailleur and thus made it, temporarily at least, a
five-speed bicycle? I understand the chain line will be rather less
than ideal, but I want to make this rideable for my brother as soon as
possible. Should I shorten the chain when I do this? The chain is
extremely grotty-looking: should I buy a new one, or attempt to clean
the present one?
[ He doesn't need a 53-tooth chainring now, anyway. He's not strong
enough to push 53/11, at fourteen. Heck, I can't even do that, and
I'm 23!]
And the pedals. They're simple rat-trap jobs, with reflectors on both
sides. I want to fit him with toeclips as soon as he's confident
enough to wear them. Do I just pry off the reflector on one side of
the pedal and screw on the toeclips? The reflectors seem to be
pressed onto the pedals, and aren't scrwed in--it looks like a pry
with a screwdriver will snap them off to expose the holes drilled to
accept toeclips. Since this is a French bike with cottered cranks,
I'm assuming the pedal threads to be 14mm, and so getting new pedals
isn't an option (yes, I know Sheldon Brown has Lyotard pedals in that
threading in stock, but I'm doing this on the super-super cheap, and
can't afford to buy new pedals!)
The rear derailleur looks serviceable. It could do with some cleaning
and lubrication. It seems to be bolted on via an adaptor claw of some
sort; too soon to tell whether or not this could be replaced with the
(presumably better, 1985 vintage) Shimano 105 unit from the Raleigh.
So here's the plan:
Short term: New tires, tubes (presta tubes in schraeder drillings
work, sizewise: do I risk flats from grit getting in though?) , new
chain(?), remove broken front derailleur & cable & shifter. Clean
frame & freewheel. Fit toeclips.
Longer term: Replace derailleurs with more useful units, preferrably
serviceable partsbin stuff. Replace shifters with bar-end shifters
(frame has no downtube shifter bosses, but has cable guides. With the
randonneur bars, I assume this was intended for use with barcons).
I'll get photos of the project up in its several stages on the
Livejournal soon. In the meantime, any help that you all might be
able to offer is as ever appreciated. Once this is all over, I'll be
able to take him with me for rides in the country. That would be
cool.
-Luigi
Pimpin' my lilbro's ride.
www.livejournal.com/users/ouij
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