I put together many a U08 and A0-8. While these bikes have little nostalgic appeal to me, Peugeot had one thing going for it and that was a sense of quality control. I am not saying that the bikes were great, but they were consistently good, which was a pleasent surprise in the bike boom days. At that time almost every sub $150 dollar bike was a lottery for the conscientious mechanic when you opened the box. For example, the Italian bike favorite was the chainline from hell, 25% of the Motobecanes had forks bent in shipping (or otherwise), Raleighs had component changes from the catalog or forgot to braze a joint every now and then, Schwinns required assembling and taping the bars and the wheels were often atrociously built (or better put, merely laced).
By contrast Peugeots were highly assembled out of the box. They were also shrink wrapped. Many of the adjustments were pretty close and I suspect some dealers passed them on to customers with no more than 10 minutes of assembly time. I don't remember too many frame defects either, although I was pretty young and hadn't developed as critical an eye at that time. Anyway, I thought I'd pass on this hidden virtue of the Peugeots when new.
Joe
At 11:55 AM 6/24/01 -0400, Jerry & Liz Moos wrote:
>Gee, Garth, my first ten-speed was also a UO-8, and I remember it
relatively foundly. The frame and rims were heavier than on a top model,
but the bike was much lighter and livlier than the Huffys and Murrays of
the time, or the Schwinn Varsity. The Simplex Prestige derailleurs did
leave a lot to be desired, but once I repaced mine with Shimano Titlist
(and SunTour ratchet shifters), the bike was a pleasure to ride. I always
thought Simplex made a big mistake with this rear derailleur, when the
Simplex Criterium found on the PX-10, which was also part pastic and looked
the same as the Prestige to the novice, actually shifted better than a
Campy NR thanks to a proper forged cage lacked by the Prestige and a
spring-loaded upper pivot lacked by the Campy. The Simplex Criterium
shifters were also much better, forged alloy and less prone to slipping
than Campy. Had Simplex made all their plastic derailleurs like the ones
on the PX-10, the French bicycle industry might be alive and well today.
One has to remember that plastics were a glamorous high-tech material at
the time, but mistakes were made in its application, just as mistakes were
made in the early applications of aluminum, titanium and carbon fibre to
bicycle frames and components.
>
>Regards,
>
>Jerry Moos
>
>garth libre wrote:
>
>> Please don't tell me it's true. In 1972, I paid $120.00 for a Peugeot
and another on this list paid less than $200.00 for a PX-10 at the tail end
of 1971! My $120.00 bought me a virtually unusable piece of crap. When the
Central Park junky stoled it from me, two weeks after I bought it, part of
me was glad. Mafac racer brakes: ok they stopped. Heavy steel unbutted
frame: heavy and not much of an improvement over my early sixties Dunelt.
(Rudge like). Seat: bad bad bad. Rims: heavy steel and not an improvement
over anything. Derailleurs (front and back): the worst that could possibly
be made.... More horrible shifting is not possible if they were designed by
a cadre of retarded preteens. Somedays it was faster to just get off the
bike and help the chain on to the next cog with a stick. The plastic metal
shiffters: when you used them the metal part separated and sometimes
pinched your thumb skin. Now let's discuss the PX-10 for less than double
the price. A totally respectable piece of machinary that brought joy to
many and fueled the dreams of all us less fortunate who were caught by the
ten speed bug during the 70's bike boom. What bothers me most is that other
companies like Atala and even Schwinn were putting out out decent bikes for
the same that a U0-8 cost. I only bought the Peugeot because it was my
first 10 speed and I didn't know better. Two years later, I saw Nishikis
and Gitanes and Motebecanes and of course Atalas that let people travel all
over the east coast metropolis for the same $120.00 I spent cursing plastic
derailleurs. An early 70's UO-8 was more a mistake than the wiretapping of
the Watergate. Was any other bike as badly made and designed, for the same
money? Garth