If we are talking about the model marked "SunTour 7", I think it came out in the early 70's. I have one as original equipment on my circa 1972 Follis mod 172. At first I thought it was a replacement, as I didn't expect a SunTour FD on a Follis. But another CR member had a Follis 172 about the same age, also with a SunTour 7 FD. At the time, the Simplex FD's were still the pushrod type, as were the lower end Campys, so Follis may have been looking for a moderate cost parallelogram type. Don't know why they didn't use a Huret, though. By the mid 70's Simplex had introduced parallelogram FD's, both in plastic and the all-alloy SLJ, and Campy offered the more afforadble Nuovo Grand Sport with pretty much the same design as NR, so the use of SunTour derailleurs was brief on high midrange European bikes like the Follis 172, although they established themselves on lower end Raleighs like the Grand Prix. In the early 80's use of SunTour would expand again on European bikes, notably on Motobecane, where the Grand Jubilee shifted from Huret to SunTour derailleurs. Not sure of the whole SunTour product line in the 70's, but I think maybe SunTour 7 was replaced by SunTour V.
Regards,
Jerry Moos
Big Spring, Texas, USA
> From: joeb-z@comcast.net <joeb-z@comcast.net>
\r?\n> Subject: Re: [CR] Disraeli Gears
\r?\n> To: discodave39@yahoo.co.uk
\r?\n> Cc: classicrendezvous@bikelist.org
\r?\n> Date: Wednesday, April 22, 2009, 10:11 PM
\r?\n> Those came out about 1975 or 76. A basic steel derailleur
\r?\n> that worked very nicely. The Suntour rear derailleurs all
\r?\n> work the regular way. Some of the fronts work
\r?\n> "backword".
\r?\n>
\r?\n> Joe Bender-Zanoni
\r?\n> Whitneyville, CT
\r?\n> ----- Original Message -----
\r?\n> From: "David Pearson"
\r?\n> <discodave39@yahoo.co.uk>
\r?\n> To: classicrendezvous@bikelist.org
\r?\n> Sent: Wednesday, April 22, 2009 10:22:08 PM GMT -05:00
\r?\n> US/Canada Eastern
\r?\n> Subject: [CR] Disraeli Gears
\r?\n>
\r?\n> Hi All,
\r?\n>
\r?\n> Does anyone know how to contact Disraeli Gears. The e-mail
\r?\n> address on the web-site doesn't work. I've tried
\r?\n> several times but keep getting this mailer-daemon thingy.
\r?\n> Maybe someone on here will be able to assist. I am trying to
\r?\n> identify a Suntour derailler. I don't know what age it
\r?\n> is or whether it is on topic or not. The only identification
\r?\n> on it is Suntour 7, 5 or maybe 6 speeds and the derailler is
\r?\n> reverse action. I have just bought this on E-Bay and of
\r?\n> course it hasn't arrived yet. Any help with the contact
\r?\n> e-mail or ID of this bit of kit would be highly appreciated.
\r?\n>
\r?\n>
\r?\n> David Pearson
\r?\n> in a bit windy waiting for the rain
\r?\n> Cuernavaca
\r?\n> Mexico