I've been interested in this myself as it comes up frequently with my favorite brand, Bottecchia. From the late 60's to the mid-70's Bottecchia had two models at the top of their line that shared a Columbus tubed frame. They differ in that the top of the line Professional model is full Nuovo Record while the second place model, the Giro d'Italia has a mix of Campagnolo and French parts. What is interesting as it relates to this topic is that catalogs as late as 1973 list the Giro d'Italia as using the old Record derailleurs and Record shifters. I've seen several pictures of Giro d'Italias dated as '69's with that setup. Later models, however, starting at least by 1971, seem to come with a Valentino Extra drivetrain although this is not indicated in the catalog (well, except for that ever present "Specifications subject to change without notice" warning). I've never seen a Giro dated as a 1970 so I can't be exactly sure when this occured and I don't know if there were Record and Valentino models produced simultaniously but it does seem posible that old style Record was no longer available in the early 70's prior to that 1973 cut-off date.
Regards, Derrick Bourgeois Colorado Springs, USA
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Message: 12
Date: Sun, 17 May 2009 07:14:21 -0700
From: Jan Heine <heine94@earthlink.net>
Subject: Re: [CR] RE Campagnolo old Record rear deraileurs
To: "Charles T. Young" <youngc@ptd.net>,
<classicrendezvous@bikelist.org>
Message-ID: <a06230906c635c993a27b@[67.100.126.241]>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed
At 11:09 PM -0400 5/16/09, Charles T. Young wrote:
>I thought it odd also but in an off-list discussion with Wayne, he
>pointed out that Chuck Schmidt's timeline has it so:
>
>"1973
>The last year the Record rear derailleur is available. "
>
>I had assumed from the absence in the 1967 Catalog 15 that it was
>supplanted at that time by the Nuovo Record.
>
>If so, the NR must have gutted sales of the Record. How else to
>explain their relative rarity if they were in production for approx.
>10 years? Sales may have been largely confined to those distrustful
>of the durability of a largely alloy unit.
The "available" Record derailleurs probably were left-over stocks...
I used to work with a mid-size company making model railroads, which
worked very similarly to Campagnolo. Products that stayed in the
program longest were the ones that sold the poorest.
Mid-size companies like Campagnolo don't make every part "just in
time," but they set up their assembly lines to make a few parts at a
time. When they have a year's worth or so, they put them in a
warehouse, and switch their assembly line to the next part. However,
it is hard to predict demand, and so sometimes, a year's worth of
supply sells out in 3 months, at other times, it sits on the shelves
for decades, especially if it is superseded by a new and better
product.
So if Campagnolo made 5000 Record derailleurs in 1966, there may have
been 500 Records left in 1967, when the Nuovo Record was introduced
and the Record became obsolete. Rather than throw out the 1000 shiny,
new Records, Campagnolo kept them on the order sheets. Being
obsolete, they may have taken 6 years to sell.
At some point, when a product sells so poorly that the
warehousing/inventory costs are higher than the expected profit from
sales, there is either a "blowout sale" or the parts go to scrap.
Others stay on the shelves for decades, which is why you sometimes
can find NOS parts at factories or distributors.
It would be interesting to know whether the 1973 year date means
"available from the factory" or "available from distributors." The
first-generation TA cranks with the pear-shaped axle were available
in the U.S. for quite a while after TA stopped offering them in
France, simply because some distributors had left-over stocks. But
the factory had switched to the square taper long ago...
Jan Heine
Editor
Bicycle Quarterly
140 Lakeside Ave #C
Seattle WA 98122
http://www.vintagebicyclepress.com