Ken Wehrenberg brings up a great point : What was your first case of 'hotrod fever' in childhood? Mine was :
Raleigh Grand Prix, 1972 model, bought used in Jan 1973 ($90). Went down a sewer drain and pretzled the rear wheel 30 secs into my maiden voyage, i was crying and my dad got me a Weinmann dimpled rear rim two days later. Also, atom freewheel was garbage, shop replaced it with a suntour freewheel, under the still-valid warranty.
pretty soon, I removed the pie plate and pedal reflectors, but I left the wheel reflectors and rear reflector on. My parents got me one of the first 'Bell Biker' helmets in 1974.
pretty soon, got fed up with the simplex rear derailleur and bought a suntour V-GT ($12.95, BTW). Maybe I threw the prestige into the spokes?
Someone opened a care door in front of me on the way to junior high school and I ended up with a new set of Weinmann levers with gum hoods and grey barrel adjusters and QRs, I think.
pretty soon, one shift lever snapped and I got some used campy levers ($12) at a prairie cycle club swap meet at the university.
Aftere regreasing the bottom bracket, I could never get the cotters on tight enough to last! After destroying two sets of cotters, I got a light Sugino Maxy - $29.95 complete (w/bottom bracket), the one w/a fixed outer chainring, because I was too proud to ask a bikeshop to reinstall my cotters (and wanted a lighter bike). Used the spindle in the raleigh cups.
To carry the 1/2" motorcycle cable and my kryptonite lock, I was forced to install a pletscher rack to haul all 4 lbs of luggage everywhere in town on my 'lightweight' !!! I think people forget that in the 1970's bike theft was a daily experience ...
After a second crash (1st one into a parked car, second one was a high speed wipeout on a curve), I got a new chromed fork for the undamaged steel frameset.
Then in 1977, i bought a SEKAI 2500 grandtour with my hard-earned cash ($240 - paper routes and lawn mowing). This bike had suntour cyclone gears, forged dropouts, db steel, shimano 600 hubs, 300 gram 27 1/8 tires, dia compe sidepull brakes (black anodized) with QRs and barrel adjusters, sugino maxy black-anodized cranks, 25 lbs.
That second bike, arguably superior to the raleigh gran sport, was selected because al the parts were so well balanced, I would never again have 'hotrod fever' because if I upgraded any single part, the whole bike would be out of balance.
Finally, in 1982, upgraded the 21.5" grand prix with a 23.5" grand prix frame, and the whole bike was stolen a short time later.
- Don Gillies
San Diego, CA, USA