Ken,
Neat link...
I think that you're right. I remember seeing one or two early "Criterium" derailleurs that were dark blue, the rest were black like this one:
For whatever reason, not many of those earlier Simplex Criterium blue/black derailleurs survived into the 70s.
Most of the older Criteriums that I've seen have been in the past few years. Maybe because they were so mundane that I overlooked them back then. Now that I have 3 bikes that they would be the correct RDs for I've been keeping an eye out for them.
There were also some Criterium RDs that had a tinge of red in the silver name badges.
We sold Gitanes up through about 1976. The Gitane Tour de France came with Simplex Criterium derailleurs up until 1975. So did some of the early 70s Andre Bertins that we carried.
In our locale, the first thing that most new Tour de France owners did was replace the Torquemada model Freccia D'Oro plastic saddle with a Brooks Pro or B17. Freccia D'Oro means "Golden Arrow". ;-(
The next thing was change the Simplex Criterium RD to a Campy NR if they could afford it or Suntour V or VGT if not.
We replaced very few Simplex Criteriums and the few we did were takeoffs. On the other hand we bought Simplex Prestige derailleurs by the box full and changed them out at the slightest problem.
Funny thing, in our area, most of the PX-10 owners kept their bikes completely stock for many years!
Chas. Colerich Oakland, CA USA
Kurt Sperry wrote:
> On Mon, Jun 7, 2010 at 9:40 AM, verktyg <verktyg@aol.com> wrote:
>
>> The Criterium originally had a clear plastic name plate with a black
>> background. These changed to a silver background shortly afterwards.
>
>> Chas. Colerich
>> Oakland, CA USA
>>
>>
>
> My impression- or perhaps mis-impression- is that the early Criteriums
> had a dark blue (almost black) rather than black background. I could
> easily be wrong and there may have been both though. See photos at
> link below:
>
> http://tinyurl.com/
>
> Kurt Sperry
> Bellingham, Washington
> USA