gaucho777 

I'm curious, when you received Peugeots from the factory, did the bars come wrapped or was that up to the shop to do?

Here's my Peugeot with the original handlebar tape under the Mafac body.



+1 to wrapping with only the clamp on the bars then mounting the lever to the clamp after wrapping. This method gets more difficult with some clamps such as some versions of Weinmann levers/clamp which use a nut pinched between the clamp ears. The nut will easily fall out of the clamp unless it is secured by the lever body. With this type of clamp, I simply loosen the mounting bolt as much as possible and then slip the tape under the body before tightening down the mounting bolt.

verktyg 

WASH YOUR MOUTH OUT WITH SOAP!

We sold Gitanes up through ~1975-76 and Andre Bertins from 1975 through the early 80s. Peugeots were the competition!!!

At the peak of the bike boom in 1972-73 we would receive a truckload of bikes. They were selling faster than we could unload them from the truck and put them together. We didn't pay much attention to the bar tape unless is was coming loose...

Most of the entry level Gitane Gran Sport models came with factory wrapped plastic tape until about 1974 when they switched to cloth tape. The thin plastic tape that Gitane used was such a PIA to wrap that we used cloth tape any time there was a problem or the bars came without tape from the factory.

We never paid much attention to plastic bar tape except to remove it! If it came loose it would unwrap by itself!

These pictures from the 1970-73 Gitane catalog shows the tape wrapped around the levers but that may have been done by Mel pinto Imports for the photo shoot.



An NOS Gitane Gran Sport, The bars may have been re-wrapped with modern tape???



My 1971 Gitane Tour de France still has the original factory wrapped plastic tape. This tape was mach thicker than the tape used on lower priced models. Later TdFs and Super Corsas came with cloth tape either wrapped or unwrapped. They used white cloth tape on a lot of bikes which easily got dirty on display models so we frequently replaced it.



Peugeot used thicker, better quality tape. Here's before and after cleanup pictures of the original tape on a 1972 U08.



Tommy Simpson's 1961 Gitane bike with the "fancy" tape wrap around the levers.



Jacques Antiquetil's 1963 bikes.




BTW, from the 1970's on, most teams re-wrapped the bars on their bikes before every stage or race. Bikes had to look clean and shiney.


verktyg

Chas.

rootboy 

Tho' those are Campy levers on there in the pic, there's MAFAC clamps under them. Switched back and forth.
I always do the under-the-levers wrap.

CV-6 

Please share your technique.

Grand Bois

See posts 19 and 21.

CV-6 

I guess I am not very intuitive as the photos do not reveal to me how it is done. Is it one continuous wrap? Pieces cut out to warp the levers then wrap the bars? Extra tape needed?

crank_addict

The mentioning of Tommy Simpson. Good pic of the wrap in this one. (Though eerie as this might have been taken on his fateful day.)

crank_addict

Those 1/2 hoods are a PITA. Even having the clip intact, the rubber eventually disintegrates or curls on the rearward portion. I tightly wrap the edge of it and seems to do the trick. Cloth Tressostar, single layer. To try something different, I fully wrapped the GB bars. For this bike, I was bummed the beautiful 'greenish' patina that was on the adjusting barrels came off even though I carefully lubed them.

gaucho777 

^Cool Peugeot. Those handlebar-mounted cable guides/bottle cage mount are neat & I dig the old-style graphics!

@verktyg, thanks for the reply & info. Peugeot, Gitane, what's the difference?

dddd

Great job working around those hoods The look is just perfect.

For anyone applying wrap under the lever bodies, my experience suggests that some subsequent additional tightening of the clamp nuts will be needed to maintain a safe level of attachment of the lever to the bars as the wrap material compresses over time. The same applies to any threaded attachment where bolt tension depends on compressive force in any polymer or organic material like paint, plastic or tape.

SJX426 

@randyjawa - You might consider these:
Universal Brake Lever Hoods Ammortizzatori Coprileve Freno Corsa | eBay

verktyg 

SPOILER ALERT!

The cosmetics on the bike boom Peugeots was slightly better (sometimes a lot better) than on Gitanes from that era.

One big difference was in the forks on Peugeots all the way up to the PR10 model. The blades were made of rolled heavy gage sheet metal rather than tubing. The seam was brazed down the back sides of the blades.



I discovered this the first time I tried to straighten a bent Peugeot fork at our shop. The seam split like a banana peel!

The other thing was, Peugeot used a cheap piece of seamed straight gage tubing for their steerers. They had a split sleeve brazed into the bottom in the fork crown area. A lot of other companies did this too, including Motobecane.



Gitane used a butted steerer made by Nervor (not Nervex or Nervar), even on the "all Reynolds 531" models.



Lastly, were the UGLY "Aztec" lugs that Peugeot used on their lower end models....





Those Peugeots have withstood the test of time so I guess the French shortcuts worked! A Centime saved is a croissant earned!


Oh and BTW, Peugeots were easier to assemble out of the box than Gitanes... We used to compare notes with the Peugeot dealer down the street...

13 Gitanes, 11 Motobecanes, 8 Bertins and 7 Peugeots, 1 Lejeune and 1 Mercier....

verktyg

Chas.

eschlwc

yeah, i totally dig my '84 davidson. best bike i've ever ridden.

i bought an '81 mondia 'super' recently just for the super record rear derailleur. so now the davidson is sportin' a bit of black and titanium.

hobbs1951

Tom Simpson,"Tommy"; was wearing #49 in the '67 Tour.

Jon.

hobbs1951

Try removing the lever clips from the lever bodies, affix clips to bars, wrap, then attach bodies to the clips.

Hey presto, bar wrap perfection!

Jon.

non-fixie 

I rode my Champion Mondial to work today and it made me think of this thread. I had to negotiate dense rush hour city traffic which meant I rode with my hands on the hoods are lot more than I usually do. Those half hoods are really wiggly when you grip them tightly for a traffic light sprint! I think I now know why the pros taped them down BITD.