Zaphod Beeblebrox 

They really did a slipshod job of finishing these lower end Peugeots. The Paint is absolute crap. There's overspray onto the chrome lugs on the fork crown (original overspray!) and I think they had Maaco shoot the paint Meguiars scratchX removes as much paint as it does blemishes on this thing. And then there's the plastic Simplex drivetrain. Lovely.

I can't wait to see how this rides.

cudak888 

Better then you describe, until the plastic Simplex FD snaps off, spins around your chainwheel, and embraces your RD with a loud smash.

-Kurt

Bikedued

Yeah, for all of their cosmetic shortcomings Peugeots always seem to ride like nothing else out there.,,,,BD

PDXaero

my 1968 UO-8 has a terrific paintjob and intact plastics.
Slipshod is a little harsh, I prefer the term "fly-by-night"

noglider 

Well, the ride is good, not great. Very good, considering how cheaply made it was. Other bikes in its price range didn't ride as well, which is one thing that makes the UO-8 a good thing, but there's no magic.

I've straightened a few UO-8 frames and forks. It was disconcerting to learn how soft they were.

Zaphod Beeblebrox 

great, and I opted to only replace the plastic rear derailleur with a newer metal simplex one


Can replacement foam half-hoods be had for the mafac levers?


Its crazy how such nice brakes are paired with such a turd of a drivetrain.

dck

This sounds like the beginning of a long, loving relationship.

I bet in a year or two the UO-8 will be your favorite bike.

Chicago Al 

Oh crap, you didn't remove the original Peugeot factory overspray did you??? There goes the patina, the je ne sais merde*, the essence of the Peugeot experience!

*je connais.

awesomobob

I have a coventry eagle road bike, (English) with a plastic simplex rear derailleur, (bless it's soul it had to be roughly 35 years old), i hit a pretty deep pothole (not paying attention) and it just snapped.


I replaced it with a shiny suntour seven derailleur and will never buy a simplex again.

Trek760

okay... that's pretty damn funny.

Rabid Koala

When I worked at the LBS that sold Gitanes, we mocked Peugeot's poor quality. The ones with the soft frames were the gaspipe Follis models. They bent forks very easily.

cudak888 

Bad thread title. It invites SS/FG hipsters to tell you that you're supposed to spell it "screw U O-8."

-Kurt

Kommisar89

I don't know man, I'm rather fond of mine, original plastic derrailleurs and all. Though I don't think it rides better than my old Bottecchia Special. We won't know for sure until I get Rosebud II on the road but then I think my Special cost about $40 more than a UO-8 at the time.

zonatandem

What do you want? Cost of an O/8 was about $125 brand new. It's not a Cinelli!

prettyshady

I feel quite bad, since I have never ridden my U0-8. poor thing must feel left out

randyjawa 

I agree that Quality Control issues abounded at Peugeot and many other French bicycle manufacturers in days gone bye. But quality issues have presented themselves with just about any vintage road bicycle that I have run across. But there is the odd Pinarello, or Marinoni, or believe it or not, Vitus that did impress both with materials used in frame construction and quality of workmanship involved. But Simplex is another matter...

Here is what some Simplex front derailleurs will look like shortly before They feed themselves into the chain, rings, freewheel and finally, spokes...

In all fairness, I really do like the way most of the Simplex transmissions I have used worked. Near flawless friction shifting coupled with quiet operation. Perfect! But when they go, they go big time and I have found an awful lot of bikes with broken Simplex front derailleurs. A Lot!

And on a final note, I really do not like the look of plastic anything on a vintage road bicycle, I don't care how well it works. But that is just me.

Road Fan

You sound like you actually expected this to be a Rene Singer for the price of a loaf of Wonder Bread. How could you have had that misapprehension? Besides, it's a 40 year old bike.

Long-time CR members will know (and I'm sure I've seen this comment here over the years) that in the post-war years racing bikes were often seen as tools for racing, rather than as artistic statements of worth and craftsmanship. The UO-8 and its siblings were mass market products, from a very high-volume factory that did not do state of the art craftsman-grade finishing on it's top products, the PX series.

Road Fan

Keep in mind price/performance. Those nylon Simplexes usually outshifted the then-leading Campagnolo Nuovo Record, with much lighter weight, much better gear range and wrap capacity, and much lower cost. Impact robustness is the trade-off. But usually a plastic part that never gets a crack started doesn't break.

Are you also saying you think the metal Simplexes are just as fragile?

Road Fan

$90-$95 around 1968 - only $5 more than a Varsity!

Poguemahone

+1. Another factor in the plastic Simplexes is exposure to light, which can slowly deteriorate older plastics. They shift very well, in good condition-- but they're hard to find like that.

UOs in general are a great base. The frame and the headset on them are the parts really worth keeping. Then you just play with the rest. On mine, I kept the ADGA saddle and the seatpost, the stem and bars as well. Everything else, I changed out, and I couldn't be happier with the end result.

I've got some customs and high end road machines, and I wouldn't claim the UO rides better than they do, but for what I ask it to do (In town fixed gear beater) it is really a remarkable little machine, far preferable to the current mass made fixies I've ridden.

Grand Bois

The paint and chrome on my '74 PA10 is remarkably good. It has been a fixed gear, a single speed and a five speed. Now it it has ten speeds and I'm gearing it down for off road use. I've had a lot of fun with this bike!

T-Mar

Boom era workmanship on the European marques was erratic at best. You would walk down a line of bicycles, inpecting them closely and purchase the one few the fewest defects.

To be fair though, this was the boom. Demand was high and there were lots of new faces working overtime in the recently expanded factories. Under these conditions, defects were bound to increase. The trouble was they were getting by the inspectors. The inpspectors were new, didn't care, the standards were low and they were told to accept defects because the demand was so high that they knew they would not be returned by ignorant Americans who knew nothing about lighweight bicycles.

However, the Japanese were in the same situation and if you walked down a line a Japanese bicycles, they were all identical. Even if they didn't have the ride quality and history of the European brands, the workmanship was better, and more importantly, consistent. A typical consumer may not have been knowlegeable about lightweight bicycles but to most, a Japanese model just looked better, even if they couldn't explain why.

While many at this forum malign the Japanese companies, we can at least credit them with raising the bar on workmanship and quality control. They forced the Europeans to raise their standards, lest they loose the entire bicycle industry.

As for Simplex, it's quite ironic that we moan about their fragility. One of the big original selling points of Delrin plastic was that it could not be broken. There is a classic 1967 photo of Raleigh executives visiting the Simplex factory and twisting a Prestige derailleur 90 degrees with a large spanner. It didn't break and sprung back, so Raleigh committed to Simplex's Delrin derailleurs and a lot of the industry followed. Of course, it didn't hurt that were lighter and cheaper, and shifted more smoothly, straight out of the box. Unfortunately, there probably wasn't any accelerated age testing, and little did they know (or care?) that they would become brittle.

Personally, I always liked the Simplex Prestige rear deraillers. What I did not like was the piston actuated front derailleur and the flexy levers. Shifting onto a larger cog was met by a lot of resistance, flex and vagueness. I found they worked much better with a metal lever. I imagine they would be quite nice with metal levers and a HyperGlide freewheel.

markk900

On my AO-8, I replaced the front Simplex with a Suntour SL and never looked back - I agree with T-mar that the piston type front doesn't shift well (unless running very similar front rings).

On the back, I replaced the freewheel with Hyperglide and shifting was excellent, however due to fears of the plastic rear snapping off I put on a Suntour V - to be honest it didn't shift any better and frankly looked a bit clunky. I compromised with an SX100 cheapy from VO, and though I've switched back and forth several times I actually prefer the shifting and chain wrap of the SX100!

To T-Mar's point, I have only ever had the all alloy levers.

On the Trek and Norco, its all Shimano Arabesque or Suntour BlueLine and they shift well (Suntour better), but perhaps because I have had the Peugeot for 36 years shifting it seems somehow cleaner and smoother to me.

Mark

love2pedal.com

The Peugeot UO8 was a prize compared to the similar Italian bikes of the same era (Chiorda, LaBonne, etc) that came with Campy Valentino with the bonus features of wobbly chainrings and chains that didn't track straight

jebensch

I have my father-in-law's UO-10., and had to figure out a build to make it unique within the stable. I took advantage of the invitation to convert to SS the turd drivetrain and banded shifters afforded. It's definitely found it's comfort zone there. Easy-pedaling ratio, Milano bars and fenders from Velo-Orange - enough bells and whistles that I don't mind that it rides like an AMC Pacer.