atalamark

Folks-

Okay, I got this great old Motobecane Le Champion. I just got the bottom bracket back from Phil Wood, rebuilt.

I'm now in the process of getting it all back together but now I'm stumped!

You see, I live in Maine where my daily commute (and any riding really) involves hills. I'm talking long, steep hills where I'm at.

This bike has the original Stronglight 93 which has rings of 52 and 44!! Kind of inhuman if you ask me. The crazy part is the original freewheel, which I don't have, would have been 14-24 I think.

Anyway I put on a Suntour freewheel thats 14-28 and it just wasn't quite enough for the long hills.

So I thought well maybe a long cage derailleur, a buddy had an old Shimano Titelist GS and today I went to mount it, and what do you know? its missing the anchor bolt for the cable.

I was all set to use the long cage with another Suntour 14-32 freewheel.

Now I'm back to the same spot, big chainrings with obscure 122 BCD rings, whenever I find the right rings on Ebay in smaller sizes they're a million dollars!

As well long cage derailleurs tend to be pricey. If money wasn't an issue I'd just scoop up the next Campy Rally I saw.

So I'm sorta stumped. The only thing I'm thinking is I have this Stronglight 104 crankset I'm trying to sell for a friend. Its NOS and kinda has that Campy look, plus the chainrings are 50 and 38, which would be MUCH nicer for climbing hills. Of course the spacing is also 122 BCD so I could just put the rings from that on the 93.....

Its just one of those things. I just want to get the bike together, as stock as possible, but also be able to actually ride the thing 4 miles to work without walking up the last huge, long hill.

I guess I'm seeking advice or positive feedback or I don't know???

thanks, just had to get that out.

Mark

BlueDevil63 

You should be able to pick up an older Suntour or Shimano long cage RD for a very reasonable price, like $25. That should handle up to something like a 34 tooth large rear cog.

due ruote 

I agree; I'd find a Suntour V-gt or Cyclone gt. And maybe try the rings from the other crankset. Another option, period correct though not original spec, would be to replace the Stronglight crankset with a TA. Then you'd have all kinds of options for smaller rings.