Chombi

About a week ago, I stumbled on to these at eBay just by chance, and I just had to get them as they seem to be French 80's and very unusual.




My guess is they could be part of Stronglight's Delta group from the mid to later 80's as I vaguely remember maybe seeing a pair being sold as such a few months ago at eBay, but not 100% sure. The two piece cage is aluminum, same with the mounting screws. The pedal body is composite (Delrin?) while the very short axle seems to be CrMo steel. Weight without clips and straps, comes in a few grams lighter than my Look Keo Classic composite pedals, so quite light. The box they came in has French words printed on it that seem to confirm where I think they came from, but other than that I cannot seem to find any information about them in the net at all. Anyone else here seen these before??

unworthy1

whatever they are (unique!) I don't think that's Delrin. Looks like either glass-reinforced or possibly what they called "carbon" back then (when molded) and was a carbon-filled resin but obviously not CF fabric.

zukahn1 

Thje closest I have seen are some Profile bmx limiteds from the late 80's which ran 100 or so back then.

gaucho777 

I can't help, but I will say those are very cool and will look great on any of your vintage carbon bikes. The shape of the cage plates makes me think they could be for the track.

PDXaero

Chombi

Oooh!, there it is, Stronglight PR300....
Needle bearings?...I had a feeling that the bearings are different because of how short the axle is.
I noticed that the cage mounting screws are different on my pedals. They might have changed the screw spec from aluminum to steel at one point for more durability. The allen sockets would make it easier to tighten them up too. The markings indicating which side they are for is also different, with mine using L and R for Left and Right, and the ones in your pic saying G and D for Gauche and Droite. Could be signifying threading as my pedals are BSC (9/16). Are yours French threaded (14x125)?
Thank you for posting the ID info PDXaero!
Gaucho777, I think you could be right about them possibly being track pedals as they seem to have that abbreviated look to them..... I am considering changing out the Look Keo Classics on my Vitus Carbone to these ones, or using it on a another future full French C&V build.....

gaucho777 

Notice also that PDXaero's photo shows a logo on the pedal body which appears to be missing from yours.

I love discovering these obscure parts I haven't seen previously. Nice score. Here's another thread with some additional photos and a different (road?) version of the pedal cage that wraps around the pedal body. I think you may be onto something with L/R and G/D as a signifier of threading.

https://forum.ctc.org.uk/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=75057

unworthy1

Stronglight called it "fiberglass", but we'd say glass-reinforced or glass-filled resin, to differentiate from typical fiberglass: laid up glass fabric or chopped fibers saturated with liquid polyester or epoxy resin.

Chombi

I guess "Glass Filled Resin" will always be better than plain ole "Delrin".....
Thanks for the clarification!

unworthy1

It's possible that the resin used is Delrin (a brand name for Acetal) but more common with glass-filling would be ABS or Polypropylene resin. In any case the glass-reinforcement will make the pedal bodies much stronger than unreinforced resin, and ABS or PP will generally weather better than Acetal.

Catnap 

it's possible that they were made by Stronglight for another company like Spidel or Gipiemme, that was pretty common back in the day. They remind me of the rare Assos pedals.

kroozer 

Do you have to remove the front cage plate to install toe clips?

Chombi

I don't think so, doing such will most likely end up tilting the foot/shoe downwards on the pedal too much, that might make it hard to slip the cleats into the rear plate. I think the front plate mounting screws are shared with the clips that will be mounted on top of it. The special washers on the front plate mounting screws seems to indicate this too, as it presents a flat surface against the toe clip mounting surface and not the conical back of the mounting screw.

fietsbob

Of course Not , silly, But the bolts you see, also hold the toe clip on top of the front plate ..

dddd

I remember taking some extremely light, black plastic (Vittoria iir) one-sided platform pedals off of a bent LOOK steel bike that I sold.
It turns out that the spindles are titanium, and iir, one of each pedal's bearings is just the spindle running against the hole in the pedal body.

Anybody ever hear of those? I'll try to dig them up soon, and post photos.

It can be hard figuring out who really made some of the obscure parts, but some (like EDCO and Roval hubs made by Maillard) give obvious clues.

Chombi

Actually, someone here in the C&V forum, doing a weight weenie build was looking for those Vittoria pedals........ He might still be looking for those if you might be selling them.
IIRC, those Vittoria pedals were vying for lightest in the 80's, competing against Assos' own version.
Please post some pics if you find them. It should be interesting to look at and learn about the details on those pedals.