I was looking through the thread about that gorgeous green Presto and noted one of the Forum members wrote that he'd never seen a bike with a Portacatena attached. He also noted that he believed there was another kind of attachment for the Portacatena - the one in which the chainkeeper is attached directly to the dropout.

Being the friendly, helpful kind of guy that I am I would like to share a couple of pics of the screwed-in version. This is the later version; it came out around 1977/78. The 1010B dropout does indeed have two pre-tapped screw holes built in. The chainkeeper part screws directly into these two holes in the dropout. As you can see on mine, I have treated the chainkeeper crescent to some drillium (of course, right?). The earlier type - as on the Presto - was designed for the earlier 1010A dropouts (and later 1010B dropouts without drilled and tapped holes) and incorporated the attachment inside the dropout fork itself. The chainkeeper is a little beefier, however, it has less overall length than the screwed-in version.

In order to shift from the cogs to the chainkeeper, Campagnolo designed a special shift lever stop for this system. It incorporates two notches vice the little flick-out used to limit forward motion on the normal shift lever. The first notch limits the shift to the smallest cog. When the button on the right side shift lever is depressed the lever is allowed to move forward to the second notch, thereby allowing the chain to shift from the lowest cog to the chainkeeper. When setting up the derailleur limit screws, you have to put the shift lever all the way to the second notch and turn out the rear derailleur limit screw enough so that the chain is allowed to move onto the chainkeeper. Pull cable taut and tighten cable clamp bolt. Once the wheel is installed, shift the lever back to the first notch and the derailleur will shift the chain onto the smallest cog. Pretty neat little piece of kit, really.

Great little device for a couple of reasons: one, it makes removing the wheel and cleaning the drivetrain a breeze. Two, on a downhill you can sneak up on other riders while coasting - with the chain on the chainkeeper there is no drag on the freewheel and your descent is near-silent! Breakaway, anyone?





Sorry no pic of the lever arrangement but I am currently at my Flickr upload limit for July! There are some comprehensive pics of the mechanics of the shift lever on the Presto thread, however.