Firstly, Fichtel and Sachs is a german company who purchased many french component producers, which doesn't make them french

Secondly, i don't know how u can say sachs has nothing special and always behind shimano: if you had a little notion about history of bikes, u would know that if sachs wasn't german, or if germany had won WW1, or if they hadn't even started it (no matter how u turn it), they would now possess all patents about bikes:
in fact they just invented nearly EVERYTHING which is know used, from the internal gear hubs (which the famous english brand Sturmey Archer introduced in england, as the english economy refused to import german products) to the hydraulic disc brakes...
Their patents of course were all blown up with the treaty of Versailles (and later again after WW2), which nearly destroyed the brand...
The french component makers owned by Sachs also were high quality, especially Sedis chains which were in the 80's the chains with less friction loss world wide, and were mounted with the torpedo sachs 5 and 7 gears.

So it would be nice if u showed this company a little bit respect, even if it's now in the hands of american giant SRAM, who makes very good products by the way.

@ cpsqlrwn : your Torelli surely is a goof bike, and if u need sachs components of the time, i think SRAM produces some for old sachs users, so just get informed on their website.
=D