Originally Posted by
HillRider
A major reason for the switch was that by the 70's the US was the only user of 27" wheels and the rest of the world had settled on 700C as it's standard road bike wheel size.
In the 70s quality bikes started coming out of Japan. They never used either 27" or 700c as a major standard for their home market & still don't. The Japanese manufacturers of the day - like today's Taiwanese manufacturers - would put any size wheel and tire on the bikes your contract called for.