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Old 04-08-19, 06:31 AM
  #53  
63rickert
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Originally Posted by mstateglfr

bikes of old were limiting with regards to gears. A 42-26 bailout gearing isnt enough

hopefully ive just misunderstood you.
My first derailleur bike, purchased 1965, had a low gear of 39x28. That bike was not purchased from a specialist shop, it came from the Schwinn dealer. Mr. Schwinn had a 36 chainring sitting in normal inventory he could have popped onto my crank if I'd asked. Riding around on that bike it was soon discovered that 2 miles away another Schwinn dealer, operated by a tinkerer, could supply me with infinite gears, a Schwinn shop 4 miles away operated for racers could sell me low gears, a Raleigh store 8 miles away operated by a collector had super low gears on bikes sitting on the showroom floor. That dealer let me take a test ride on a Gitane fitted with a low of 28x30. In 1966. Soon after that I met Oscar Wastyn.......

This notion that "bikes of old" were limited is nonsense. It gets repeated here endlessly and is simply factually wrong. Endless repetition of false information will not make it so.
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