Originally Posted by
Muffins
Goodbye, old steel bikes with friction shifters. I'm moving on to modern indexed shifters, and space-age aluminum.
Nah, that is 100% satire. I've just snagged this neat Raleigh Technium for the best possible price of free; it was listed for several months, eventually dropping to $75, before being listed for free. The previous owner was moving, so he couldn't wait until warmer weather to sell. It is totally equipped with Shimano 600 tricolor, which was not shown in the listing photos, or I would have probably bought it at $75. Only the front derailleur is the original Suntour 🅰️5000. I've heard all the horror stories, yes, which is why I've mostly avoided them. I'm just curious if exposure to road salt is likely to exacerbate the lug failure issues?
A great "buy"!
Who told you that the Alpha 5000 was junk? They are not junk. People who had problems only did so due to running into compatibility problems, but only on the rear Alpha 5000 derailleur had the issues and that's because those REQUIRED an
aAlpha freewheel or any 4-notch Suntour freewheel, Suntour AP chain, Accushift shifters and cables, and Accushift rear derailleur cable because those were compressionless housing cables, thus the most difficult part of restoring the 5000 rear was finding the freewheel and the AP chain, probably the chain will be the most difficult part to find? But if the only 5000 on the bike is the front derailleur you shouldn't require any of that stuff the rear would require to operate correctly.
Even if you still had the 5000 rear, all you would have to do is switch off the index mode and use it in friction mode, which worked wonderfully.
Unless the front derailleur has a weak or broken spring I would leave it on; OR, you could find a Shimano Tri Color 600 front derailleur to match the rear, they're only around $25 on Ebay used of course, there are NIBs for $70 to $100, but a new front might look odd with a used rear.any