Originally Posted by
JohnDThompson
The Prestige derailleurs actually work very well when new, and handle up to a 28T sprocket. They performed better than most other derailleurs on the market at that time, and were considerably lighter as well. The problem is that they don't tolerate neglect. Grit eventually erodes the pivots, so they become sloppy and shifting performance suffers. And the Delrin plastic become brittle and failure prone after prolonged exposure to UV light.
i recall riding a Peugeot back to back with my Suntour equipped Mitzutani Super-Lite factory race bike... Shifting was kinda vague, and suffered from hesitation, then needed a tweak a minute or so later.... Wes' PX bike's chain always seemed to flop around over bumps too.
i concluded that simplex sucks back then.... and you acknowledge that they don't improve with age, unlike many french wines.
Suntour also made some not-good ders in the day... i have one that i have tried to mate up to a few projects... it keeps landing back in the suntours bin, in a bag.. now with a couple extra notations on it.
my only campy bike of that 1960s-70s era was also my first road bike, and i had no chance to compare it before it got stolen.. a Lygie Dura-lumin bike... dressed in my favorite blue...the r. der. was a gran turismo with that crazy loop-de-loop cage... it would shift, eventually.
cassette design also plays into shifting... a straight cut freewheel will always be worse than a more modern cogset.
i don't recall what freewheel was on that bike.. and i should add that i rescued that bike from a chicken coop, complete with a pound of free fertilizer on it!
i have an immaculate looking simp-der in my bins... it is sloppy feeling, but the plastic hasn't cracked... yet.
that odd cage pivot placement may be why Wes' chain always flopped around, IMO. i know he never dismantled it, since just changing a sew-up baffled him.
