When I started working at the power plant many years ago, it was hard to find a pair of gloves. The tool crib only had slippery thin cotton gloves, so most people just went without. They had leather gloves, but only for welders. The older guys saw skinned knuckles and calluses as a badge of honor. Eventually, the number of minor hand injuries added up to where OSHA forced them to change the culture to wearing gloves for every task, every time. You couldn't just use any glove, though. The safety manual had a chart listing the appropriate glove for different tasks, like Kevlar for cutting, rubber for chemicals, leather for welding, etc. To eliminate the excuse of not having gloves with you, you were required to have a pair on your person any time you were in the plant, even if you were just walking through. I still bust a knuckle now and then, but after working in that environment for so many years, I tend to give more thought to the consequences of not using protective gear.

Good god, there's another one out there and this one has chrome socks in the back--six of 'em. This one and mine might be the entire production run for these things.

https://milwaukee.craigslist.org/bik...888950508.html


Looks like this one is from a flipper in Wisconsin. I'm not tempted, although I would consider a couple of other old bikes I've seen that aren't quite this French.

It's another tall one according to the CL ad. Maybe someone else closer will grab it..

Not much bike work for the last week or so due to a visiting dog; we volunteered to host a little foster dog during the Operation Silent Night when they clear out the shelter for cleaning and repair. Beagle mix Holly kept us busy doing non-bike stuff.


She left yesterday and returned to the shelter, freeing me up to waste more time on bike-funner stuff. I had a brainstorm during the break regarding the chain dragging on the seat stay and lateral tube when running on the big chainring-small cog combo; if I simply adjust the rear derailleur to "lock out" the small cog I can run the RB-T wheelset with the indexed shifting and Grip Shift setup with six gears on the back instead of seven, so I'm gonna try that. So, no more 27" wheels and 5-speed freewheel, but back to 700C with cassette.


So I'm back to this bar and wheel/tire setup, and I'm starting to put it back together.

late to the game but cheapy falcon thumb shifters would be great for that build....more functional in my mind that the bar end

I do have some thumbies new in the bag and was going to try them until I figured out how to proceed with my Grip Shifts. I really like GS on upright bars. Barcons were a fallback choice and holdover from the drop bar days and they can be problem solvers at times. My old boss had a bum left flipper and his upright Witcomb was fitted with a thumbie and a barcon on the right side for him to be able to use his right hand to shift both the front and the rear derailleurs. You do what you need to do.

Well, I finally rode the bike today.


It's still incomplete because it has not been a priority but dammit, it was 80 degrees out and sunny so time for a bike ride! In my regular daily duds, I tucked my jeans legs into my socks and set out. Front derailleur cable not anchored so I had the cage set in place on the middle ring, stem slightly off center, Fujita Pro saddle being a proper ass hatchet. Good lord, how could it hurt that bad within yards of launch? Toe overlap was distracting and Vibram soles not moving easily on the toothy plastic pedals. Shifted the rear a couple of cogs up and down, denim pants stuck to the recently Proofided saddle. Man, I was really out of shape, the reason we joined the Y to improve our fitness a bit. This bike will be finished lo-o-o-ng before I'm in good enough shape to get very far on it. Rolled up to my driveway and dismounted...and fell down. Toppled over like the tricycle guy on Laugh In is the best comparison. 'Tis but a scratch, as they say, but this happened in front of my hot neighbor. Of course.


Next outing will be more successful, I'm certain.

With the hot neighbour?

No chance of that with this degree of embarrassment, which is unlikely to increase my appeal to her.

Hey, it's progress, right?

I went to physical therapy for several reasons, one of them being stiffness. I came close to falling nearly every time I got on or off the bike because swinging my leg over had become hard. It turns out it wasn't stiffness, it was weakness. Some exercises have helped, and I have to continue. Aging brings on so many indignities.

Dismounting a Mixte or Step Though after after decades of swinging a leg over takes some getting used to. When I'm on the Mixte I have to think about the dismount, because if I don't, I'll end up swinging a leg over when it's not needed. If I happen to be carrying a huge pile of stuff on the rear rack it can end about like your tumble.

I'm guessing I'm a decade or so from needing considering a mxite, but, reading the posts and looking at the photos --

So, Shifter locations: I see downtube shifters, stem shifters, bar-end and I guess thumb shifters would be fine with upright bars. Has there ever been "downtube" shifters somehow mounted on the, hmm, "upper downtubes", the twin ones? I guess either a very specialized clamp-on, or have bosses brazed on. And the routing for the RD would be straightforward enough, but the FD... one of those with the cable entry from the top? And would the results be a natural hand drop from the bars to reach the shifters there? It seems possibly better, no interference, than the traditional downtube mount.

My BIL Jeff came over today while out doing chores and asked to take the Jeunet out for a ride. He used to ride a Mercier mixte in Portland decades ago and gave it to his youngest sister (whom I married). It was later stolen off the other sister's porch. Anyway, he went down the block as I did yesterday and managed not to fall down on the dismount when he came back. He approves.





He's the guy who was with me for the aborted TransAm a decade ago.
Map 12: Random thoughts on 8.5% of a westbound TransAm, truncated.

Start looking now, especially if you need a tall one. I have since learned that Raleigh made a '70s model named Super Record (no relation to the Campy stuff) that was available in a 24" mixte. Found one in Nashville and one of the very similar home-market Wisp versions, also 24" on the other side of the goddam Puget Sound, fer chrissakes. I'd have loved to get either one of those.

If you take a smaller frame you qualify for the nicer-tubed Reynolds and Vitus bikes out there by A-D and Motobecane.

Never seen "lateral shifters," what I guess you'd call downtube shifters mounted on the twin lateral tubes of a mixte, or "upper downtube" shifters if they were on one of the Motobecanes that use that configuration.

Seriously if you think you'll need or want one in a decade start looking NOW.

Good point on the shopping. And I do ride 24".

All you need are the shifters made for the Raleigh Chopper 10 speed MK1.

For upright bars I like thumbies. Our Mixte's are all drop bar, we have downtube and bar end shifters.

I had to look that one up. Imagine showing up at a club ride with that setup!

None on eBay right now; if the 3sp version's asking prices are an indication, brazing on bosses and repainting the entire frame would be cheaper.

Don't you mean the Super Course? I'm pretty sure they made a nice mixte by that name, and I was very familiar with the US-market Raleigh catalogs in the 1970s.

That threw me, too, at first. I lived through that decade and worked in a shop during the last third and I never heard of the bike then or since. The Super Course was three-tube Reynolds and they did make a nice mixte but I'm not sure if the sizes exceeded 21". I only just (since buying this Jeunet in November) found out about the Super Record in searching for other tall mixtes. Here's one belonging to forum member bwilli88 , built for his wife. I was shocked to learn they made a 24" tall mixte and would really like to find one that's actually obtainable. Found one 24" in Nashville but the guy was not interested in shipping and I could not find a facilitator.


You can see there are others out there, true seventies bikes but not many of them tall mixtes. That's why I was so surprised they'd escaped my attention for half a century.

Got another ride in today after making a necessary saddle change. I mentioned the ass hatchet Fujita Professional that was on it and which I rode for a few years previously, so I know it works. It used to be comfortable so I have no idea how I got so tender after not riding for a few years. Surely my calluses could not have faded so easily. Anyway, I decided to try the Ideale 6 that I had on the Nishiki Cresta GT and removed when I decided to put that bike up for eventual sale.

Here's the Ideale in place of the Fujita. It seemed to be the most forgiving shape of any of my saddles.


Broader seating surface for my apparently broader butt.


Pretty supportive but the seat rail configuration combined with that particular seatpost result in a slight lack of forward positioning but good enough for a test ride.


Less immediately painful than the hatchet but I'm really going to have to get in a lot of gradual seat time to become accustomed to riding again.