1929 Griffon as restored – out on the Springwater Trail in Portland, Oregon
1929 Peugeot freewheel and fixed cog – for the Griffon’s flip flop hub.
On this Friday evening, with the gentle cool breeze blowing across my summer garden, I thought it would be nice to share some of my favorite photos of my bicycle restorations from the 1920’s through the 1950’s:
1947 Camille Daudon
This custom Daudon was built for Irene Faberge Gunst. The engraved cap can be unscrewed, with a tool kit stored inside the steerer.
A 1946 Peugeot Polymultipliee Gent’s bike
Headlamp by Edelko – 1946 Peugeot
A 1947 Peugeot Mixte. The bike when acquired consisted only of the frame and a few components.
A beautiful Simplex TDF rear derailleur on the 1947 Peugeot Mixte.
Early 50’s Mercier Meca Dural head tube. The upper head badge is missing.
Early 50’s Mercier Meca Dural in a Portland snowy winter. I’ve taken this bike out on the road – very fun to ride. It is built with duralumin tubes which are held together with ornate lugs via internal steel expanders.
A 1953 French mixte with Oscar Egg lugs.
Astoundingly gorgeous Fratelli Brivio (“FB”) hubs were among the many interesting components found on the Oscar Egg mixte.
A 1941 Goeland. My restoration of this bike is still in progress. A rare pre-WWII example.
The Goeland belonged to Annie Laurin – with her address noted on the engraved tag.
1950 Sturmey Archer shifter.
1950 Raleigh Sports Tourist. This bike gets the most views and comments from my readers. It’s an amazing machine, and a joy to ride.
Today I ventured out for a test ride on this Mid-Century Mercier Meca Dural – a bike which had been incorrectly modified when I acquired it last fall. I spent the winter restoring it and replacing many of the incorrect and missing components. But, I hadn’t had time in my schedule to get the bike out on the road for a test ride until now.
Vintage Rigid Chain Guard
Carradice Long Flap saddlebag – stuffed with all the possible tools need for a first test ride.
Unfortunately, I chose a bad moment to take the bike out to Sauvie Island – one of my favorite low key cycling jaunts. It’s the weekend before Halloween, which I realized only too late upon arriving at the Sauvie Island parking lot where cyclists normally unload their bikes for a journey around the bucolic beauty of this little island treasure near Portland. That meant hordes of cars heading to the Pumpkin Patch – a place where kids can enjoy all kinds of thrilling Halloween activities. There are no shoulders on the flat roads of Sauvie Island, so cyclists who venture there rely upon the good will of the Island’s drivers, which is usually just fine. Today, however, was not the right day to take an untested bike into this environment, and that realization dawned on me after just a few minutes of cycling on the Meca Dural’s duralumin frame.
Original alloy Guidonnet Levers.
The ride I cut short to avoid the stress of a steady stream of vans and SUVs passing too close provided some valuable information. One thing I learned was that these original guidonnet aluminum alloy levers have an unusually long reach, so if you need to brake suddenly and don’t have gigantic hands, you may not stop as quickly as you would like.
C.M. long reach calipers.
The C.M. long reach brake calipers have quite a bit of flex under hard braking. This caused the front brake to jump a bit when I attempted to stop suddenly. That may simply mean that the brake mounting bolts need a bit more torque – so that’s an issue to sort out.
Chain guard mounting hardware.
I also discovered that the lovely vintage Rigid chain guard which I had installed using a combination of new and vintage mounting hardware needed adjustment, as the chain rubbed against the guard in the lowest gear. Fortunately, this mounting hardware makes it very easy to adjust the position of the chain guard by turning the nuts on the long connecting bolts.
Vintage Simplex Grand Tourisme rear derailleur.
The 3 speed freewheel is mated to a 46 tooth Louis Verot chainring on Stronglight 49d crank arms. The small cogs make for high gearing, which was almost too high even on the totally flat roads of Sauvie Island. One solution will be to locate a vintage french threaded freewheel with larger cogs. The bell crank actuated Simplex derailleur worked perfectly and can definitely handle larger-toothed cogs. Shifting was straightforward, with no noticeable over-shifting required. Since I didn’t have the original chain, I had guessed at the chain length.
The ride quality overall was comfortable. I attribute this primarily to these wonderfully preserved vintage Mavic 650b rims and the new Panasonic tires, inflated to fairly low pressures, as well as to the flex characteristics of the duralumin frame. This bicycle’s frame design doesn’t include an extra set of mixte stays extending to the rear drop out. Initially, I experienced a bit of a wobbly feel at the front end, which would likely become a non-issue once a rider gets this bike underway for a few miles.
Meca Dural ornate aluminum lugs joined by internal steel expanders. Kitty is optional equipment.
After this brief ride I know what is needed to make the bike more useful and reliable. And, I didn’t worry about the Meca Dural aluminum tubes – they performed no differently than any steel framed bike I have ridden. The bike as pictured weighs 24 lbs – very impressive considering the full fenders, chain guard, and dynamo lighting system. The next time I ride this bike, I hope to have a bit longer and more enjoyable ride.
Late 40’s/early 50’s Mercier Meca Dural, as originally acquired – with incorrect 700c wheel size and various missing parts.
To counteract the too frequent headaches and setbacks on the mechanical side of bringing this Mercier Meca Dural back to life, I decided to focus on the “extras” that are often regarded as nonessential accessories – chain guards, lighting, and racks. As fashion experts know, it’s the extras that really make one’s ensemble come together.
Baffling chain guard hardware.
Mounting a chain guard, however, proved daunting. I had a nice aluminum Rigid-branded guard from this same era, which fit well around the 46T Louis Verot chain ring. But, one of the odd things about this bike is that all the frame mounted braze-ons and brackets are missing. I had this chain guard hardware set, shown above, that included a baffling assemblage of clamps, threaded bolts, and numerous nuts and washers, but I couldn’t determine how to make this hardware work on this bike and with the Rigid-branded chain guard.
Creative chain guard mount – spotted in downtown Portland.
Fortunately, while downtown waiting to catch a train a while back, I spotted this wonderful Raleigh Sports with an interesting chain guard mounting solution. I snapped this photo with my iPhone so that I wouldn’t forget what I saw. Meanwhile, I searched the internet for chain guard mounting lore. Velo-Orange came to the rescue, with a nice discussion of different kinds of frame braze-ons for chain guard mounts, as well as how to configure hardware when your frame lacks such mounts. You’ll note in the photo above that this cyclist has mounted the chain guard using eyebolts on the guard, which make it easy to adjust the chain guard when used with the long threaded bolts – with the threaded portion attaching the the frame clamp. Using these ideas, I anticipate that I’ll get the Rigid chain guard mounted properly, but I can see that I’ll need a bit more in the way of hardware.
I don’t plan to go that far, but I am impressed with the quality of this light. When I was setting it up, I noticed creases at the back of the headlight shell that I thought were caused by the shell being dropped and dented. But once I had the light mounted, I could see that the creases were in the perfect position to hold the front brake cables in place. I don’t know if these dents were a fortunate mishap – but it works for me. You’ll note that I used red cable housing for this build. These housings are vintage from the 1970’s – they are a darker red than the new red Jaguar cables, and match the dark red color in the Mercier head badge. Hopefully, the fashion police will agree with my choice.
Installing the lighting meant coming up with a fork mounted dynamo, which this bike would have originally had (as there is no dynamo mount on the seat stays). I located a vintage dynamo fork bracket, and installed it on the fork blade over some black cloth handlebar tape, to protect the steel fork. For now, I have set up this very lightweight and free spinning Soubitez Argil dynamo, which is not from this era, but dates probably to the 1960’s. If it works well, I’ll keep it. If not, I’ll source a dynamo from this era. You’ll see that the fork bracket includes a grounding set screw in the middle of the bracket. This provides the electrical ground for this system, so it needs to contact the steel fork. But, you don’t want to screw it in too far, as it could damage the fork.
Finally came the ideas for a rear rack. I have had this interesting 1940’s steel rack in my shop for awhile. I haven’t found the right project for it. I dry mounted the rack on the bike and found that it seemed to fit well.
This steel rack is reasonably light weight and features fully adjustable stays, so that it should fit on pretty much any configuration. It is a bit rusted and needs to be cleaned and polished. It’s not the strongest rack out there, but should work well for this bicycle, which was designed for city riding.
One of the fun things about this Mercier Meca Dural, is that it served as the inspiration for Public Bike’s Champs-Elyisees d8i bicycle. The above photo provided their inspiration. When I have completed the restoration of my Mercier Meca Dural, I hope to be equally inspired, and inspiring.
