Friday 19 October 2012

A Bicycle for a Lady

I've been trying to persuade Miss Bicycles to start riding for a while now, although she has always insisted I will have to supply the bike. Last week I spotted something interesting on ebay, an old Peugeot mixte

Peugeot Mixte

What interested me most was that the photos were poor quality and the bike looked pretty rough so I guessed the bidding would be low, but there seemed to be nothing fundamentally wrong with it.

Peugeot Mixte

My guess turned out to be correct and I won it for £34, the next day and a £10 train journey later and I had it home...

Peugeot Mixte
The stem was seized at a funny angle, that was a bit of a bugger, as it was an odd 7mm allen key, which I didn't have amongst my tools but I found one in the workshop at work and set it right.

Peugeot Mixte
The chain had seen better days and the clearcoat was flaking

Peugeot Mixte
All the alloy is quite tarnished

Peugeot Mixte


Peugeot Mixte
Mudguards very tarnished

Peugeot Mixte
The rear wheel was tarnished, once I got the tyre off it saw that it had rotted through and had to be replaced

Peugeot Mixte
Leaves and cobwebs, the bike had spent some time in a barn.

Peugeot Mixte
Bars were tarnished and I never think drop bars suit a mixte.

Peugeot Mixte
Some heavy pitting on the chrome, that isn't all going to come out

Rather more money than I had hoped and several hours of elbow grease later and she is looking quite fine
Peugeot Mixte
I replaced, handlebars, brake levers, grips, cables and housings, chain, tyre and tubes, rear wheel and saddle and added a bell.

Peugeot Mixte
All the alloy was cleaned by scrubbing with aluminium kitchen foil and water.

Peugeot Mixte
A lot of it came up very shiny

Peugeot Mixte


Peugeot Mixte


Peugeot Mixte


Peugeot Mixte
I went for some nice swept handlebars and gumwall Schwalbe Delta Cruisers which I have on my Gazelle and have been very reliable.

I handed it over last night, first impressions were good, we'll take it out over the weekend and see how it rides.

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