Vintage Ten Speed is Painless, it Brings on Many Changes.

(Apparently the 1980s is Vintage now. I am so very, very old.)

Jealousy and curiosity being equally powerful motivators, it wasn't long after Ginger went Full Roadie that I began to wish I could experience the social aspect of the road ride without all the attendant arse padding. Especially when special 'family' rides were offered by various organisations and I found myself road-blocked from even the lower end rides because my bicycles were too 'slow'. "Road bikes only!" they inevitably specified. Aside from justified outrage that a 'slow' ride did not appear to exist in Perth (I have since discovered there was a Tweed Ride in Fremantle last year. Fie on after-the-fact facts!), I was genuinely interested in expanding my bicycle skills by experiencing different types of bicycles. I had also seen how slender road rider's arms were, thus invoking the third motivator: Vanity. The pseudo-nonchalant viewing of local ebay listings reached its inescapable conclusion…

circa 1980s 10 Speed Repco Traveller.

The comfortingly solid steel and lugged Repco was purchased with visions of a bicycle touring Tasmanian future. These visions are still a work in progress, as is the Repco. It was sold in technically rideable condition but with more room for potential satisfaction than current jubilation. For a start, the brake levers are an evolutionary dead-end in the bicycle world. A dead-end which I came to discover had been lovingly christened, 'Suicide Brakes'.

Suicide and lavender. A winning combination.

Note that the usual brake lever sitting on the curve of the drops has a strange side projection. This runs parallel to the straight middle of the bars, supposedly providing the ability to brake while your hands are on top rather than moving them down to the drops. According to internet bicycle history, sports cycling was all the rage in the 1970s and so bicycle shops sold drop bar road after drop bar road to Average Joe despite what Average Joe (or Jollene's) requirements and skills might actually warrant. Instead of admitting that one style of bicycle does not fit all, (and likely blinded by dollar signs as they rode the craze for…um…road bikes…that they rode.) somebody clever came up with the idea of 'safety brakes'; extra levers right next to the top of the bars, coincidentally where the drop bar averse automatically like to put their hands because going from zero to drop bars is freaking scary and people don't instantly take to hunching forward with reduced field of view. Surprising, I know. Great, right? Safety wins again! Except: Turns out that a secondary brake lever is not nearly as powerful as a primary one so you actually get less braking power from the 'safety' brake. It also turns out that the top middle of the bars is the absolute worst place for an inexperienced road cyclist to put their hands as it gives the least amount of stability and control. Lastly, the suicide levers made other hand positions awkward. Ultimately, brake lever technology moved forward and bicycling fell out of fashion so that unsuitable bicycles were no longer being forced upon unsuspecting and innocently ignorant consumers. Until the mountain bike craze of the 1990s when it happened all over again. And now the hybrid bike push. And fixie epidemic. Anyway, having personally experienced these 'safety' brakes, I can anecdotally confirm that they suck. Stopping distance is not so much about stopping as it is about hoping there is a cushioned surface somewhere in the next 5 metres. Or at least not a car.

Stem mounted gear shifters.

The other problem with the Repco is one of my inexperience rather than mechanics. The stem mounted gear shifters and the gears themselves are terrifying to me. They are not 'indexed' as I am used to when it comes to gears. By not indexed I mean that they, 1. Don't have any kind of numbers or lines anywhere, and, 2. Do not reassuringly 'clunk' into place in the way that I am used to gears sounding. Usually, when shifting gears there is a nice click or a clunk to signal to the modern rider that teeth and cogs are interacting harmoniously and you are not about to participate in anything awful like the chain making a bid for freedom or your face meeting the pavement. If indexed bicycle gearing is like a staircase inside your house, these gears are like finding your staircase has been replaced with a water slide. They are known as friction gears and I am told they are a pleasure if you know how to use them. Because there is no predetermined sweet spot, you are able to tweak them to your liking. Great in theory but as I am still learning how to deal with indexed gears of more than one chainring, still a little above my skillset for now. I am aiming to conquer them though because I would hate to replace something which works and also because I think the stem mounted shifters are very pretty.

Lastly, I am not a huge fan of the orange and silver colour scheme but that's a problem for Future Fat-bottomed Girl and the powder-coater of her choice. Hmm…I've always wanted a cherry red frame…here's the rest of the Repco without comment. Or a bit of comment.

Shiny.

There's that 'Vintage' patina! You know. Rust.

I have no idea if this is good or bad.

Restrained lugs.

"Repco Cycle Company Huntingdale Victoria"
Australian manufacturing or just a sticker?

None of that Yankee spelling here. Ls and Us everywhere!

The days of the metal head badge were but a memory when this Repco was born.

Shimano branding detail.

Pashley Princess Sovereign in Buckingham Black.

After my initial search for an all-weather upright bike led me to the dead-end junction of retail frustration and bicycle shop proprietor aggression, I was ready to concede that Perth was still a bicycle backwater, at least so far as Dutch style bikes were concerned. A week had passed after my doomed Gazelle and Lekker test rides, another slovenly Saturday sat fat-bottomed on my horizon and I relegated skirt guards and built in lighting to the dusty box marked, 'Discarded Dreams'. But my melodrama was soon interrupted by Ginger, he came back from some early morning errand excitedly ejaculating about finding a shop stocking the third bike on my test ride list: The Pashley Princess Sovereign. Hand built in England with a lugged steel frame, dynamo headlight, integrated rear light, hub gears, fully enclosed chain case, skirt guard, rear wheel lock, wicker basket, Brooks saddle, frame mounted pump and 'Ding-dong' bell; The Sovereign is the Rolls Royce of Upright Bicycling.

Image from official Pashley Cycles site found here.

We immediately drove to the better-heeled part of town so I could see if the hype was justified. It was clear that the shop primarily catered to selling very expensive road bikes to men who believe in buying very expensive road bikes. Ugly team jerseys and taint specific saddles abounded. This was too usual a state of affairs to note in detail, the main difference between this and every other shop I had previously encountered (apart from the road bikes being more expensive) was that they had a section of 'obviously girly' upright bicycles. The kind of bicycles a status conscious roadie might be convinced to purchase for his girlfriend/wife without her consultation and then spend their weekend outings eye-rolling at her inability to keep up in the park. "Is that wicker basket slowing you down, babe? Should've got a carbon one!" (Side bar: If your significant other insists on calling you babe, then all the weight reductions in Roadie Land probably won't make a ride with him any less leaden.) However, when you live in a bicycle backwater you cannot mind the cynical motives behind a bike shop stocking town bicycles, you simply give silent thanks and then prepare to be patronised for your purchasing choices.

Pashley Head Badge.

The Pashley Princess Sovereign is the spec-cream of the English made Pashley Cycles crop. Solidly understated and completely conventional, it is what you picture in your head when somebody says, 'British Bicycle'. The company offers a limited but coherent design aesthetic, featuring their classically shaped, lugged steel frame in a restrained yet delightful range of colours. Pink, blue, the quintessential bicycle red. You've probably seen a Pashley on television or film if anybody was in sniffing distance of an English village. You've definitely seen one if you were paying attention when Anne Hathaway got smeared by an automobile in that film about odious little Thatcherites having terribly white problems once a year. That was a red Pashley Britannia. (The bike, I think the car might actually have been a bus. I was too busy looking at the bicycle.)

Fully enclosed chain case means less chain maintenance, more weather proofing.

Woah, hey! No derailleur! The rear hub.

Pashleys have been manufactured in England since 1926 and wear their pedigree with pride. They are Dutch bikes: English style. A modicum lighter and slightly more compact in their geometry than their Oma cousins, Pashleys are aimed at both the urban and country environment provided the hills aren't too steep and the roads are semi-surfaced. Of their loop frames, The Princess Sovereign is the most expensive but broken down into its parts (and taking the manufacturing into account) it's not difficult to see why. Different Pashleys have different specification levels, a pop of colour will cost you gears or change the handlebar shape but they're all superficially the same. Being the 'top of the line', the Princess sovereign has the most gears of the loop frames - 5 speed Sturmey Archer hub gears. Though they are very proud of their English heritage, Pashley have fitted the Sovereign with a Pletscher rear rack. I presume this is because of the universally acknowledged strength and quality of Pletscher carriers, they easily accommodate baby seats and other heavy loads. Unfortunately, they have a Pletscher specific mounting system for baskets which is useless in Australia but they also have the standard 'rat trap' so your ability to carry is not compromised if you possess some ingenuity. (And by ingenuity I mean you can totally cram a milk crate on the back if you have no self-respect.)

The dynamo driven headlight has a wide arc of illumination.

The rear LED is steady (Not flashing), battery powered and very visible.

The Princess Sovereign model comes in three frame sizes and two colours, 'Buckingham Black' or 'Regency Green'. The shop had one of each colour in the medium sized frame on sale as they were the previous model and had some shop soiling. I crossed my fingers that I wasn't too tall (Pashley go by inner leg length so there is quite some overlap between frames) and then I rode them both along the leafy streets of Nedlands, dodging unnecessarily rugged 4WDs as I went. I was instantly pleased. Compared to the relative nimbleness of the steel Schwinn Jenny, the steel Princess Sovereign felt like a particularly elegant steamroller - I barrelled along the road propelled as much by inertia as peddling, the sheer weight of the Sovereign meant that what she lacked in quick starts she made up for in unstoppable force. The riding position was a great substitute for posture training and the distance between my knees and the handlebars gave a feeling of riding very neatly. It was obvious why they named her Sovereign - I couldn't help but feel regal. Compared to the Schwinn, everything felt more formal, from the harder saddle encouraging me to sit properly, to the super-solid pedals. It required a more formal style of bicycling than the breezy, casual cuteness of the Jenny 7 Speed. This was my first encounter with hub gears, though I was familiar with the 'thumb shifter' style changer mounted on the handlebars. It was quite the psychological leap to accept the fact I could change gears while at a complete stop or during active peddling. Still, I never quite got over derailleurs so I continue to pause cranking when I shift - at least it keeps me from getting back on the Schwinn and decimating the mechanism. The green Sovereign shifted smoother than the black (A hint of woe to be examined another time.) and this alone made the choice of colour difficult. As much as I wanted the black model, I could see it had been ridden a lot more and the green one actually had dust on it, so unloved was the colour. In the end I chose personal style over perfection and took the black Sovereign, though it was destined to cause trouble through no fault of its own.

The Brooks takes some breaking in and was a shock even to my fat bottom, especially
after the plushness of the Schwinn's comfort saddle but once it did, it was heavenly.

The Princess Sovereign may look genteel but she has a surprising amount of street smarts. First there's the rear wheel lock. The key stays inside until the lock is activated, you push a lever down and it 'locks' the back wheel, preventing it from turning and making the Sovereign impossible to simply ride away. The weight then deters anybody from kidnapping. I combine the rear lock with a cable, thankful that I don't reside in a city where bike thieves strip Brooks and everything must be U-locked. (I still remove the French made pump when I leave it outside, though.) Looking at the wheels of the Pashley, you may wonder where the spoke mounted reflectors are. They are absent because along with great lighting, the Sovereign comes with Schwalbe puncture resistant Marathon Plus tyres which have a reflective sidewall. Very reflective, much more so than traditional reflectors.

Here it is reflecting a flash in daylight.
At night, flash photography makes it resemble a UFO.

The tough tyres are perfect for urban environments, living near a pub in Perth meant there was often glass on the pavement outside my house and the Pashley accidentally rolled over shards on more than one occasion, never a puncture to blight her. Unfortunately, it's now a conscious effort to avoid rocks and glass on my other bicycle after I grew too accustomed to disregarding them. The tyres are that good. For all her toughness the Sovereign does retain some delicacy through the included wicker basket - despite the rack to hold it in place I couldn't bring myself to trust the lovely leather straps and woven wicker to the elements (This was to be my all-weather bike, after all) so on the way home from her liberation we stopped at Ginger's preferred bike shop (He had become a roadie, much to my shame.) and bought the incongruously stocked (For a standard roadie-centric shop - so they were on sale!) Bontrager faux-wicker front basket and attempted to purchase a matching rear one. This is where the Bontrager Vs Pletscher problem manifested. Both companies are heavily invested in the prestige of their rear racks and as such they have both created accessories compatible only with their specific carriers. After much examination, it was accepted that the Bontrager system was completely incompatible with the Pletscher rack, not even the rat trap provided a work-around. Fortunately, there was another rear basket with a spring loaded 'quick release' style, universal rack attachment that clipped it to the sides of the carrier. An occy-strap purchase later and it was semi-permenantly attached to the Pletscher. My Pashley Princess Sovereign arrived home, triumphant.

The full stack of baskets. Handlebar mounted Bontrager and no-name brand
secured with small black strap under rack.
In the absence of a cargo net, I bought a second, more colourful and wider strap to secure loads.

After over a year of riding it, I have found one flaw with the Pashley: It's so heavy that the kick-stand does not support it properly when unburdened and especially not when it's carrying a rear load. Many a time I've had to catch it and a few times I have failed and then had to straighten the handlebars. It's my desire to install a double stand (Like Dutch bikes often have) and Pletscher makes one I will eventually order online. Apart from that, I can say that for me the Pashley was absolutely worth the price. Though at about AU$1700, you can trust I have comprehensive bicycle insurance. (And also that I didn't pay retail.) It changed the way I ride - the weight and proportion required me to be more mindful in the beginning, to watch my technique. Once I mastered it, nothing could beat the feeling of stability and 'solidness' with the bizarre bonus that the more I asked the Pashley to carry, the less I felt like I was carrying anything, making the Sovereign an excellent transportation cycling/cargo option as well as a leisure ride. Unsurprising, as Pashley famously make old-fashioned cargo and work bikes for businesses in the U.K. Think mobile ice-cream sellers, deliveries etc. A woman even went touring on a Princess Sovereign so they're evidently built to carry. Pashley make roadsters as well as loop frames and have even recently delved into cruiser shapes. Whether this is folly remains to be decided by the market but so long as they continue to do what they do best, a few of these English gems will find their way to Australia and wait patiently to be appreciated.

And the fat-bottomed will continue to pose with them on front lawns.

P.S. For the one major fault inherent to the Pashley Princess Sovereign, I refer you to my more recent feelings on the bloody kickstand.

P.P.S. A lot of traffic arrives at this post searching for the weight of the Pashley. Without knowing exactly I can confirm that my medium frame Pashley is pretty damn heavy by modern bicycle standards. Heavy enough that a very fit personal trainer friend remarked upon it when lifting the back and estimated it to be about 20kg. I am woeful at judging weight by lift so take this with a grain of salt. Just know you'll probably struggle to get it up more than a few stairs.

Schwinn Jenny 7 Speed 2011 (From the block.)

UPDATE: As of mid 2012, Schwinn ceased production of the Jenny.

As of mid 2017 the Schwinn Traveler Womens is closest equivalent.

Don't be fooled by the rocks that she's got, this Jenny is a solid and reliable entry level bicycle wrapped up in a pleasingly understated package. Amongst 'real' cyclists, Schwinns lost all of their cachet once they ceased production in the U.S. but from the moment I pressed down on her pedals after an almost 15 year absence from the bicycling world, I was won over by the Jenny's modest, mass market charms.

Schwinn 'Jenny' 7 Speed - Retails between AU$400-$600.
As photographed in the exotic locale of the Fat-Bottom Household Lounge Room.

I'm not really risk-averse but I'm no bungee candidate either so I was slightly nervous when first I test-rode the Jenny. Firstly, it had been over a decade and it wasn't my bicycle so I feared a 'you break it, you bought it' situation. Secondly, the saddle had been properly adjusted to my leg length and it was a higher position than my memory of bicycle seat heights, probably at the direction of my parents either out of ignorance or safety concerns. I fully expected disaster on the hot gravel of Canning Bridge Cycles rear car park, particularly as there was a gym next door and it appeared to be 'Gymnasium Hour'. Everywhere I looked there were monster 4WDs birthing tank-topped, micro fibre towel toting gym bunnies. There was also an abrupt descent at one end of the car park which ended in something semi-industrial involving metal detritus.

I needn't have worried. The Jenny was comfortable and stable to me from the first push to the final, exuberant stop thanks to her sturdy steel frame, instantly responsive front and rear caliper brakes and broad, soft saddle more like you'd expect on a beach cruiser. (It's actually the Schwinn 'Downtown' model.) The upright position gave me a wide view of the cars trying to kill me and made a significant psychological difference to the amount of control I felt I had over the bicycle. Not that it was all in my head: The 7 speed Shimano gears are operated by the novice friendly 'revo shifter', something I hadn't even heard of at that point let alone personally encountered. The last time I'd seen gears they'd been thumb shifters on late 20th century bicycles so the smooth rotating action of the revo shifter seemed miraculous. Once I had established which number gear I had set off in, I didn't have to look at the shifter to turn it or keep track and a reassuring 'click' told me I was on target.

Shimano 'Megarange' 7 speed, 'Super-low' 14-34.
The numbers mean the smallest cog has 14 teeth, the largest 34. The larger the cog, the easier the gear.
(Yes, this is 'Bicycle Gears for Dummies' because I am still a dummy but I intend to be a dummy who learns.)

A Shimano 'Revo' shifter. (Image from Shimano website)
It sits in a seamless fashion above the handle bar grip and shifts by a rotating action using the rubber section.
Your hand barely moves from the normal riding position so it's a great system for less confident riders.

Surprisingly, there's not really a wasted gear on the Jenny when it comes to traversing the somewhat erratic topography of suburban Perth. Bike paths are as smooth as it's possible to make them but even they cannot escape passing through suburbs with the prefix 'Mount'. As it was built over everything from sand dunes to swamps, Perth can be delightfully flat and then suddenly slap you with a hefty slope, requiring a very speedy transition from seventh gear down to first. The no-brainer revo shifter excels under these conditions where other types of more 'mindful' shifting might find you reaching the base of the same hill still in third if you've had to stop for traffic as well. At times like that, I rather wish both my bicycles had revo shifters. I probably spend the least amount of time in 6th gear but there's no single setting I shun, they all have a job to do.

Your money goes on smooth shifting rather than metal head-badges.
And I'm fine with that.

The Jenny is relatively light for a steel bicycle with such a 'big' feeling frame, I have no problems lifting it up my front steps even after a particularly tiring ride. At 175cm (5ft 9"), I am at the taller end of the average height for an Australian woman (Most women I know are over 5ft 6", under 5ft 10".) yet my Schwinn Jenny is a size 'S' frame. The 700c wheels add to the 'large' feeling but if not for a later discarded sticker indicating the frame was for up to and including 175cm I wouldn't have believed I'd get away with a small. Schwinns are obviously sized large.

Pieces of Flair? The 2011 model Jenny is so deliciously downplayed that the only bit of
extra decoration went entirely unnoticed by me until I took this photo.

The other features of the Jenny that attracted me were the chain guard and pannier rack. Other than the generous gears and the very plush saddle (Even a fat bottom needs some cushioning) these are the two 'at market' features which really made this bicycle an excellent re/introduction for me to transportation cycling for the price. When researching I found many entry level steel frame bicycles that offered either a chain guard or an appropriate number of gears. Not many included a back rack though a lot had cute but flimsy front baskets which were clearly meant to appeal to a certain demographic. (Hipsterettes. The demographic is Hipsterettes.) Unfortunately the 'vintage look' market also means vintage amounts of gears (3 or 1 speed), manufacturers counting on the fact that most of these bicycles will be used for very short journeys made purely to impress other Hipsters at inner-suburban pubs or 'pine crates for chairs' cafés. I admit: I'm partial to a wicker basket but I also wanted to carry things weighing more than two baguettes or a litre of that Hilo slop which dares to masquerade as milk. I wanted to go further than my local deli and I wanted to do it dressed as myself. The rack was a must.

The Jenny's back rack has a fiercely sprung trap with a good range of motion. So far I have used the rack alone to relocate a boxed cheesecake (That time I used a belt as well because it was my first time trusting the rack), a biscuit tin full of my own dinner and an esky full of dinner for five. I purchased the front basket from the bicycle shop, it's only rated to hold 5kg so it's strictly for my handbag and any layers of clothing I might jettison during a ride. The chain guard means I can travel without getting grease on my leg and it offers a reasonable level of protection against the chain chewing on my pants. (It's probably still advisable to secure any 'Vintage Clothing Market' flares with a hair elastic.) The Schwinn Jenny also comes with a basic hammer strike style bell, a tiny gong to announce your presence as you circumnavigate your fellow man and any excitable dogs your fellow man may not wish to be interacting with your spokes. I eventually purchased three Knog lights (Two front and one rear) to complete the Jenny, happy to support an Australian design even though the people behind it are Category 5 Hipsters (Their ad campaign features a woman about to engage in sexual congress with the 'Boomer' front light).

Australian law requires a helmet,
a red rear light and a front light.

Although to be honest,
I can kind of see why she does.

Knog Rear light saves me from wearing
my LED knickers.

Not only do Knog lights look nicer than the thrusting, metallic POWER BEAMS!!! aimed at the Roadie commuter market, they come in a range of nice colours and feature a rubbery and clever quick-release attachment system which solved my personal problem of Basket Vs Headlight positioning by allowing me to attach them to the fork without using any tools. It also allows me to swiftly remove them to my handbag in the event of Shifty Hipster sightings in those more 'troubled' areas. You know, the ones with Porsches.

Post lights and basket, I think the Schwinn Jenny 7 Speed has reached her full potential as a fair weather transport bike/leisure ride and has provided the perfect level of coddling to regain my confidence as a cyclist. She's dependable, practical and fun. For an entry level upright bicycle, I wouldn't ask for more.

P.S.
I've since retired the wicker front basket and fitted the Jenny with Basil Memories Bottle baskets, my review and photos here.