O fellow classicists,
I got bored today after the club ride (rode the Falcon San Remo fixie, including storming up one of our nastier, longer hills in the area on it). Walked into the kitchen and saw the Batavus Course frameset sitting on the bookshelf where it's been for several months ... one quick trip to the LBS for a few goodies scavenged cheap from the back room, and a couple of hours later I had another bike.
This one is probably early to mid-80s. It came with Maillard hubs, including the infamous Helicomatic, but I had robbed it of its wheels a while back, and a generic replacement set went on. The derailleurs are Sachs-Huret Rival, the brakes are Weinmann 605 sidepulls with non-aero levers ... the cranks are marked "Toronado X," and use funky chainring bolts a lot like cheap cottered cranks. Still, it's close to my size, with Gipiemme dropouts and Reynolds 501 tubing. It's somewhere in the Raleigh Super Course/Gitane Interclub/Peugeot PR-10L category - budget, entry-level fast club bike of its era.
If I keep both hands on the bars, it's a cool little bike. Fairly zippy handling, just long enough to absorb road shock ... ah, but you noted that "if I keep both hands on the bars." Like every other Batavus I've ever ridden, the forks are a little off. Now, normally you see forks that have been bent back - these go to one side, such that the wheel tilts leftward and the bike wants to go right when ridden no-hands. I know there used to be fork-straightening tools, and perhaps that is what this bike needs ... that, or another fork. I kind of prefer the former - I have a whopping $33 invested in this one ....
Oh, and what Mark R. says about the Roll-y Pol-ys? I have a set on my Rivendell and love them, love them, love them. I'll never go back to sewups ...
Russ Fitzgerald
Greenwood SC
rfitzger@emeraldis.com
http://www.emeraldis.com/
http://www.lostweekend.homestead.com