Daniel Swords wrote about the TA pedals:
"Yes, I have tried them out. I bought a pair last Christmas and installed them in my Stronglight crank that had previously been tapped out for Phil Wood CHPs. They work great, no problems. But, going against popularity, even though they are fine pedals and nice to look at, neither the TAs nor the Phil Wood CHPs are as light and as free spinning and as comfortable and as inexpensive as the Lyotard pedals that I replaced and hope soon to go back to (except that I now need to buy BSC threaded Lyotards)."
Let me assume that Dan'l is speaking of the esteemed Lyotard Berthet platform pedal, which had many virtues: Light, easy-to-flip-up-for-the-toe-clip, and even maintainable. But it's not all perfect, either. Last night I took down two pair to swap French and BSC spindles, and was reminded that the Berthet was better in appearance and cost than durability. The French bike parts folks of that era were geniuses at exploiting sheet metal (Viva la Allvit, or is that a different gender?), but the Berthet used aluminum end plates with a steel barrel and platform. The platform is pinned to the end plates by 4 rectangular extensions that stick through the platform and were machine-bloomed to hold, like rivets. They can work loose, and the end plate to barrel connection is pretty crude.
I have memories of one of Beloved Spouse's 14 mm Berthets getting loose and starting to fall apart somewhere in the Appalachians, when we were bike camping from Cleveland (OH) to Atlanta. Don't go looking for 9/16" taps or 14 mm pedals there. Wound up tying it all together with radiator clamps till we got to Atlanta. Since then, almost all our cranks have been 9/16" bored. Sorry 'bout that, Francophiles, it is a small compromise for peace of mind.
Harvey "make do" Sachs mcLean VA
################################################################# ################################################################# ################################################################# ##### ##### ##### ################################################################# ################################################################# #################################################################