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Hi, Nate Taylor here. Please reach out to me at nate@sscycleworks.com for inquiries on parts availabilities and shipping estimates.

South Salem Cycleworks Museum:
Michael Wolfe’s Motobécane Grand Touring Bicycle - Rest in Piece(s)

Michael Wolfe’s Motobécane Grand Touring Bicycle:

Photos below the story. Jump to photos

I had attended college for 5 years but didn’t end up with a degree, and the scholarship was shut down. I continued working at the nearby cannery, Agripac, but now I had a longer season, and with seniority, earned a higher wage. Still, the cannery season was only 6 months, and I had to rely on substitute custodial work for the local school district to get through from January to late May.

Inspired perhaps, by the Bicentennial Bike ride across America, my girlfriend and I decided to purchase better quality bicycles. On the advice of a friend who participated in demolition derbies driving his ‘55 Cadillacs, but who also worked as a mechanic in the local Schwinn dealership, she bought a Schwinn Super Le Tour II. We wondered into The Bike Peddler, just blocks away, and I fell in love with a Motobecane Grand Touring. It was gun-metal grey, with a black head tube and seat tube panel and with the lugs outlined in gold.

I asked if safety levers could be added, as well as changing the Dia-Compe G sidepulls from silver to black. Looking back, I was fortunate not to request a kickstand as well! Outside of the wheels, the components were SunTour PowerShifters, a Compe V front derailleur and VGT rear derailleur. The Normandy hubs were laced to Weinmann Concave rims. Stem and bar were Atax in French dimensions.

The crankset was from SR, while the 5-speed freewheel was a SunTour. Back then, it was called Alpine gearing, with a 14-28 freewheel ratio and 40/52 chainrings.

It was a joy to ride, as my previous experience during high school was riding a Robin Hood equipped with Huret shifters and derailleurs, paired with steel rims.

We didn’t do and epic rides, just used the bikes for grocery runs, visits to Minto-Brown park where on the return trip, my friend Charlie Burleigh would feed us at Spaghetti Warehouse he managed, and the 10 block ride to the cannery for work.

By the spring of ‘79, the girlfriend had moved on, and I was faced with returning to the cannery where my seniority would get me a big boost in pay, so much so I would not find a job that could pay as well. Fellow workers at the cannery warned me about getting caught and becoming a “lifer”.

I decided to return to college pursuing a degree in cinematography, and University of Oregon in Eugene was the best choice. I found a three-bedroom duplex in north Springfield to live in, and began searching for work. I applied at some bike shops, not wanting to get involved in the canneries again, despite the pay difference, and was fortunate enough to be hired at Hawkeye’s the Good Life.

It was a summer job, ending with the student rush in the fall. The head mechanic, however, quit over a dispute on wages, and I was asked if I wanted to continue. Heck, I’ll go back to school during winter term, I thought! And as each term ended, I used the same excuse for two years! Hawkeye’s was not just selling bikes, but also XC-skiing, backpacking and canoes. I was mesmerized and added not only to upgrading the Grand Tour, but purchasing XC-ski equipment.

The safety levers came off, I built a lighter set of wheels using SunShine Pro-Am hubs, derailleurs upgraded to SunTour Cyclones. The Dia-Compe G’s were exchanged for Royal Compes, the headset to a Stonglight V-4, and the SR cranks were replaced with Stronglight 105, including a Stronglight sealed bottom bracket.

I did an overnite trip to the coast with Darrel, who had a Bruce Gordon touring bike. I didn’t own a luggage rack for the Grand Tour, but scrounged up a Pletscher. Good lesson, as the rack would sway under the load of panniers with every pedal stroke! Upon returning, I ordered a Jim Blackburn rack, which at the time was still made by him.

In the spring of 1981, a group of Dark Star Ultimate frisbee players decided to tour the Gulf of Mexico, starting in Corpus Christi, and ending up at the Atlantic ocean. Dark Star’s frequented Hawkeye’s as the nephews of the owner were players as well. I was invited as the mechanic, and decided to go.

Four of them were taking a train, but one other and myself couldn’t afford that and decided bike/hike. It was pretty uneventful, other than spending the night in an abandoned lot in L.A. We got let off in Palm Springs, where the wind was whipping up sand that stung as it hit us. We were fortunate to catch a ride with a cook, desperate to get back to the oil rig off Corpus Christi. The ball joints on the car were so worn out that oversteering was the only way to keep the car going in a straight line! The cook was out of cash, and we had to chip in to keep gas in the tank.

Miles and miles of sagebrush . . . is my only recollection of driving across Texas. We did stop in San Antonio, as I had taken apart the SunTour PowerShifter to clean, and lost the pawl in the car somewhere. I think I had to buy a complete shifter.

We made good time, arriving only two days after the others had arrived by train. We set off the next morning, where I wore my Skid Lid helmet for the first day, but it traveled the rest of the trip lashed to my sleeping bag atop my Blackburn rack.

Before crossing the border into Louisiana, we were pulled over by a state trooper, who informed us that we were to ride against traffic on the opposite side of the narrow road. It was a relief to reach Louisiana! We didn’t see any alligators, only one large snapping turtle.

Searching for a campsite that night, we were told to do so next to the police station. It rained heavily that night, and I awoke to the floor of the tent rising up next to my sleeping bag. Everyone had to move their tents to higher ground, most of us naked!

We’d hoped to ride into New Orleans, but the forecast was for continued heavy rain, and a consensus was reached to hop a bus to Pensacola. We spent the night on the beach there, with the wind blowing sand against everything. The next morning, I detected a grinding in my bottom bracket, which was before I installed the Stronglight sealed one. Most of the Dark Stars had Phil Wood hubs and bottom brackets, and I certainly envied them. I could have ridden off with them, but the noise of the bottom bracket distracted me, and I was determined to overhaul it. They wouldn’t wait, and so I was left to ride on my own.

I found a bike shop there, and revived the bottom bracket that day. The owner referred me to a couple where I could spend the night. They told me I shouldn’t leave without visiting the National Naval Aviation Museum, and I tried the next day, but was told without long pants and a safety flag, I was not allowed in. I think it was mostly my ponytail that was the issue! My hosts took me in the next day through the back entrance without difficulty.

I continued to explore Pensacola, until I realized I had just enough money to ride across the panhandle to reach the Atlantic Ocean. Four days, at 125 miles each day. Reaching Jacksonville, I discovered the bridge had no sidewalks, only travel lanes and a narrow ledge I could wheel my loaded bike on. Before I reached the middle of the bridge, the paddy wagon and police arrived and gave me a ride, along with a lecture to the other side. They inspected the contents of my handlebar bag, finding a film container with what was formerly aspirin, then a white powder from the rattling around, and let me go.

I reached the Atlantic ocean that night, dipped a wheel in the water, but got up early to return to Jacksonville to prepare for the Greyhound bus ride home. How I got across that bridge once more, I do not recall!

The Grand Touring spent many trips touring the Oregon Coast with my room mate, David Pittman on his Miyata 1000. I remember waking up one night at Cape Lookout watching other campers frantically chasing their tents blown by an intense wind off the ocean. We used hiker/biker sites when we could, but often bushwhacked off to the side of the road.

I remember coming back from San Francisco one year, and unexpectedly finding a section of the road that had dropped due to the amount of rainfall. Neither of us crashed, but one of David’s lowrider panniers fell off and slid down the road.

Charlie Burleigh and I rode our bikes up to Valsetz, before it was abandoned and leveled. We camped out by the pond and awoke to rainfall. I had a GoreTex jacket, but Charlie had nothing. We stopped by the company store, where Charlie cut holes in trash bag for his head and arms for his Gortex jacket.

By the time I moved back to Salem in 1981, I had an Early custom touring frameset in the works, built by Gary Earl Hale, who taught Butch and Dwan of Co-Motion how to build frames. When it arrived and I built it up, the Grand Touring became a commuter bike for work purposes and running errands. In its 14th year of service, I began hearing clicking noises when riding it, and finally diagnosed it as cracks in the head lugs.

The cost of repairing and painting the Grand Touring would have been more than what I’d paid for the bike, but it was hard for me to strip it down and transfer the French-dimension parts to a Cilo I’d found. The frame, beyond repair, I could not toss in the recycling bin, and still hangs in storage.

Pictures of the Motobecane Grand Touring bicycle:

The Motobecane at Battle Rock State Park on Oregon's southern coast.

On the Gulf Coast ride, overhauling the bottom bracket.

Riding on the Gulf Coast in 1980. Here we are stopped at a store front.

Here I am with the bike in the winter of 1981.

The bike on the Oregon Coast in 1981

June of 1981. Here I am with the bike at Cape Meares, on the coast, due west of Portland.

Here I am on a gravel road in 1981.

At the Oregon border.

1984: If you ride a bike a lot, you will get a flat tire.

Here I am touring on the Grand Touring bicycle in 1984.

At Oregon's Silver Falls, west of Salem.

At Crescent City, on the coast of Northern California. The hollow redwood log is at the town's Beachfront Park.

I'm about to go on a rainy ride in March of 1988.

I won two six-packs of beer in a bike commute challenge.