I’m Hans, an expat from Germany who moved to southern Spain. This website shows some pictures I took while pursuing my personal interests: tinkering with vintage bikes, touring around Europe and Asia, killing time in my Andalucian hideaway.
The nipponcycles story
Without the Japanese bike industry, the development of the modern bike would have, in fact, taken a different path. In 1964, Suntour invented the slant parallelogram rear derailleur. It allowed the jockey pulley to position the chain close to the sprocket cluster, regardless of which gear was selected.
Exactly 20 years later, when Suntour’s patent on the parallelogram derailleur expired, Shimano came up with its groundbreaking index shifting. In order to provide discrete gear positions, the Shimano Index System (SIS) integrated click stops into the shifter – taking advantage of the smooth shifting provided by Suntour’s parallelogram design. Since then, index shifting has become the standard for derailleur gear from virtually every manufacturer.
Contact Me
If you have any suggestions or questions, feel free to drop me a line. I look forward to hearing from you!