Of all the various US made CNC-art-object derailleurs of the mid 1990’s the Precision Billet Proshift seemed to me to offer the most. They were devastatingly light, had two sprung pivots (and so were widely considered to work with Shimano SIS) and had all the trick elements; stainless steel fittings, sealed bearing pulley wheels etc.. Precision Billet also seemed to be a serious company intent on actually manufacturing hardware rather than vapourware.

This specimen has a ‘medium’ length pulley cage, and the slightly more surreal looking style of parallelogram.

I like the combination of the rather beautiful lush purple, which seems to have come from the world of home furnishing, with the exaggeratedly machine-like forms. Holy moly - it’s Robocop meets Lawrence Llewelyn-Bowen

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1. •Brand: Precision Billet
   

2. •Country: USA
   

3. •Date of introduction: 1994?
   

4. •Date of this example: 1995?
   

5. •Model no: unknown
   

6. •Weight: 174g
   

7. •Maximum cog: 32 teeth?
   

8. •Total capacity: 36 teeth?
   

9. •Pulley centre to centre: 67mm
   

10. •Index compatibility: 8 speed
    

11. •Chain width: 3/32”
    

12. •Logic: top normal
    

13. •Pivots: two sprung pivots
    

14. •Material: aluminium
    

15. •My theme: A riot of colour
    

0347/L