In line with their process of continual improvement, SunTour took the SunTour V series and upgraded the parallelogram plates from steel to aluminium - the result is the 1973 SunTour V Luxe series.

As well as making the derailleur fully 128g lighter than the V GT, this upgrade also had the effect of uprating the V series to be all aluminium (like the super expensive Shimano Crane) and a step ahead of the comparably priced Shimano Titlist (which had steel pulley cage plates). In the 1970’s intense competition between SunTour and Shimano was improving the derailleur so fast that European manufacturers did not know what had hit them.

This example, with its more sculpted pulley cage plates, is a later V GT Luxe, the classic, best selling, touring model in the V Luxe series - truly a great derailleur. This particular example was manufactured in 1980 - demonstrating the popularity of the V GT Luxe well after the introduction of later, supposedly superior, but less well-loved models.

It is also an oft-forgotten fact that the simple, strong, competent SunTour V GT Luxe was the preferred derailleur of many early mountain bikers - the SunTour Mountech and Shimano Deore XT (M700), with their multiple sprung pivots were initially viewed with some (justifiable) suspicion.

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• Derailleur brands: SunTour
• Categories: SunTour - the V story
• Country: Japan
• Date of introduction: 1977?
• Date of this example: 1980 (two letter date code is WA)
• Model no.: 1500
• Weight: 251g
• Maximum cog: 34 teeth
• Total capacity: 36 teeth
• Pulley centre to centre: 65mm
• Index compatibility: friction
• Chain width: 3/32”
• Logic: top normal
• B pivot: unsprung
• P pivot: sprung
• Materials: aluminium