France is the ancestral home of the derailleur. France dominated the world market for derailleurs for the great majority of the 20th century. But, by the end of that century, the Japanese had, in the politest possible way, razed the French derailleur industry to the ground. The very last French made derailleurs ever to be introduced, just as the millenium ended, fell into one of three distinct populations:

• Rather cheap, undoubtedly nasty, often very plastic derailleurs that no Japanese engineer would dirty their hands with.
• Surreally weird, impossibly technologically advanced, unfortunately unsaleable derailleurs like the EGS Up Cage or the MAVIC Mektronic.

and...

• The very neat, very tidy, very conventional, rather attractive and beautifully made Sachs Quartz.

The Sachs Quartz was a subtly curved, highly integrated design. It was beautifully detailled with Titanium small parts, a sealed bearing tension pulley and a labyrinth sealed 'centeron' style guide pulley. The tolerances look tight, the chrome is lush and the anodising is sleak and silky. All fantastic... but for the usual Sachs love of inexplicably high weight.

The Sachs Quartz came in two cage lengths (short and medium) and two generations:

• The first generation had a normal cable clamp bolt without an eyehole through it. At the cable clamp there was only one 'groove' for the cable to lie in. This generation was compatible with the Sachs ARIS indexing system.
• The second generation had a cable clamp bolt with an eyehole through it. At the cable clamp there were two alternative 'grooves' for the cable to lie in. If you fed the cable beside the cable clamp bolt the derailleur was compatible with the Sachs ARIS indexing system. However, if you fed the cable through the eyehole in the cable clamp bolt the derailleur was compatible with the Shimano SIS indexing system

Cunning!

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This is an unused, rather lovely, example of the short cage version of the second generation Sachs Quartz. Hence the code MQUS2:

• The 'M' indicates that it is a mountain bike gear.
• The 'QU' stands for 'Quartz'.
• The 'S' indicates that it has a short cage.
• And the 2 points to it being the second generation.

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• Derailleur brands: Sachs
• Categories: Sachs - the admirable, but stubbornly unsuccessful, Success
• Country: Germany, manufactured in France
• Date of introduction: 1997
• Date of this example: possibly 1999 - the inner pulley cage plate is stamped ‘O9’
• Model no.: MQUS2
• Weight: 237g
• Maximum cog: 32 teeth (source: Sachs)
• Total capacity: 28 teeth (source: Sachs)
• Pulley centre to centre: 50mm
• Index compatibility: 8 speed
• Chain width: 3/32”
• Logic: top normal
• B pivot: sprung
• P pivot: sprung
• Materials: aluminium, with a titanium pulley bolts and cable clamp bolt

Ref. 2138