Re:
Yeah thanks DSH- I've yet to 'read' the whole thread, and my French is pretty basic, but that is illuminating!
I guess Peugeot were a special case during this period within the continental pro peloton, being almost unique among prominent trade teams- French, Italian, Belgian, Spanish, Dutch/British- in not being on the Campagnolo 'roster'. I've no idea whether Campagnolo literally sponsored the dozen-odd competing trade teams that featured that cursive Campagnolo script on their jerseys just underneath the main sponsor? The only other prominent mid-late seventies team that was beyond the Campag. orbit that I can think of was Super-Ser, a '75-'76(?) Spanish outfit using Zeus components (including centre-pulls one year.) So now I am wondering if the brazed-on gear levers phenomenon might have dispersed outwards from Peugeot to the other French trade teams during the late '70s and thence to the Italian teams?
Also instructive from perusing that thread is the information that, around 1974-5, just like Raleigh, and on a smaller scale, Holdsworth in the UK, Peugeot found it convenient to set up a 'custom shop' outside the mass-production facilities to hand-build top-level racing frames for the trade team(s) and other discerning customers. It is more or less an open secret that before (and possibly even after) the mass producers did this, some pro riders would simply employ their favoured small independent frame builder to build them a custom frame, and get it sprayed and decaled so as to be indistinguishable from their 'team issue'.
Also interesting about the three distinct 'training', 'road', and 'time-trial' bikes that Peugeot pros would be issued with, and the tube specifications for each..