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Centurion Bikes Germany
Centurion sold mountain bikes in Europe designed by Wolfgang Renner, who had been importing Japanese-American Centurion road bikes into Germany starting in 1976. In the US market, WSI/Centurion sold road and touring bikes and later sold mt. bikes via their WSI/Diamond Back brand out of Canoga Park, California. 1) Early German Centurion mountain bicycles were designed and constructed differently from Diamond Back but later models looked fairly similar. 2) For example, the 1982 Diamond Back is lugged while than the 1982 Centurion is TIG welded. 3) The Centurion brand retired from North America in 1990 but continues today in German speaking Europe: Centurion
Wolfgang Renner, field testing early mt. bikes
centurion.de
1982 Country
Presented in 1981, on sale in 1982 - the first real mountain bike made in Germany! Radfahren Magazine
Tange frame, almost all Suntour components.
1982 Country
redfahren
1983 Theo Intra
Theo Intra was a(n obscure?) 1950's German track & road racer, whose connection to Centurion is unknown. Not as inspiring a model name as Centurion's later names:
- 1987: Lhasa Kathmandu
- 1987: Arrival
- 1988: Jetstream
- 1992: Elevator
- 1994: Racoon Team SX
- 1995: Rocky Racoon 4)
More detailed pics at: https://fotos.mtb-news.de/p/999816
1983 Theo Intra
mtb-news.de
1984 Explorer
1984 Explorer
mtb-news.de
1985 Rocky II
mtb-news.de
Production Notes
[1]. ?
3)
Centurion catalogs made for the US market do not list mountain bikes: http://vintage-centurion.com/literature/centurion-catalogs.shtml
4)
Presumably borrowed from the Beatle's Rocky Raccoon. Otherwise, raccoons (note spelling) are called Waschbären in German.
centurion/start.1631045578.txt.gz · Last modified: 2021/09/07 13:12 by gchandler