I have a few old bikes that I'm wondering if I should donate to the local bike co-op. I think the Ross might be worth something.

* Bike Nashbar brand 21" ATB from 80's with steel frame. Has Suntour XC rear 15 speed, thumb shifters, cantis with a chain stay U brake (a horrible type of DiaComp that is forever to adjust), ridgid fork, Scott AT aero bar. Was going to either donate (it does ride well as a beater street bike for a large teen, better than a Next) or cut it up and make a chopper out of it.

* Ross Mt. Something (Hood?) donated from my dad. All original chrome frame, ballon tires, 5 cogs in the rear, non-index thumbs, huge canti's, solid fork, welded V handlebar stem combo. Was one of first commercially available mountain bikes. Ridden less than 300 miles, very good original condition. Thinking it might have collector value?

* Pugoet (sp?) cross bike early 90's ?, large frame must be 22-23", donated from a friend. Canti brakes, $400-600 estimated new price, not anything special but rides efficiently for a heavy cross bike.

What to do? I have too many bikes for my storage -

my good mtn bike is a '93 Cannondale delta V that I've had since new and beat the living tar out of and it still rides perfectly. SRAM and avids replace the old crap.

DD

I just reduced my bike count from 13 to five, and it was surprisingly hard to do. Nothing had any particular collector value--it was just 30 years of bikes I bought, rode, then replaced without getting rid of the old ones--but they all were well-maintained and worked fine. I wanted to sell or give them to who could use them, rather than just junking them. You might check with local boys and girls clubs, YMCA kid programs, things like that (didn't work for me because all my frames are 64cm or above, but they're growing some BIG eighth-graders these days).
The Nashbar sounds like a good item for the Salvation Army. They could price it low enough that somebody who needs transportation could use it to get to work.
I dunno about the Ross. They were pioneers--a Mt. Hood was my first mountain bike, more than 15 years ago, and it was fun, but it wasn't a prestige name like Ritchey or Fisher that would attract collectors. I beat the cr@p out of mine for three or four years and sold it for $50 less than I paid for it, but that was in 1989. It might be a donation, too.
The Peugeot might be attractive to a French-bike nut, or you could turn it into a singlespeed. Getting hard to find French parts, but early '90s might be late enough that they'd switched to English threads and stems.
Regarding the Cannondale: My main MB is a '94 'Dale that I've hammered mercilessly since it was new, and it's still hanging on. Every time I get ready to upgrade it, I think, "Well, it still works great, so I'll wait until something breaks."

There's a local inner-city bike co-op, aimed at taking kids who are interested in bikes learn how to fix them. The program starts when I kid wants a bike, but they first have to build a bike for someone else to learn how it works. Eventually they get to build their own bike.

Donated bikes and parts are sourced from the community, and the center has some stands and tools.

I think I will donate the pugoet to the DAV (its ridable and in a good shape) and the "needs TLC tuneup" nashbar bike to the co-op, and for good measure I'll volunteer to help kids learn how to wrench them.

Interesting to hear of your situation - I also have had good luck with my cannondale, a vast improvement over the constant maintenance needed on the nashbar. I've never even changed the oil on the headshock in 11 years and it still holds air. My only gripe is that the front end washes out regardless of body position, tires, air pressure, etc. Rode some other bikes and its definately the frame, but perhaps its not the same geometry after the beating I've given it. Not good for racing or overly agressive riding but still ok.

DD