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The word "derailer" (or "dérailleur") is actually a metaphor, relating the gear change to what happens when a railroad train goes off the tracks. In English, we call this a "derailment," not a "déraillement."
In fact, in the railroad industry, there is an obscure device designed to deliberately derail a runaway rail car. This device has always been called a "derailer" in English, and a "dérailleur" in French.
Don't get me wrong, I am not anti-French. I lived in France for a year, I speak fluent French, and love the people and culture of France; I have a Web section devoted to cycle touring in France; I have created a French/English-English/French bicycle dictionary; I read all 1500 pages of Lés Misérables in French, and greatly enjoyed it; but I refuse to use a fake-French spelling or pronunciation for my bicycle's gear changer.
The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man. -- George Bernard Shaw
-Sheldon
