gitaneusa.com :: View topic - Looking for info on Professional Tour de France bike

mcldtr

Found this bike at a used bike sale. Would love to learn as much as possible about it. The bike has not been restored. All I could find as far as serial # is brevcam on right dropout and nolo on left dropout.

sandranian · Site Admin

Before anyone tells you what you have there...and there is a lot to tell...you will have to share with us what you paid for this bike. Don't worry...it will be worth it.

mcldtr

$50.00

sandranian · Site Admin

Wow. That is the steal of the century. What you have there is an early 1970's Gitane "Super" Tour de France, so called because the frameset was actually an upgrade on the standard Tour de France frame, with Campagnolo dropouts (that is what is stamped on the dropouts -- where the wheels clamp on to the frame -- and you read and thought was the serial number). Campagnolo was (and still is) considered "high end" equipment, and you are lucky that you have a bunch of it sprinkled on that bike.

The frame is made of Reynolds 531 seamless "double butted" steel. This means that the main tubes are actually thinner in the middle, and thicker towards the joints (called the "lugs") in order to maintain stiffness/strength but lighten the tubes. Reynolds 531 was state of the art from the mid 1930's until the 1980's, and is still preferred by some framebuilders and riders today.

Back to the "super" moniker. If you look at the Gitane catalogue of 1970, the top of the line Gitane "Super Corsa" came with Reynolds 531 tubes and Campagnolo dropouts. The "Tour de France" was specced with Reynolds 531 but Simplex dropouts. Gitane dealers in the USA had an easier time selling something called the "Tour de France", because people here knew what that was. So a lot of the Gitane Super Corsa's were rebadged and sold as Tour de France bikes, sometimes with a mix of Campagnolo (more expensive) and French (i.e. Simplex, Mafac, and Stronglight) parts. By the way, the Stronglight crankset you have there polishes up amazingly. Just be sure and research the correct way to do it prior to attempting it....

There is tons more to tell...but I am going to wrap this up for now. Needless to say, you have an absolute steal there....

Can you take a picture of the "drive side", so we can see the rear derailleur as well?

sandranian · Site Admin

The rear derailleur (Suntour) might be a replacement. However, Gitane was notorious for mixing and matching parts.

verktyg

Stephan filled you in with most of the details but... the bike was manufactured, imported and sold as a Tour de France model. It's probably around a 1972 model.

As such it would have come with Simplex Criterium derailleurs and a plastic torture device to sit on. The derailleurs and saddle on your bike have been upgraded and the sewup rims have been replaced with clinchers otherwise it looks original.

One of the first things that most TdF owners did was replace the saddle. Frequently they mounted a Brooks Pro leather saddle (maybe because Peugeot's similar PX10 model came with Brooks Pros).

Next thing changed were the derailleurs. Owners either upgraded to Suntour or the more expensive Campy models - you have a mix of the two.

Most Gitane TdFs came with the spec'd out Simplex dropouts. A few frames came with the more expensive Campagnolo dropouts like your bike. Some even came with several different older style Simplex dropouts.

Older style Simplex dopouts:

Campy rear dropouts became the industry standard for rear derailleur attachments while Simplex dropouts needed to be modified to use anything other than a Simplex rear derailleur.

My guess is that what happened was that during the 1971-74 US Bike Boom, the $250-275 TdF models were in far more demand than the $450+ Campy equipped Super Corsas. Gitane may have had a surplus of Super Corsa frames and maybe no Simplex dropouts or just a supply of Campy dropouts and no Simplex.

Anyway, there's one other difference between the TdF and SC frames. The TdFs had shorter steering tubes to use Stronglight P3 headsets. SC frames used the thicker Campy headsets - about a 9-10mm difference.

You have a great bike with great classic equipment. Don't let some hammer mechanic talk you into making changes or butchering your classic components. The only thing that I suggest is to tighten up the nut under the front on the seat.

Enjoy!

Chas.

greyhundguy · Last edited by greyhundguy on Tue May 19, 2009 5:26 am; edited 1 time in total

mcldtr,

Nice score!
Is the saddle an Ideale or Brooks?

Jay

greyhundguy

mcldtr,

Since it has a Campagnolo Record front derailleur and shifters, you may want to track down a Campy Nuovo Record rear derailleur to finish it off. A 'patent 73' RD can be had for about the same or less than a Simplex 'Criterium' which it likely came with.

Jay

greyhundguy

Also, I just noted the rear Brake appears to be a replacement.

Jay