gitaneusa.com Forum Index » Vintage Gitane » When were candy purple TDF's with Huret dropouts sold?    View previous topic :: View next topic  When were candy purple TDF's with Huret dropouts sold?   Posted: Mon Nov 02, 2009 2:17 pm volkscycle Joined: 02 Nov 2009 Posts: 7 I have a candy purple TDF frame withfull 531 tubing and Huret dropouts and a 4 diget S/N. It has the same Decals as a 1970 TDF, but the seat stays do not have the 6cm finishing plate at the top. The seat stays at the the top look like the 71 /72 models. Any idea what year this frame was sold? Correction The purple TDF has a 5 diget S/N. Jerry Last edited by volkscycle on Wed Nov 04, 2009 12:01 pm; edited 1 time in total   Posted: Mon Nov 02, 2009 2:54 pm sandranian Site Admin Joined: 27 Feb 2006 Posts: 2701 Location: Southern California If they are the honeycomb dropouts, it would have been the mid 1970's, about 74-76, if I am not mistaken. Chas??? _________________ Stephan Andranian Costa Mesa, CA www.gitaneusa.com   Posted: Mon Nov 02, 2009 3:47 pm greyhundguy Joined: 09 Apr 2008 Posts: 678 Location: South-Central VIRGINIA Volks, Pictures would help greatly! Jay _________________ Dance like nobody is watching.   Posted: Mon Nov 02, 2009 3:56 pm volkscycle Joined: 02 Nov 2009 Posts: 7 Thank you for the response. I would be suprized if it is that new, but the Huret shifters on the bicycle have the cable hiden until it comes out of the shifter. I have 1973 bike with Huret shifters and a Jublee deraileur and the cable is open like the early 70's campi shifters. The TDF frame came with a Stronglight BB. The dropout adjustor screw just goes through the dropout and screws into a plastic piece that fits into the slot where the axle goes. The lugs and the fork crown are the same as the 1970 TDF that I have. I know that the 1968 TDF's came with Huret dropouts ( per the catalog ), but I have other bicycles where they weren't made to the catalog.   Posted: Mon Nov 02, 2009 4:01 pm sandranian Site Admin Joined: 27 Feb 2006 Posts: 2701 Location: Southern California Yep...going to need pictures. Unfortunately, that is usually the only way...and certainly the best way, to identify the bikes. _________________ Stephan Andranian Costa Mesa, CA www.gitaneusa.com   Posted: Mon Nov 02, 2009 4:05 pm volkscycle Joined: 02 Nov 2009 Posts: 7 I will try and post pictures tomorrow. OK, here goes....   Posted: Mon Nov 02, 2009 11:21 pm verktyg Joined: 14 Jan 2007 Posts: 2814 Location: SF Bay Area You asked for it... The French were quite fond of Huret derailleurs. At one time Huret was a big name in racing. During the 1960s you had a choice of expensive Campagnolo metal derailleurs, cheap plastic Simplex derailleurs and "solid looking" Huret Alvit metal derailleurs (plus a few other inconsequential French, Brit and Italian makes). Huret also sold an economy model rear derailleur the Svelto and later, in 1967, the Luxe. Alvit Svelto Huret introduced the the Alvit rear derailleur in 1958 but the version most people are familiar with (shown above) came out in 1961. By 1965 they had produced over 5 million of them. Huret continued making the Alvit up until 1983! It wasn't uncommon to see a top model French bike with a Reynolds 531 frame and alloy components equipped with Huret Alvit derailleurs (they also came on most Schwinn tanks up through the mid 70s). For example, the 1964 Gitane '102' the precursor to the Tour de France model used Huret Alvit derailleurs: http://www.gitaneusa.com/images/catalog/1964/Page_04.jpg In the late 60's the European bicycle industry standardized on 3 different styles of rear dropouts with integral derailleur hangers - all incompatible with one another. You had the Campagnolo design which became the world standard, the Simplex dropout that only worked with Simplex derailleurs and the much less common Huret that only worked with... you guessed it, Huret derailleurs. Campy Simplex Huret The Simplex dropouts could be filed and the hole taped to work with derailleurs that used the 10mm threaded derailleur mount like Campy. It wasn't until much later that other makes of derailleur could be adapted to fit Huret dropouts (think Maginot Line). You may have a European model TdF from the early 1970s. Between 1968 and 1974, all of the Gitane Tour de France bikes imported into the US that I knew of, saw, heard of or saw pictures of had Simplex derailleurs (99.9% Simplex Criterium model derailleurs). They came with at least 4 different types of Simplex dropouts, occasionally they even used some older model Simplex dropouts without derailleur hangers (probably due to shortages during the bike boom). A few TdFs even came with Campy rear dropouts, again probably due to parts shortages. A lot of TdFs and even some Super Corsas came with Huret front dropouts - they looked identical to Campy front dropouts and a centime saved is a centime earned. The 1968 Gitane catalog seems to have a typo or mistranslation: English: "huret derailleurs prestige group, Huret fork ends" French: "dérailleur AV et AR Huret" (Huret front and rear derailleurs) 'prestige' were the cheap model Simplex derailleurs, not Huret. You can't have it both ways! Either it's Simplex or its Huret. Most likely any TdF with Huret derailleurs had Huret dropouts too, but... If the people who wrote the copy for the 1968 catalog didn't know what they were talking about (highly likely) then you can't use it for a reference. Volkscycle you mention that "...the Huret shifters on the bicycle have the cable hidden until it comes out of the shifter." Do you mean that the derailleur cable runs inside the frame tube? Or, the shift cable is inside a cable housing for the full length from the levers to the derailleurs? The willow leaf seat stay caps were discontinued probably about 1971. The purple color in 1974. Also, I've seen Tour de France fork decals on different Gitane models including Interclubs and Super Corsas plus a few European models. BTW, if you do have Huret dropouts, the Huret Challenger and Success derailleurs designed for Huret dropouts work exceptionally well (some came with adapters to fit Campy style dropouts). Chas. When were candy purple TDF's with Huret dropouts sold?   Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 5:26 pm volkscycle Joined: 02 Nov 2009 Posts: 7 Chas Thank you for the excelent complete response. Since the 73 & 74 TDF 's didn't come with full Reynolds tubing the purple frame must be a 1971 or 72. I didn't finish cleaning up the green 1970 full Reynolds TDF frame with "willow leaf" seat stay caps I won't post pictures of the frames till tomorrow. What is the difference between the Huret dropout threads and Campi dropout threads? Jerry Re: When were candy purple TDF's with Huret dropouts sold?   Posted: Tue Nov 03, 2009 10:33 pm verktyg Joined: 14 Jan 2007 Posts: 2814 Location: SF Bay Area volkscycle wrote: Since the 73 & 74 TDF 's didn't come with full Reynolds tubing the purple frame must be a 1971 or 72. Jerry, I'll be polite and not snidely ask "Where did you get that misinformation"? Gitane used the Mylar silver foil decals on their racing/performance/sporting models from ~1968 until early 1974. The only difference in decals between models was usually the right fork decal (and the Reynolds 531 stickers). Here's an example of an almost all original 1971 Gitane Tour de France with foil decals. Foil decal Gitanes were available in the colors on this 1970 catalog spec sheet plus candy apple gold, copper and probably some others that I don't recall. Match blue came in an infinite variety shades from robin's egg blue to turquoise. I suspect that the color was mixed daily using white plus the turquoise blue candy apple lacquer that they used for Champion Blue. The blue quickly faded to a turquoise-aquamarine color. (The 1974 TdF bikes came with in robust blue, red and kelly green candy apple lacquers or as they say in the UK "flamboyant" colors). Note: these colors are way off except for white... and black! The 1968 Gitane catalog lists blanc, bleu, rouge (and vert omnium) colors. Purple Gitanes probably date from maybe 1970 until early 1974; how's that for weasel words? At the end of the foil decal run there were still a few green and purple bikes available because either they were less popular or Gitane made more of them. They made a lot of white bikes too. (purple and green were my least favorite Gitane colors in those days but I've mellowed in my old age) Around 1974 Gran Sports starting coming in deep burgundy and very ugly brown colors. Orange bikes were not that common and black bikes were extremely rare (saw one in the flesh in 1973 and one on the internet a while back). About mid 1974 Gitane made a lot of changes in the US market. The most visible was the switch from the thin easily scratched foil decals to thicker, more durable plastic decals in either yellow or green. They also changed the frame colors they offered and plus improved the cosmetics... slightly. Along with these changes the model offering was substantially reduced. The Tour de France model was "dumbed down" plus it had a hefty price increase as well. The foil decal TdFs imported into the US had all Reynolds 531 frames with Simplex dropouts (occasionally Campy) with 1/2 chromed forks and stays. The '1974' models had the new Huret '"honeycomb" rear dropouts, only the 3 main tubes were Reynolds 531 and only the forks had chrome plating. They also switched from sewups to 27" clinchers. It's quite possible that what were billed as 1974 model Gitanes were early 1975 models. Gitane Pacific who had just taken over importing and distributing Gitanes didn't seem to have a clue about the changing US bike market (or much else about the bike business). They were late to the party and trying to cash in on the fast fading Bike Boom market for entry level bikes! By 1974 many US bike buyers were becoming more sophisticated bike consumers ready to step up to a better quality bike. So... Gitane introduces their flagship model, the TdF, with lower quality features for a lot more money! DOH! One other thing, there were still a lot of bike boom era bikes in the pipeline in 1974. It wasn't uncommon to find a "NEW" bike that was built in maybe 1971 or 72 still on a showroom floor, especially in the less popular smaller and larger frames sizes (50cm, 62cm and 64cm sizes). volkscycle wrote: What is the difference between the Huret dropout threads and Campi dropout threads? Campy dropout threads use the wonderful, sacrosanct Italian bicycle thread standard: 10mm x 26 tpi - (Threads Per Inch!). A formato bastardo if there ever was one! The Huret hanger thread size is 10mm x 1.0mm which is so close to 10mm x 26 tpi that there's no problem switching back and forth. The challenge is going to be finding a later style rear derailleur that will work on the old style Huret dropout. Here's a Huret Challenger (steel version of the titanium Success) with the correct stop tab for a Huret dropout. There were also tabs for Campy dropouts too. You might also consider one of the highly worshiped because they were the lightest derailleur ever made, extremely flimsy Huret Jubilee derailleurs. They came in at least 4 versions; the one on the right has the stop for a Campy dropout, the other two fit Huret dropouts and there was a "Bi" version that went both ways. A Simplex derailleur with a tab (Criterium or LJ) or Shimano with a tab might work without modification. I've never tried one on an older Huret dropout??? These tabs fit in front of the hanger instead of using the stop at the bottom or rear like the older Campy, Simplex and Huret derailleurs. Simplex Shimano Chas. When were candy purple TDF's with Huret dropouts sold?   Posted: Wed Nov 04, 2009 10:18 am volkscycle Joined: 02 Nov 2009 Posts: 7 Chas Thank you for all the effort you put into my question. I bought the purple TDF because I liked the color when I saw it at Recycle Cycle in Seattle. I bought the green TDF for parts since there was significantly more rust on the chrome. I posted pictures in the S/N section this morning. The purple shows up blue in the pictures. Jerry When were candy purple TDF's with Huret dropouts sold?     gitaneusa.com Forum Index » Vintage Gitane You cannot post new topics in this forum You cannot reply to topics in this forum You cannot edit your posts in this forum You cannot delete your posts in this forum You cannot vote in polls in this forum All times are GMT - 8 Hours   Page 1 of 1   All Posts1 Day7 Days2 Weeks1 Month3 Months6 Months1 Year Oldest FirstNewest First  Select a forum Gitane USA----------------Vintage GitaneGitane RacingModern GitanePro Racing - Classics/Giro/Tour....Owner Gallery   Powered by phpBB © 2001-2004 phpBB Group Designed for Trushkin.net | Themes Database.