 |  | | | |  | |  |  | Brand New French Thread Headsets! |  | |  |  | |
 Posted: Mon Jan 25, 2010 11:45 am |
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| edorwart |
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| Joined: 23 Sep 2009 |
| Posts: 50 |
| Location: Bucks County, PA |
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Velo-Orange now has their own French Thread Headset, all new and $30.00. I have not personally used one but have used their French Thread Bottom Bracket which is a nice piece.
http://www.velo-orange.com/vofrthhe.html |
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| | | | | | | | | New French Headset Stack Height | | | | | |
| Posted: Mon Jan 25, 2010 1:17 pm |
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| verktyg |
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| Joined: 14 Jan 2007 |
| Posts: 2814 |
| Location: SF Bay Area |
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These new French headsets from Velo-Orange are a great idea, but....
Don't everyone rush out to buy one of these for your classic Gitane.
To throw water on the fire, the stack height is 41mm which means they will probably only work of frames that originally had Campagnolo Nuovo Record or Super Record headsets or the rare Stronglight Super Competition S5 or D6 headsets. For example, the early 70s Gitane Super Corsas.
I'm disappointed that they didn't take that into consideration when they designed these headsets.... There is a BIG world beyond Campagnolo, especially in the realm of French bikes! 
Most Gitane Tour de France bikes from the 70s came with Stronglight P3 headsets with a stack height (total top to bottom measurement of the headset components) of 33mm! 
8mm doesn't sound like much but it's a lot to try to make up. For example you could have 1mm faced off of the fork crown and 2mm off of the top and bottom of the head tube. That still leaves 3mm (1/8"). You may be able to make this up by using the top lock nut from your original headset and a thin lock washer or no washer at all.
I've had to do this on several French frames before that had short steering tubes and it's a lot of work!
You may not be able to use this headset with center pull brakes without finding a rare front brake cable hanger that was used on MTBs that attached around the stem.
Most of the less expensive Gitanes from the 70s used headsets with around a 30mm stack height. These are easy to spot because they have an octagon top lock nut (The Stronglight P3 headsets had a round lock nut with 4 spanner pin holes in the top).
During the 80s Gitane used a bunch of different headsets, probably most of them under 41mm stack height.
One last point, old French thread headsets had fork crown races with a 27mm bore. Crown races with a 26.4mm bore are much more common and that's probably what these Velo-Orange headsets have. It's easy to fix but you have to find a bike shop with a 26.4mm fork crown facing cutter to do the job right.
Good luck... The Grinch!  |
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Chas.
SF Bay Area, CA USA
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1984 Criterium
1969 TdF
1971 TdF
1974 TdF
1984 TdF x 2 Bikes
1970 SC
1971 SC
1972 SC
1984 SC
1984 Team Pro
1985 Professional
1990s Team Replica |
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