Originally Posted by
TenGrainBread
I see
repechage point about the fenders. While it wasn't the fashion to put fenders on race bikes in the US, the 700C "Sportif" with fenders was a common style in France. A competition bike designed for long rides where weather is unpredictable and comfort is somewhat important. Still considered a race bike but designed for more than just crits.
The fender mounting braze-ons on the bike indicate it was designed to be able to take fenders.
just about every bike ever made with Campagnolo 1010A dropouts at that time, had fender eyelets, as they were part of the forging itself. If a frame maker had these in his shop, he would have to take them off, but why would you? Down the road, someone may want to put fenders on the bike. However, the presence of these, doesn’t mean the bike was intended for fenders at the time it was sold.
Seattle frame builder Angel Rodriguez, who had worked at Singer before this frame was made, ordered this in 1976 for likely a well heeled client. As confirmed by Olivier, who likely actually brazed this frame, it was built as a racing frame, for the US market, where Campagnolo was the rage, and shipped bare.
If Angel, who had worked at Singer, wanted the classic French style Singer with fenders, he would have ordered it that way. Instead, this is an ‘Italian’ style frame, with Campagnolo dropouts, Campagnolo cable clips on the top tube, a peg on the down tube to lock into Campagnolo band on shifters, with the intent to build an entirely Campagnolo racing bike for the US market.
When found, this is exactly as it was, with no fenders. In the US in those days, nobody used fenders on racing bikes and many didn’t on touring bikes either. I have a 1971 Cinelli with full Spence Wolf Alpine components, with the original receipt, from the original owner. It has these same dropouts but was never fitted with fenders. My 1971 Masi has these dropouts, was sold new in Vancouver but never had fenders. There are lots of stories about Cinellis being delivered to the US in the 1960’s with fenders, and the first thing that happened, was that they were discarded.
Olivier at Singer shipped a bare ‘racing’ frame to a former worker at the shop, with no fenders, to be built up with Campagnolo when it arrived. This has been confirmed directly from him.
I find the bike, 40+ years later, built exactly this way, with no indication it was ever built any other way, and no fenders were ever mounted.
For some reason, people want to continue to keep telling me it is not built ‘correctly’.
WTF?