Feldman

Very old (maybe late 60's, check the seat stay caps) Gitane!

chainwhip

New cables, tires and bar tape.
Rough paint.
Looks well loved to me.

bikemig 

Looks like a Gitane TdF with weinmann concave rims, simplex derailleurs (shifters and FD, I can't see the rear), stronglight 93 crank, and mafac brakes. What's not to love about this bike?

Everyone needs a Reynolds 531 bike as a beater bike, right? And I thought I was doing good with a Sekine SHS 271 (tange tubing) as my beater. Maybe I need to turn my mid 70s Peugeot PR 10 into a neighborhood lock up bike,

Wildwood 

Definitely not a tweeker's saddle.

Moving toward Ugly Betty status, but too much paint remains. and chrome not flaking may be a stopper.

verktyg 

It's a 1969-71 Gitane Tour de France. The Mafac brakes, Stronglight P3 headset and 93 cranks are all that's original. Everything else has been replaced or upgraded.

The Stronglight P3 Top Lock Nut has been replaced with one that has flats instead of 4 pin holes. Sensible improvement.



@Wildwood "Moving toward Ugly Betty status, but too much paint remains. and chrome not flaking may be a stopper."

Chrome on the rear stays is gone.


verktyg

Kent T

I wish my beater bikes had this nice of a frame, by the way. Reynolds 531, a touch of class. I have a motto in life, "If It Fits, It Shifts, and I can ride it, I give it a try, if possible" P.S. A Sekine SHS 271, is a nice bike in it's own way. A 1982 Bridgestone Spica, with 4130 Cromoly, is a C&V ride I enjoy right now (and yes we need a saddle upgrade, and a rear tire). What matters in my world, is did you enjoy riding whatever bike you have? If you did, and you grinned, all we need to know. Ride on, and enjoy. With all your body can give it. Ride in your own way too. As a physically challenged, adaptive cyclist, I support you.

SurferRosa

Points off for ...

1. Rear brake cable routing
2. Bar tape job
3. Combo cable lock
4. Chain on the small ring
5. French fit
6. Visiting an actual library
7. NDS photo

canklecat

Stealth beater. Clever owner.

big chainring 

Couple coats of white Rustoleum....good as new.

Wildwood 

#5 = It IS French, how should it fit?

truth is = thought you would be crying over all that excessive cable housing for both brakes.

Wildwood 

.....or clearcoat to preserve the patina? It took decades to get like that.

P!N20

8. Front quick release on drive side.

P!N20

Stops rubbing the paint off the seat stay cap

verktyg 

Picky, Picky, Picky....
@SurferRosa What's this stuff about French Fit???


verktyg 40+ French bikes

rustystrings61 

Whoa there.

1. Rear brake cable being controlled from the left might mean the rider (or a previous rider) went through the training where whichever hand you put in your jersey pocket to retrieve a banana was used to run the rear brake.
2. Yeah, bar tape job is sub-optimal.
3. Combo cable lock is sufficient in certain locales, though not in a high-crime area.
4. Chain on the small ring is absolutely all right - unless you're one of those people who think The Rules by the self-anointed are anything other than self-aggrandizing crap from a buncha poseurs. Just sayin' ...
5. French fit is appropriate for not only French bikes, but boom era machines in general. That was how they were sold, just like we measured from center-to-top
6. Visiting an actual library keeps people like me employed, and I have enough @$$hat administrators pondering the silicone snake oil of replacing us all with servers to be touchy about it.
7. NDS photo is a pity - on the other hand, I contend that a Gitane TdF looks good from any angle, so it's not the sin it could be. Especially when they appear to be of the 60 cm to top variety.

Then again, I rode my battered green TdF fixed conversion this morning before coming to work at an academic library, so ...

Lemond1985

Owner was just spotted returning rented VHS tapes, mailing a letter, picking up pictures from a Photomat, and then using a pay phone and overheard saying, "There's plenty of fish in the sea my man, but at the end of the day ... it is what it is."

Additional point deductions may be possible.

horatio 

Lotsa battle scars.

madpogue 

Fah, literacy is over-rated. As is free public access to literature, media, etc. Let's turn everything into either a QR code, an emoji or an icon post-haste; then we won't have to wait another 486 years for Idiocracy to become a documentary?

clubman 

Ha! Points returned for all of the above. Call him yesterday's man. At least Capital One didn't lose his data, he's cash-only.

madpogue 

Throw in Pony Express, the telegraph, the electric bicycle and the milkman. Technologies come and go, as will smart phones, Alexa, and all her friends. The public library and postal delivery have both been around for centuries before any of those (relative) ephemera. What do you think will outlast today's fads?

(Duh, it just dawned on me - this entire subtext resides on a thread in an entire section dedicated to paragons of what most would consider obsolete technology......)

Bad Lag

We and our machines are the giants upon whose shoulders you stand. Tread lightly.

madpogue 

^^^^^ Thank you for making my point.

Phil_gretz

I'm going to disagree. It's not appropriate to leave a bike in the small ring, even if you've just stopped at the top of Mt. Ventoux for a photo. (Rule #26 ) Chain on the big dog. Sur la plaque, ****tard.

madpogue 

Parking a bike on the large chainring seems to me like parking a motor vehicle in fourth gear instead of first. But that's just me. 'Course, this bike is, in effect, a commuter bike.

Lemond1985

When I rode my bike to community college, it was a flat area, so I was in my large chainring at all times. I used to park at a bike rack and scoff at how 99% of the other bikes were in the "small" chainring. "What a bunch of WIMPS!" I would think to myself.