Is this a Mavic neutral service bike?
 

Bought this a few months ago near me in Thiers and was showing it to a friend who said it might be a neutral service bike. I'd never heard of them before even though I've watched the TdF for years and must have seen the yellow car shooting by now and then. It wasn't sold to me as anything special, and the price was good - I was interested in the advert that roughly said (in French) Mavic bike, electric, doesn't work. The second part of my ignorance is that I'd never heard of the Mektronic derailleur. The guy did mention to me a problem with the derailleur not working. My French is not great but when he uses the words problème and dérailleur in the same sentence I'm lulled into thinking that French is easy!. When I got the bike home I gave it a good clean (it had been stored in a barn) and was surprised that it was in good condition. The batteries were dead so these were changed out but still the mechanism didn't work. I found an instruction manual online and this said to put the head unit at a certain angle and hey presto it worked perfectly.

My question then is it a Mavic neutral service bike?

p.s. Before someone mentions "how do you ride a bike without a chain" , chain is off for replacement :)

https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...75be40cbb.jpeg
https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...cc48b834b.jpeg
https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...4c325f9a6.jpeg
https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...7d16c6d72.jpeg

Yes, that is a Mavic neutral service bike. Very cool find in great condition. Just don't ride it in the rain or high humidity; Mektronic likes dry conditions.

That's a great find, even if it isn't a service bike, but more than likely is. I'd ride it, sans that nasty saddle. :thumb:

Looks like a Cannondale sticker on the seat tube.

Yeah, I'd guess that was a CAAD frame provided to Mavic. Ultegra 6500 crankset. And a quill stem. I'm guessing late 90s? 2000? You should post this in C&V.

Supercool find!

Wow! Now that’s a bike which would be cool to have! Working Mektronic and great condition…congrats!

I would ride that all the time. Don't hang it on a wall. Very cool find.

Thanks for all the kind replies. It's always nice to find something you weren't expecting. I didn't mind either way on the neutral service angle as the components are pretty funky.

I will have to slam the seat down even further to ride it, I suspect it might be too big for me but I'll test it out over the summer. It's not my main bike (n+1 syndrome) so maybe the stretched position will be okay for short rides.

Moving to Classic and Vintage

My comment was wrong so I removed it
Ed

cool find

Someone else here on C&V was just asking about Mavic service course bikes...