Help ID LECOULANT bike maker, please

[jamesdak]

Ok, another sorta, maybe, mystery bike to ID. You folks have come through in the past so giving it another try. Picked this up recently and the owner wasn't really certain of lineage but thought it might be Gitane. I went though all the 80s Gitane catalogs and don't find anything with frame details like this, much less Columbus SLX tubing. It is french threaded and french tubing size. The BB is Cinelli though and there are the raised spires in the bottom of the seatpost as would be correct for SLX. I've been digging around on the internet for a couple of days now with no real luck. Thought I'd put this out for others. I need to sort out the rear shifting and a balky rear shifter before I try a test ride. Oh and note how tight that rear end is, short chain stays and the dropouts are not what I would have expected. I'm thinking mid 80's because of 128mm rear spacing and one set of bottle cage braze-on's. I did finally find one Gitane from the early 90s' that seemed to have the same seatlug cluster with the fastback seatstays. But it also had to sets or bottle cage braze-ons and and a clamp of FD setup.

Here's some detailed frame pics, any ideas as to the actual builder?

Thanks in advance for any assistance. It's not all that critical to know who made it but it is very nice to know who makes them.

 

[foz]

Re:

I have no idea on the builder, but I like it! The dropouts look more late 90s than anywhere in the 80s.

 

[rikster]

Searching "cycles lecoulant" or "cadres lecoulant" on Google, it appears Lecoulant was a bike shop in Granville in northern France.

The searching also seems to mention a French artisan frame builder called Alain Michel, although his own frames seemed to have distinctive pantographing on the lugs and forks, I'm thinking if he built frames for the Lecoulant bike shop he might have built something a little different so as not to identify himself as the builder and might explain why it's Columbus SLX tubing and why it doesn't match up with any Gitane frames?

It's all a bit of guessing really as the names of Lecoulant and Alain Michel seem to be connected in some way from the searching.

Whatever it's background it certainly is unique and although green has never been one of my favourite colours the paint scheme on this is beautiful.

 

[jamesdak]

Re:

You might just be on to something with the Alain Michel thing. A quick search is finding some bikes that have various similar features.

And the lopro shown in this post with the same style paint job...

http://www.retrobike.co.uk/forum/viewto ... p;start=10


I'll dig into this deeper later today. Right now I have to get ready and head out for a 100 mile bike ride.

Thanks for the lead!

 

[Nob]

Very subtle & classy paint job & the colors match well

 

[Old Ned]

Re: Re:

I have no idea on the builder, but I like it! The dropouts look more late 90s than anywhere in the 80s.

+1!! Lovely.

 

[allenh]

Re: Re:

I have no idea on the builder, but I like it! The dropouts look more late 90s than anywhere in the 80s.

Another +1, that's a lovely thing