Starnord Eddy Merckx

[non-fixie]

A few weeks ago, while looking for bits of bling on ebay.fr, I stumbled across a purple Eddy Merckx frameset.

That colour was enough to stop scrolling and take a closer look. Of course I don't need another bike, but this looked rather tasty. Much more interesting than the usual cheap & cheerful Merckx-branded bikes I've seen from that era.

Forged Huret ends, a full complement of Vitus 172 tubes. Metric and with French threads of course, but the seller supplied both a headset and a bottom bracket. And in a non-French, but also very usable 62cm size to boot. Dang!

I ignored it for a couple of days, and had almost forgotten about it, when the smart people of ebay.fr sent me an e-mail: price lowered! Dang again!

I have no balls to speak of, so I duefully clicked and paid.

The frame showed up a week later, and the first thing I did was pop in a couple of wheels, measure the frame angles and have a look. 73 degrees head tube and seat tube angles. This is a proper racing frame:

I spent a couple of weeks going through my bins to find the appropriate parts that this bicycle may have originally come with, and this is what I came up with. Finished building version 1 today. It still needs different pedals, but other than that I am pretty happy with how it looks.

Hopefully the weather will permit a test ride tomorrow.

 

[grantoury]

Handsome and a good size, I like that.

 

[non-fixie]

Weather was meh. Dog wanted to go to the beach. No test ride.

 

[non-fixie]

Dog off to the woods with the missus. Weather somewhat bearable.

So I made a few last-minute changes, fitted a pair of clincher wheels and took the result on a short ride for final adjustments. None were needed and it rode quite nicely, too.

 

[Guinessisgoodforyou]

Very nice and it's a good colour too.

 

[grantoury]

Stands out nicely against the grass. Was this Eddy's own company?
I don't think he used these? He had his frames made by Ernesto Colnago if I recall correctly.

 

[non-fixie]

Stands out nicely against the grass. Was this Eddy's own company?
I don't think he used these? He had his frames made by Ernesto Colnago if I recall correctly.

Thanks!

(** note to self: stay close to green stuff, just in case someone takes a picture **)

No, these were built while Merckx was still very much racing and winning Tour de Frances and stuff. Sometime around 1970 he apparently registered his brand name and logos, and these were subsequently licensed to a number of manufacturers in Europe. Falcon in England, Kessels in Belgium, Crescent in Sweden, Colnago in Italy, Miyata in Japan and Bernard Dangre in France. There may have been more. Merkckx started his own operation in 1980.

The bikes Merckx rode in anger during his career were built by different builders. He started out on a stock Superia AFIK, but I've read his Peugeot PX10 was replaced by a Masi with Peugeot decals. After that it gets a little fuzzy. Kessels, Colnago and De Rosa were the suppliers from '71 onwards, but I don't know who actually built the frames Eddy rode. In the case of De Rosa it was probably Ugo himself, as he also helped Eddy to set up his own production facility.

My example was made by Bernard Dangre's Starnord factory in northern France. Dangre was a bit of an oddball, as he did not build to stock, so this bike was actually ordered by someone, presumably around 1975.

Fun fact: during the seventies the licensees made al sorts of bikes under the Eddy Merckx brand.

Miyata made a very, very nice randonneur (note the Eddy Merckx-branded bags!):



But my favorites are the cute kids' bikes that were also made by Dangre:

 

[Guinessisgoodforyou]

I want that randonneur so bad..

 

[non-fixie]

I want that randonneur so bad..

You and me both.

I am generally happy with my size, but not when it comes to Japanese touring bikes. Or French ones for that matter.