Classic and Vintage Bicycles: What's it Worth? Appraisals and Inquiries - Motobecane grand touring mixie

Just bought a Motobecane Grand Touring bike. I learned it is called a mixie. Can anyone help me identify the year of manufacture by the following info: It is a 24 speed, on the fork it says '888 Vitus', It had Weinmann center pull brakes the color is gun metal gray, The shifter says 'Suntour ARX', On the sprocket it says 'Stronglight', The wheels are Weinmann. On the underside of the frame there are two sets of numbers as follows: 6515759 and 71002. I paid $45 for this bike in good but garage dusty condition. Rear tire is flat. Can anyone tell me what I have? Something tells me I did OK. If you need a pic I'll do my best to post one.

PICTURES, please.

Hello Welcome to the forums.

sounds like nice Mixte. pics are the best way to get a good quick ID.

Post 1980, Motobecane catalogs are hard to find. Google component date codes, thats your best bet to get the age. My guess is 1982 or 1983. Grand Touring model was about half way up their product line, a good mixte for sure.

Post some pictures please. From the drive-side (right side) of the bike.

Will post pics in the morning .........too full of chikin wings right now.

I was just thinking about a Motobecane Grand Touring being offered locally, an earlier version and not a 'mixtie' which is what I think you meant. (Pretty sure your bike is not 24 speed unless it's had considerable changes to it.)

Agree as usual with wrk101, it's a mid level bike in their lineup. At $40 you did well unless the bike has some big problem. Pics will tell us a lot...try to get closeups of the crank and derailleurs. Motobecanes are known for nice paint schemes so even a basic one will be a very good looking bike.

http://i1131.photobucket.com/albums/m550/DWinMO/IMG_0122-1.jpg

Did quite a bit of research online, looked at several scanned promotional spec sheets and judging from the components and paint schemes that came on them in different years, it was a process of elimination. I believe this was a new color in '82, was not pictured but was said to be also "in New Blue" as an alternative to the Grey, it also has Huret shifters and derailers, Stronglight crank, Weinmann brakes and Wheels with Mailard hubs. This particular group of components I did not find on any of the other years. This year '82, as much as I can tell, did not have Suntour or Shimano as the other years did, and in the literature description exact components were not stated but said to be good touring components or something to that effect. Weinmann wheels made in Belgium, but frame and other components all made in France.

My theory, since the '82 was made in those "in between years" so to speak, the frame is actually a left over from 1980, as the inside of the left chain stay drop out has 0980 stamped on it. The "in between years" being the years between when Motobecane stopped making them, I believe was 1980, and the other company (don't remember name) started making them again using the Motobecane name in 1984.

For those of you that have more experience and knowledge about these things, does this scenario seem feasible? Shooter1, how does this coincide with your information?

Pics as promised. I was mistaken as to the it being a 24 speed. It has a 2328192328202328212328222328232328243 gang sprocket in front and a 6 gang sprocket in the rear.

If these pics aren't big enough let me know....they were 8x10 100 dpi.

You did incredibly well for $45.00, that's a sweet bike!

Yes. Well you did, indeed.

Pics as promised. I was mistaken as to the it being a 24 speed. It has a 3 gang sprocket in front and a 6 gang sprocket in the rear.

Huret derailer 232819

Front derailer is Suntour, the rear one is Huret in case you were curious. Nice find!

18 speed, looks like Weinman concave rims, Vitus 888, Huret rear derailer, sounding pretty familiar! I'm wondering if the Suntour derailer and shifters could have been an upgrade from Huret?

Really nice score!! I had the regular version of that bike once. It was a nice rider but I changed out the triple crank to a double. Will you ride it or flip it? Where I live females like Mixtie bikes or sometimes their boyfriends like to buy one for them to get them into riding. A vintage Mixte is just right for that purpose. It looks to be in great condition and with the storage bags, in season worth 4-5 times what you paid.
http://i816.photobucket.com/albums/zz87/Tbike4/Motobecane/Side_1.jpg

Think I'll wipe the dust off, shoot some WD40 around, fix the flat and put a few miles on it.