Senior Member
Join Date: Apr 2006
Location: Washington County, Vermont, USA
Posts: 3,778
Bikes: 1966 Dawes Double Blue, 1976 Raleigh Gran Sport, 1975 Raleigh Sprite 27, 1980 Univega Viva Sport, 1971 Gitane Tour de France, 1984 Lotus Classique, 1976 Motobecane Grand Record
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The nice thing about those Huret honeycomb dropouts is that they will accept Campagnolo-type derailleurs, Huret derailleurs, or Simplex derailleurs. I think the Gitane management of that time must have been a little freaked out about component availability--they probably had to take whatever they could get--so this was their way of building in a maximum amount of wiggle room.
Chas will weigh in with the final word before long, I bet, but my recollection is that most of the honeycomb dropout models were built with 531 in the three main tubes only.