Last summer I bought a Gitane Sports Tandem from a man who was retiring and moving to Corsica. He had collected most of the parts (plus a few extras) but had not put it all together yet. This is what the bike looked like when I brought it home:



I stripped it of parts and paint and had it powder coated. It then sat in my shed awaiting the right time to put it all back together. Today a friend and I started cleaning it up and bolting on the stuff the previous owner and I had collected along the way. Here it is on the bike stand when we started.



Firs off, I put on the foil decals. The originals were not available, and I can’t say I care much for originality, so I put on some decals from an Interclub. They went very nicely with the apple green paint. I have a head tube decal for it as well, but it needs to be trimmed a bit to miss the mixte downtubes.



Meanwhile we cleaned up the four Stronglight crankarms. The front BB, which was mounted in an oversized, movable shell, was in decent shape so I simply put the original back in place. For the rear, though, I had a French Velo Orange BB that was just the right length for the triple. I like the way old Nuovo Record front derailleurs work so I added one from my box of parts.



Besides the two Mafac Racer brakes, this bike also has a drum brake. I have no idea yet how well it works! But it is a cool old thing.