Concorde Squadra aero steel bike project

[SWijland]

I have been looking for a (vintage) steel aero frame for quite some time now, but up until now I was never able to find one I liked or was my size. A week ago I came across a very odd looking Concorde Squadra frame on an online classifieds website. Odd looking in that it was built with what looked like aero steel tubing. I took a chance and bought the frame as quickly as possible, hoping that it would something special. It was dropped off today at my place and I couldn't be happier.

It is indeed a Concorde Squadra and is it built from Columbus Ego tubing. I was hoping for Columbus AIR, but Ego is even better. To be honest I didn't now Ego even existed before today, but it looks amazing. Almost every tube of the frame has some kind of aero profile. Really cool.

The frame belonged to Eddy Vancraeynest. He is probably a big guy since the top tube length is a massive 60 cm (c-c). The seat tube length is 60 (C-T), so either he had a long upper body or this was his time trial frame. I suspect the first.

The paint on the frame is not something I really like, but I will keep the frame as it is for now until I think of a better finish. The same goes for the components and the fork. I will build it up with a DA 7700 groupset I have lying around, but I hope to build it up with some nicer parts in the near future.

[TimmS]

Seriously, where do you find all those nice bikes!?

[engi]

Looks interesting!

[quattrings]

Looks amazing!

I have aquired a 1982 Peugeot ph12 recently which is built with carboprofil tubing and should have a real nice ride I was told.
Sadly it's in nowhere near the condition your beautiful Concorde is in. It's in dire need of some tlc. Luckily it came with a decal set, CLB brakeset, the aero shifter assembly and the original FD.
Once the bike is finished I will give it to a friend of mine who has picked up on cycling after an injury.

[SWijland]

@quattrings: seems like a sweet project. Though matching the original paint will be difficult I suspect.

[rajMAN]

Very good find. The PDM squad rode a similar machine and their paint scheme I thought to be the best in its day and still lust after one today.

[Geoff]

Ok, that's nice. Eddy had so much promise. I think that is the ADR 'W'-Cup Coffee colours. It would have been 1988 or 89. He won a really big U23 race around then, it might even have de Ronde or Paris-Roubaix, I can't remember... Anyway, fabulous bike.

[kgt]

lovely!

[SWijland]

I just heard back from the bike store - JOWAN - that supplied this bike to the team. According to them the frame is 20 years old and belonged to a team called KSV Deerlijk - Westauto's. The club president at that time was Walter Coecke.

After some googling I managed to find a reference to this team being a semi pro cycling team from 1993. If I am not mistaken the picture below is of the team.

@Geoff: Eddy won the Ronde van Vlaanderen for U23, if Google is correct.

[Geoff]

Fantastic find. You seem to have a knack for locating old pro frames?

[SWijland]

I just weighed in the frame after removing the fork and the headset and it weighs just 1950g. Very nice given the huge size of the tubing and the big size.

So far so good!

[SWijland]

Progress on the Concorde has been very slow. Finding the right parts turned out harder than I thought. That said, I did manage to find a very nice Chorus titanium seatpost and an ITM Kystral titanium stem to go with it. I also ordered a Chorus 9 speed groupset and a pair of black Shamal HPW wheels, which I think will look very nice with the frame. I hope these will come in this week.

[SWijland]

The Shamal wheels came in earlier than expected. The wheels themselves are in superb condition and I think they look amazing in the frame. They are tubulars though, which does make them slightly less practical...

[SWijland]

Progress is slow (I actually removed all the parts from the frame and put them on a Fausto Coppi I am also working on), which was a nice opportunity to take some glam shots of the frame. Enjoy .

[SWijland]

Recently I got hold of a really nice Campagnolo Record Titanium 9-speed groupset. When I bought it, it was still on a bike. Seeing as the frame of the bike had cracks in the headtube, I was able to get the entire bike at a really nice price.

The best I can tell the groupset has seen very little use, but it had been in storage for quite some time. I ended up spending the entire morning today cleaning all the parts, removing rust in some areas and replacing some badly rusted bits and pieces. For now I am quite happy with the way the parts look on the bike. I also managed to find a seriously cool San Marco Regal saddle with a Flemish Lion printed on it, which I think looks great on the bike. All I need to get now are some nice wheels. Although the Shamal wheels looked okay, I still wasn't happy with them.