Are there any members willing to place a bet on whether this price can be repeated or even improved upon?
When this item was first brought to the List's notice, I thought it looked sort of familiar, but just put that down to the 543 generic likeness. But my interest was aroused and the images of couple of my Easter-time purchases came to mind.
It was the last day of our - my wife and myself - holidays in mid-France..and for the previous six weeks we had been scouring around a dozen or so "brocante" and "troc" shops as well as the usual weekend flea-market type sales, looking for cast-iron wood-burning stoves, rugs, wardrobes and the like..the sort of thing you need to give a small cottage some sort of lived-in French "paysan" atmosphere.
We had just visited the local large builders' merchant to buy some ceramic tiles, blinds etc to bring back to the UK, and the car was looking pretty full-up. I needed just that one last fix before we headed up to Zeebrugge on the morrow..just one last visit to the troc warehouse 300metres up the road...just one last chance to find the illusive Herse, Singer, Hurtu, Thomann..whatever it might take to end the holiday on a high
My wife took a lot of convincing..maybe there would be a wonderful art nouveau wardrobe just waiting to be snatched up by a visiting English couple for a handful of euros..My argument was convincing..my strategy was working. Needless to say we didn't find that wardrobe...but we did discover a couple of interesting bikes parked in the far corner just behind the fridges and the cookers (if Nelson MIller is reading this he MUST be able to recall that far corner!)
A flash of bright orange, broken by white panels..and a much darker turquoise blue with a subdued D/T transfer in silver grey...and there I had them.in my sights..a CNC Special and a Peugeot Team Pro from circa 1960..and only 40 euros apiece..or roughly £50 the pair. After years of being dragged around a large variety of warehouses, junk-shops, flea-markets and the like..and then being placated with a fleeting visit to a shoe=shop window, my wife is accustomed, even hardened to the worst of my excesses..and knows when not to object when she sees that glint of treasure-discovered in my eye. She is even learning to spot a bargain too..And so it was in this case. With another 80 euros on the Debit Card I was in a good mood again...and flying on that high..
The CNC tirned out to be a mid-range machine, nothing special frame-wise, but it had some very nice tackle on it. The Peugeot was a different story..a super frame with even better tackle including one of these ultra rare Simplex gears..but not in as quite as good a condition as the Ebay one.
The point of this story is not to gloat at my good luck but to marvel at the Aladdin's cave of cycle parts that I visited in the course of a weekend visit to France earlier this month. In the sous-sol of a 1960s "pavillion" on the side of a road leading nowhere but further from nowhere,and into nowhere in particular, I met a real "marchand", one of those French newcomers to Ebay. He told me that he was watching with real interest the progress of the auction for that Simplex because he said...modestly "I have four of them NIB !". He also showed me 6 NIB 543's..and that was just the start of three-and-half hours of eye-popping envy. But it was the collection of frames and bikes that really interested and astonished me..he had everything you could wish to drool over..Singer, Herse, a Chaplait tandem, Carre, Guillot, Hurtu, Barra, Gnome-et-Rhone, Mecadural, Terrot, Aquilon.. the list was almost endless..but the real star of the collection was a Colibri. I had never seen one before..and may never see one again...although I have fixed another "rendez-vous tout prochainement".
It was the only frame that I have ever seen constructed with a bronze-welded bottom bracket assembly and full cast lugs elsewhere. Perhaps..on reflection that was the frame's Achilles heel..because, as "le marchand" pointed out with his finger, there was a small but yet pronounced oval hole at the bottom of the seat tube on the back face just where it has been joined to the bracket shell. The frame wasn't rideable in that condition, but whether the hole was a result of corrosion or due to fatigue, who knows.
Of all the superb frames on show in a vast chaotic display..the Colibri was the "merchant's" favorite...not for sale at any price. When I pointed out that it was pretty unsaleable he talked about the essential repairs he was going to have to have carried out...but "it is difficult to find a 'cadreur' these days.." he complained..
Feeling a desperate need to get to know this fellow better..to get into his "good books" I volunteered my assistance. The state of negotiations at the moment is that of a general agreement to accept my offer...but can we do some sort of trade...the repair in exchange possibly for some article I might otherwise wish to buy. I have always had a soft spot for bartering, as the process has an essential role to play at bike jumbles.. And so might possibly start another short and interesting chapter in my framebuilding career....but in this case I feel as though I might be undertaking the renovation of someone's own crown jewels, of an object beyond pricelessness
Watch this space..there might just be more to come...but maybe discretion will become the better part of valour..or words to that effect.
Norris Lockley...Settle Uk