[CR](TI-)Raleigh Team Pro and Presto frame building trivia

(Example: Framebuilders)

Date: Fri, 20 Oct 2006 21:26:08 +0200
From: "Freek Faro" <khun.freek@gmail.com>
To: classicrendezvous <Classicrendezvous@bikelist.org>
cc: faro@cistron.nl
Subject: [CR](TI-)Raleigh Team Pro and Presto frame building trivia

Listers,

Please allow me to disturb your (beginning) weekend relaxation, with some Dutch framebuilding trivia of the 70s. And sorry for all those links, seems the only way to illustrate this little story.

As is probably widely known, Jan Legrand, team mechanic of the TI-Raleigh pro team, build many (but not all) of the teambikes for TI-Raleigh. At the same time, Jan Legrand was building frames for Presto, a famous and still-in-business bikeshop in Amsterdam (http://www.presto.nl/, click on 'webzine' and '81 jaar Presto').

Frames that were built by Legrand had a special identifying detail, the overlaying seatstay caps. You can see this in the ex-Leo van Vliet team bike:

http://www.wooljersey.com/gallery/Freeks-racefietsen/presto+1979/KIF_3033 .JPG.html , exactly the same solution as in this 1979 Presto:

http://www.wooljersey.com/gallery/Freeks-racefietsen/presto+1979/KIF_3532 .JPG.html.

In this Presto however (also built by Jan Legrand, in 1972), the seatstay caps do not have that overlap: http://www.wooljersey.com/gallery/Freeks-racefietsen/album231/cute_brake_ bridge.jpg.html. He must have developed that detail a bit later.

Further inspection of the 1979 Presto reveals more interesting details: open-ended forks and chain- and seatstays:

http://www.wooljersey.com/gallery/Freeks-racefietsen/presto+1979/KIF_3538 .JPG.html.

And, even more interesting, the seatcluster arrangement:

http://www.wooljersey.com/gallery/Freeks-racefietsen/presto+1979/KIF_3541 .JPG.html.

In other words (and after checking with Loek Valk, owner of Presto) the 197 9 frame is not a Jan Legrand, but a Peter Serier! Look at this frame, at the Rotterdam Classic and Vintage Show in 2005: http://www.wooljersey.com/gallery/Freeks-racefietsen/album209/KIF_2077.jp g.html.

Apparently, Legrand and Serier were both working for Presto at the end of the 70s, and they shared some of those specific details.

Who is Peter Serier, you might wonder? Well, that's another story! Check this site: http://www.seriano.nl/ser.htm . 'Obsessed by perfection'.

PS: I'll come back to y'all when I know more about the Raleigh (Ilkeston) \u2013 Gazelle 753 connection.

Freek Faro

Rotterdam Netherlands