These Lejeune frames from the 70s really are an interesting bunch in that e ven within a model type the specifications such as lugs, fork crowns even f ront and rear drop-outs can vary considerably.
Usually Lejeune would use Bocama lugs and fork crowns during the 70s, while in the 60s they often chose Prugnat. The long-point ones on this frame mig ht be Prugnat...or Bocama..
I have collected three Lejeune and Sauvage Lejeune pro team bikes from the 60s, that belonged to Henri Anglade, Bernard Guyot and George Groussard. Al l are built with short point Prugnat lugs and use the Wagner crown with the chevron milled onto the top surface. All have Campagnolo long road drop-ou ts. The Anglade frame has mudguard eyes on the rear drop-outs but not the f ront ones, and the Guyot and Groussard frames have no eyes on the rear ones but eyes on the front.. The important components, apart from the lug set, that they all have in common are the style of top-eye...and the the scallop ed fork blade and stay treatment.
These frames and the one offered to the list were all made by the same jobb ing builder..Bernard Carre. I am currently trying to do some research about Carre, and hope to meet up with one of the Lejeune brothers in a mon th or so to find out more about this prolific yet reclusive figure.
I have a number of other Carre frames including three possibly four that Ca rre built specifically "sur commande" et "sur mesures" for indi vidual private clients. However two of the frames have something else in co mmon with the CR list one, in that they have that odd fork crown, that appe ars to be an old stock Nervex Pro with the two little points filed off. It may have been a stock item from Nervex but it isn't one that I have found i n that company's catalogue.
Carre's frames are not in any way sophisticated, and their build quality, p articularly the scalloped out fork and stay ends does make one raise ones e yebrows a little. They are as Fred put it, "tools" for racing cyclists, and it is evident that his designs, angles and the quality of "rendement" were just what the Pro riders wantd and trusted. The "private" Carre frames tha t I have do show a greater degree of attention to detail, but the more I se e of his frames, the more I am becoming convinced that he was at least a "t wo-a-day-man"..and I don't mean cigarettes.
However..if the frames were good enough for the likes of Anglade and Anquet il to seek out their builder, who are we poor mortals to pick spots of the quality of the back-filling of those scalloped ends?
A thought has just occurred to me. I wonder if the frames are "Carre" by na me and "carre" by nature? The French word "carre" means, "square" so I wond er if Bernard simply built his frames on that principle..with the top tube being just the same length as the seat-tube - with parallel angles - the ty pe of design that over here in the UK is often called "building them square ". Maybe that is the simple secret of the frames' excellent handling...but I somehow doubt it's that simple.
Norris Lockley...Settle..UK
Norris Lockley
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