>No connection to seller, etc. Item no. 230577355889
>
>I've been watching this for almost a week and
>noticed it does not turn up on a normal eBay
>search. Currently has a single bid of ยค2200,
>only 19 hours to go, and listing says free
>international shipping.
>
>700c. 53cm by 54cm. No Singer stem but most of
>the other bells and whistles like racks,
>diamond fender reinforcements, and lights with
>internal wiring. Also desirable components like
>Super Champion rims, Maxi-Car hubs, TA
>triple-crankset, and Mafac brakes. Photos on
>eBay are small and fairly useless for judging
>condition but seller sent me 16 very good high
>res scans.
As you say, it's an honest high-end Singer, typical of the bikes that Ernest Csuka loved and built best. The bike also has the neat Singer bottom bracket with the pressed-in cartridge bearings and the skinny Reynolds fork blades that add so much comfort. Singer stems were not common by the 1970s, as they cost a lot and didn't add much performance. You could have a stem made at the Singer shop, but the cost is high...
That bike looks nice, and most of those parts go on forever. The bike I ride almost daily is a similar machine from the same era. It's got at least 120,000 miles on it, and still going strong. (We had to replace a dropout that broke a few years ago...)
Make sure the seller is willing to ship world-wide and knows how to do it... because extricating a bike from central France could be quite a job.
Jan Heine Editor Bicycle Quarterly 2116 Western Ave. Seattle WA 98121 http://www.bikequarterly.com
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