gitaneusa.com :: View topic

lofter

here chas, a number tabbed bike for ya:
http://cgi.ebay.com/Gitane-french-team-RMO-Mavic-Campagnolo-shamal-vintage_W0QQitemZ230593032525QQcategoryZ115203QQcmdZViewItemQQ_trksidZp5197.m7QQ_trkparmsZalgo%3DLVI%26itu%3DUCI%26otn%3D5%26po%3DLVI%26ps%3D63%26clkid%3D7487465596746895404

scozim

Sweeeeet! That looks fast. Wonder how comfortable it is? Love the black and yellow on the Turbo saddle

Gtane

Lovely machine. The Mavic groupset (looks like the SSC) is very hard to come by. Pity about the mismatched brake calipers but one SSC version is at least there.

Tim

Peter S. Horn

Yes, this would be the RMO team bike. I believe that there also was a steel road (Columbus Genius) and a TVT carbone road model as well.

The U.S. situation by this time (1992-94) was such that although (on the road side) Columbus EL, SLX and Cromor framesets only were advertised, I was told (verbally) that a Columbus Genius and "carbon" (manufacturer not specified, but I believe to be TVT) would be added. I am reasonably sure that the latter two would have been, essentially, RMO Team framesets! It would have been up to the purchasers to equip these velos as the team replicas (Mavic Pro, Campagnolo, etc.) or otherwise.
Peter H.
Sacramento

Peter S. Horn

In retrospect, I thought that it would be a good idea to reference material on the Gitane R.M.O. bikes and the (perhaps) related U.S. Genius and T.V.T. carbone road framesets. Now that I recall, most of the steel R.M.O. team bikes that I remember seeing were the T.T. bikes as above. Most of the pictures of the road bikes, that I recall, were the T.V.T. carbone. I did remember noting a steel road example (Columbus Genius?) on our gitaneusa site.

Velonews references for 1992, re the R.M.O. bikes indicate carbon and chromemoly frames (Paris-Roubaix) and carbon frames only (Tour De France). There were no descriptions for the U.S. Columbus Genius or carbon framesets for 1992/3-1995, so we do not know if they were painted, etc. (no R.M.O. team logos, of course) as R.M.O. replicas. As a correction, I should state that the 1991 U.S. Columbus E.L. bike was labled as the Replica 11 in "Team Colors" (complete bike at $2,210.00 with Campag. C Record). My guess is that that was as close to an R.M.O. team replica as one was likely to get. As for the others, the scheme would not have mattered to me; they were still facsimiles. Similarly, we did not get the near exact replica of the 1990 Histor-Sigma Team Replica (See the 1990 French Catalogue). However, we did get a Columbus SLX frameset in 1991. A variance was the color scheme: Black/Blue. Nevertheless, a knowledgeable Gitane enthusiast might well have set up such a "Histor-Sigma facsimile" with a Sachs-Huret groupset, etc!
Peter H.
Sacramento