The Vintagent
| The irrepressible Bryan Bossier with his Peugeot 515. Note the chrome tank emblem – a Deco version of the Peugeot ‘lion’ logo in profile |
Magnat-Debon emerged with an ultra-light racer in 1906, on which their #1 racing rider, Jules Escoffier, had success at Mt Ventoux and other important events. In 1911, Escoffier insisted M-D needed a more powerful v-twin, which they refused, so he stole Joseph Magnat’s niece along the chassis design of the Magnat-Debon, creating the ‘Mandoline’ OHV V-twin; the new Koehler-Escoffier became a French racing legend. In 1927, Raymond Guiguet designed a completely new engine for KE, with a shaft-and-bevel OHC similar to the Velocette KSS of 1925. The ‘500 GP’ had a crankcase flat ready for drilling to create a new OHC V-twin; the resultant 1927 Koehler-Escoffier ‘Quatre Tubes’ (four exhausts) is surely one of the most charismatic motorcycles of all time, although little known outside Europe, one of very few overhead-camshaft V-Twins produced before 1930. Alas only 7 were built, and while all survive, their owners are understandably covetous, and they never come up for sale.
