# Belgian Montgomery Ward Elite (early '70s maybe)- Anybody Know Belgian Bikes?



## blitherbike (Sep 20, 2013)

I picked this up at an estate sale. No decals or stickers except "ELITE" on the down tube. After searching forever, I finally found a couple images online. It's a Mongomery Ward bike built in Belgium! But I have no idea who built it. Someone suggested Flandria, so I emailed them and they replied back that if it was built in Belgium, it wasn't a Flandria. Apparently all the Flandrias they exported  to the U.S. in the '70s bike-boom days were built in Portugal. They never exported any higher end bikes here then because they didn't think there was the demand for them, but some small, independent bike shops did import some race replicas in small numbers.

So now I'm thinking it's a Libertas, but I'm definitely not sure. The head-tube lugs are very similar, if not identical, to some I've seen in pictures of Libertas. But I can't seem to find out much about them. This has been monopolizing my brain for the last few weeks, so if anyone can help me at all, I would greatly appreciate it!


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