The best empirical evolutionary tracks are provided by open cluster HR diagrams. The scarcity of giants in young clusters implies that diagrams of clusters having similar ages and metallicities have to be summed. Using UBV data, Mermilliod (1981a) has divided the nearby open clusters into 14 age groups, and has described the properties of the composite diagrams MV/(B-V) and Mbol/log T. Several features complicate the structure of composite HRD, namely the presence of double stars which often mimic extended blue loops and the contamination by non-member stars difficult to identify as such in distant clusters. In order to refine the red giant observed evolutionary properties, cluster giants have been remeasured in the Geneva photometry and with the spectrovelocimeter CORAVEL.