Midlife":14rk1va5 said:Hi Simon
Thanks for taking the time to reply, much appreciated. Sounds more complicated than what I remember the rep saying at the time.
I had a vision of a "normal" framebuilding set-up (like we had at Cliff Pratt's in the basement) but with an Argon gas cylinder sort of "blowing" the inert gas at the weld whilst it was being formed........
When I bought my modern Basso last year I looked at titanium frames by the likes of Van Nicholas but nothing as complicated was mentioned. I guess joining titanium tubes has changed over the years. The only one I fancied was the Enigma Esprit as it looked like a real bike and not some sloping top tube compact
http://www.enigmabikes.com/bike/bike-enigma-esprit.html
Just out of curiosity, were you employed by Speedwell?
Cheers
Shaun
PS thanks for not locking the thread John.
I can only assume that the modern methods of making bike frames out of titanium have changed since Speedwell were manufacturing them. I do know that a certain very well known Japanese component manufacturer came to Speedwell and bought 10 frames, in the 70's... no doubt an attempt to try and unlock the then quite unique technology for the cycle industry. They did not figure it out! My father a former director of Speedwell was responsible for the devlopment and marketing of the frame, and its sucess in the 1973 TdF with the Bic Team and Luis Ocana. The link below will take you to a site in which you can see the bike in use on the Tour, badged as a Titanium Speedwell Frame.
http://www.cyclinghalloffame.com/riders ... ider_id=71
