Subject: RE: [baidarka] Aluminum Joinery
From: Flemming Sorvin (fsorvin@victoria.tc.ca)
Date: Fri Sep 05 2003 - 13:15:21 EDT
I remember these, and of having a few friends who rode them. The ALAN
frames were problematic. They did have troubles with some tube separating
from their joints and they were considered "whippy", meaning that they
were flexible but they snapped back into place.
There was another manufacturer, Vitus (named after the Dane Vitus Bering
who named the straight as we know it. As another aside, two cannons from
his ship are located in a park in his home town of Horsens, Denmark), in France
that made a similar frame but with a better record. An aluminum Vitus was the
bike the Sean Kelly rode. They also made a carbon fibre frame along
similar lines that was very cool and expensive at the time.
I still see the occaisional Vitus being used, but no ALANs.
--On Fri, 5 Sep 2003, George Kuzmowycz wrote:
> On 4 Sep 2003 at 23:46, Pierce Nichols wrote: > > > At 07:16 AM 9/4/2003 -0700, Tony Reynolds wrote: > > >One technique that no one has mentioned, and one that I would imagine > > >would be just as strong as brazing would be to thread the two pieces > > >of tubing and thread them together with lock-tite. You'd have to buy > > > I think it's a way cool idea. However, I did a bit of > > research and > > I don't think it will work well with the thin wall tubes > > As a possibly interesting historical digression, in the late 1970's > an Italian company called ALAN (I believe it was all caps at that > time) was making aluminum bicycle frames, in which the tubes were > joined by a combination of threading and adhesive, with the tubes > threaded into "lugs". I don't know what the wall thicknesses were of > the tubing they used, but the frames were very light for the time. I > also don't know what adhesive they used, and am not sure that was > ever public knowledge. > > Since the tubing diameter was the same as what was being used by the > conventional steel frame manufacturers at that time, the ALAN frames > were generally considered to be too flexible for most riders (even > though Sean Kelly was an extremely successful pro racer on ALAN > frames). Within a few years Gary Klein had commercialized the > oversize-tubed TIG-welded-and-heat-treated aluminum frame and the > ALAN design passed from the scene. Current aluminum bicycle frame > tubes have wall thicknesses on the order of 1mm, although many are > "butted", meaning that they're thicker (internally) at the ends, > maybe as much as 1.4mm. > > -gk- > - > Baidarka Mailing List - All postings copyright the author and not to be > reproduced outside Baidarka or Baidarka archives without author's permission > Submissions: baidarka@paddlewise.net > Subscriptions: baidarka-request@paddlewise.net > Searchable archive: http://rtpnet.org/robroy/baidarka > - Baidarka Mailing List - All postings copyright the author and not to be reproduced outside Baidarka or Baidarka archives without author's permission Submissions: baidarka@paddlewise.net Subscriptions: baidarka-request@paddlewise.net Searchable archive: http://rtpnet.org/robroy/baidarka
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