Track Cycling - LS Shot O' the Week, Part 1

Hi, all.

Top-quality lugs and other framebuilding components are produced all over the globe. But some of the best come from the good folks at Long Shen in Taichia in the Taichung (http://taiwan.wcn.com.tw/en/taichung/) hsien of Taiwan.

The large producers of lugged frames (Rivendell, Ritchey, Kogswell) all get their lugs from Long Shen or LS as it's known in the business.

We buy a lot of Long Shen parts and they were nice enough to share their catalog with us.

I'm gonna reformat and present it here, a page at a time, if anyone is interested.

Here's this week's page of fork crowns, the so called LC models.

As always, komments are enkouraged.



And here's a legend to explain the dimensions.

Lc 15, Lc19 and LC21....

21 is pretty sick looking.

Their kurves are kreative.

19

15 is sweet, and the brake hole will get you to the track in one piece. Steep hills of GA are no joke, they didn't write that song for nothing.

15 is sweet, and the brake hole will get you to the track in one piece. Steep hills of GA are no joke, they didn't write that song for nothing.

The 15 and 19 are nice.

We like the one we've been using for a couple of years:

Shame on you, Matt. Now that I've seen her ankles....
Will be speaking with you in the new year about tasty bits for the old steel Raleigh.
I'll be putting Campologno dropouts in the rear, so I'l need something tasty up front to balance her out.
Shame on you, showing me those lugs!

18!
i'm a sucker for straight blades.

goit any pictures of a fork made with 21?

What kind of tubes are the Model G built with?

16,17,23, and 19, and 15 (i think)

got any pictures of a fork made with 21?

Nope. But here's a closeup.

Now that I've looked at it, I think I'll make one just for fun.

I wonder what the 'Drop' means?

What kind of tubes are the Model G built with?

Kogswell frames are built using tubes from ECO.



We thought about using 'name brand' tubes like Reynolds. Then we started talking to ECO. And what we found blew us away.

ECO makes more bicycle frame tubes than anyone else in the world.

Metallurgically, the stuff isn't interesting. It's the same old 4130 krap that's been used in high performance aircraft and autos for years.

What is interesting is how the tubes are made.

See the guy in the yellow hat in this photo:



He runs the mandrel (http://www.steeltubeinstitute.org/process/Dom_Process.html) at ECO. That's the machine that butts the tubes.

He draws tubes to your spec. So if you want a 540mm top tube with a 35-45-370-45-45 'butt profile' he draws it that way. So that tube will have 0.9mm butted sections that are 35mm at one end and 45mm at the other, 45mm tapered sections at both ends, and a 370x0.6mm section in the middle.

Butting isn't special. And controlling it isn't special. What is special is that he will make you twelve of them if that's all you want.

When I figured this out, I was stunned. You can spec the butt profile for each and every tube.

Who else has that?

No one.

The really interesting part is that they can do it for fork blades too.

We had them draw five pairs of blades w/ five different profiles and we tested them and found a butt profile that's perfect for the material. Think about that for a moment. You can tweak the profile to match the material's properties.

They smile when they see the look on your face. It's that 'gotcha' smile.

so the ECO tubing is seamed?

15,17,19 and 21.

S/F,
CeyA!

so the ECO tubing is seamed?

Of course.

Modern steel bicycle tubing (ECO, True Temper and Ishiwata) is 'seamed'.

Sheet metal is rolled and welded into a seamed tube and then cold drawn to smooth out the seam. The cold working modifies the tube's internal structure (grain) so that it's indistinguishable from 'seamless' tubing.

The machines needed to produce seamless tubing and the process itself are both horribly expensive. So when new tube manufacturing is set up, as was the case with ECO in the '80s, rolled sheet technology is used. The aerospace industry (where the sheet machines come from) has seen huge advances in process control since the '60s and now rolled sheet accounts for 99 percent of tubing production.

The big names in bicycle tubing would like you to think that exotic alloys and archane methods make better tubes. But the quality of the tubes made from rolled sheet is 98 percent as good as seamless for 7 percent of the cost. And the big names are quietly moving new production there: Reynolds, the last of the seamless steel holdouts willl produce its new 953 set from sheet.

Yep, seamed. And really, really nice.

The Steel Tube Institutes web site has a very nice section on how D.O.M. tubing is made. Everyone who's interested in tubes should go there and study the modern practice. It's very interesting:

http://www.steeltubeinstitute.org/dom.htm

Whoa. Good grab, baxtefer!

I went to that site and found these:



Interesting, the blades look normal. And that crown is assymetric.

21 is so hot.

LC 21 is for 24mm teardrop shaped (aero) blades, such as Kaisei. Bold. 3Rensho had a similar investment cast crown with a different window/cutout placement.

Welcome Rodador!

S/F,
CEYA!

Thanks, Ceya. I've been lurking for a while on the Singlespeed forum. I admire your "stable" greatly.

Thanks, Ceya. I've been lurking for a while on the Singlespeed forum. I admire your "stable" greatly.

Thanks and it going to get real small soon. Dumped 3 of them with awaiting a fourth soon.

S/F<
CEYA!