Originally Posted by
chaadster
Your timetable is pretty out of whack.
I thought his TT was pretty spot on.
Originally Posted by
chaadster
Few, notably Vitus and Alan, made bonded/lugged road frames, and those were intro'd in the '70s, with virtually no one using that construction into the '90s.Klein's crazy alu dates from the '70s, though really didn't get big until around the time Cannondale launched their welded aluminum road frames in the early '80s.
The first Cannondale frame was 1983 but it was hand made, hand mitered , hand welded. I remember wanting an AL frame badly early 90's, and while I had heard of Vitus, and was told it was a boutique , hard to find, and very whippy/flimsy frame, I did not hear of Cannondale until later, maybe that was a local thing? At that time, 1992 I bought my first high-perf. AL road bike, Trek 1400 was internally lugged and Epoxy bonded and my understanding is it was the first truly
mass produced AL frame?
Originally Posted by
chaadster
Move into the '90s, and everybody was welding alu frames, from Trek to Colnago, Pinarello, Bianchi, and of course, Giant.
maybe mid 90's? That's when I remember seeing welded AL CAD's and Colnago's popping up. My frame already felt obsolete by then. It's an interesting topic as I started off my road biking days on AL so very nostalgic for me.
I think ARC welding bicycle frames at that time, mid/late 90's, made some huge strides as Reynolds started releasing tubing that would heat treat itself at the weld joint and become stronger instead of becoming brittle. That's when you saw the lugs and brazing rods really going away AFAI recall.