Originally Posted by
Doug Fattic
I still have a bunch of 1" threaded steerers that came from Miele. They include several brands including several with internal ribbing. Columbus steerers are easy to identify because they are spiral. I haven't bothered to identify the Japanese ribbed steerers but my recollection (without going to check) is that there are 2 kinds. They are vertical instead of spiral. I also have some steerers without any reinforcing ribs. All of these steerers came from Miele. It appears to me that what brand of steerer they used was related to frame size...
Miele models were built with Columbus, Ishiwata and Tange tubesets. Columbus' butted and spline reinforced steering column employed five helical ridges. Ishiwata's version used five straight ridges, while Tange's version used six, helical ridges. All three, should have external logos, which the OP did not see. It could be a non-spline version or the logo impression could be faint or inadvertently missing. Of the three, a Columbus steerer tube is the most likely to suffer a quality lapse with the logo stamp. Regardless, if it splined, the number and style of the ridges, will identify the manufacturer.