Kommisar89

Just curious about that. Most of the Reynolds 531 and Columbus frames in the 60's-70's period did not have braze-ons. I actually kinda like the look of all the clamp-on gear but I've always wondered why it done that way. Cheaper bikes with hi-ten steel frames usually did have at least some braze-ons so it would not seem that cost was the issue. I thought maybe they were concerned about the heat from brazing weakening the thin tubes but then there were many frames made from the same tubing in the late 70's - early 80's that did use braze-ons so that doesn't seem right. Was it just style perhaps?

T-Mar

I believe it was generally thought that the butted tubing was too thin and the reliability would suffer. Consequently, braze-ons were relegated to cheap frames with thick tubes and on higher end frames in areas with lots of material, like cable routings on bottom bracket shells. Around mid-1970s, shifter and bottle bosses start appearing on high end frames. Top tube brake cable tunnels started appearing later, probably because of the thinner, top tube. The front derailleur boss became common in the early 1980s and this is one case where failures are well documented and were responsible for the development of Columbus' SLX tubing. All the timeframes are approximate, based on general acceptance. I'm sure we could come up with lots of individual cases that date earlier.

carpediemracing 

Articles usually cited concern with heat as the reason for the lack of braze-ons. It might have been that the quality control was less stringent so a worker might cook a tube regularly. Even in the 90s we had frame failures around braze-ons.

cdr

Longfemur

Actually, most bikes at that time, including cheaper 10-speeds did not have braze-ons. Almost everything was clamped-on, including the downtube shifters, cable routing fitting, etc. The only common braze-ons were for fenders. Peugeots and a few other mass-market makes might have had pump braze-ons... it seemed to be a popular selling point. Even water bottle cages were clamped around the tubes. Contrary to the original post, it seemed to be the most expensive models that had braze-ons (but of course, real racing bike didn't have any since they weren't needed).

dbakl

I think it was also to allow more variety in components.

StephenH

I recently got a new Indian bike that was set up for rod brakes, which in turn is copied from old rod brake roadsters. I never realized it, but all that rod brake stuff just clamps on, and that was on bikes where an arc welder would have been perfectly fine to put all that stuff on. I would think it's largely a case of "we've always done it like this".

SoreFeet

It was a big conspiracy to keep the cable clamp market afloat.

Kommisar89

What kind of bikes are you refering to? I wasn't thinking of touring bikes. I don't usually even consider brands like Alex Singer and Rene Herse as those were pretty much out of reach for all but the most well heeled cyclists into serious touring. I'm thinking sport/touring and racing bikes in the $200 - $500 range in early 70's dollars. It was actually quite common for bikes in the under $200 catagory to have braze-ons for cable guides on the top tube, bottom bracket and chain stay and to have pump pegs. Peugeots and other French bikes typically had a right side shifter braze on as well. As you point out, water bottle cages and also shifters on most bikes were clamp on in that period regardless of price range.

repechage

while working at a bike shop in the mid 70's this discussion came up from time to time, the explainer was that Reynolds sent out an advisory after a well publicized failure in the TdF that braze-ons were a bad idea on the main tubes, acceptable on the chain stay due to the greater material thickness... Many early 70's and onwards top tier frames had braze on cable guides on the top of the BB shell.

The real reason? Fashion and costs I think, in the early 70's less braze ons saved time and it was hard to keep up with volume demands, there might be some truth to the failure advisory, but I have never referenced it in print directly.

I liked the down tube braze ons for the shifter bosses and water bottle cage, much easier to keep clean.

Road Fan

I had a 1968 entry level Falcon, with no braze-ons save fender eyes on the stay ends and fork ends. The higher-end bikes didn't have them, either. Same for all the Raleighs, Peugeots, Gitanes, Motobecanes, Dawes, Fiorellis, Merciers, and Atalas of those days (those were what I gawked at, built, or sold). the prices here ranged from $90 (UO-8 and Carlton Raleigh Grand Prix)to around $300 for full Campy. Can't say about the French constructeur machines.

The story I recall is that braze-on points can be places where the tubing is weakened due to overheating. I don't know why the problem was seemingly "solved" starting in the early '70s. It's not just the advent of SLX, because braze-ons appeared on Reynolds frames as well. It could have been use of lower-temperature silver to braze on the bits, rather than brass brazing rod.

thevenull

the reason seems to be the developement (or the cheaper avilability) of inerted-gas-brazing (don't know if that is the corrrect english term). If smaller parts are welded on, you got to heat a bigger area of the tube. If zou braze on conventional electric or autogen you might burn a thin tube.

Kommisar89

Maybe what I'm calling braze-ons is different from what others are - I'm not talking about the stuff found on touring bikes for all the racks and bags and such. I'm just refering to things like cables guides and pump pegs and such. I can't really comment on the 60's as I was too young then but all the early 70's bikes I was familiar with, which were all in the under $200 catagory back then, had braze-on cable guides on the top tube, bottom bracket, and chain stay and pump pegs. I would include among those Bottecchia, Peugeot, and Gitane that I actually owned. I have a UO-8 circa 1973-74 sitting in the garage right now and it has braze-ons for practically everything except a bottle cage. And check out this page on the Retro Raleigh site showing a 1968 and a 1970 Grand Prix: https://www.sheldonbrown.com/retroral...rand-prix.html Notice the brazed-on cable guides on the top tubes on both bikes. Or this page from the 1969 Peugeot catalog on the Retro Peugeot site: https://home.wanadoo.nl/peugeotshow/images/1969_7.jpg. Again, braze-on cable guides on the top tube and pump pegs as well.

T-Mar

A lot of people may not consisder them braze-ons, because they weren't as fancy as what eventually came on the higher-end models but the entry level, boom era models definitely had braze-ons. Usually they were cable stops for the brakes and derailleurs. They came on several brands as mentioned in the previous post.

The exent of these fittings was a cost and cosmetic consideration. For instance, you had to route the rear brake cable somehow, so was it cheaper to tack on two stops and use less housing or to manually apply three clips which looked nicer but may scratch the finish in the process? These operations were probably close enough in cost that we saw both styles on the entry level models.

Things like shifter bosses involved two brazing operations and then assembling the levers onto the fittings. This was defintely more expensive than bolting on clamp style shifters, so for this reason the entry level models didn't fit shift lever bosses.

A water bottle wasn't a necessity and therefore added bosses for one was an extra cost. Besides, the LBS had the largest profit margin on selling accessories. For this reason bottle bosses were rare on entry level. However, it would seem that the the same argument should be aplpicable for pump pegs, which were fairly common.

Picchio Special

Yet the early 70's is when the braze-ons start to creep in, beginning the shift from the no-braze-ons fashions of the 60's. You can document this informally by looking at pics of Eddy's (and other's) race bikes. But I do think the cost point is valid - labor time is money, and braze-ons take time. You can also make (and advertise) a lighter frame weight with fewer braze-ons, even though a lot of that weight is going to get clamped right back onto the frame. Once established for whatever reasons (i.e. less heat on the tubes) it easily becomes a self-perpetuating fashion - at least until some pros start using braze-on derailleur guides, which then set the new trend. Note that in post-war Britain, for example, braze-ons were common - pump pegs, cable guides, shifter bosses, lamp brackets, were common "touches." I think the "continental" style thet became more popular in the early 60's with the availability of Italian components (which themselves quickly became fashionable) was probably at least partly responsible for reversing that trend. You could almost always get braze-ons as custom options, even in the 60's, and they do appear on bikes, so I think fashion and cost are more likely responsible for their relative absence than the "bad for the tubes" line.

dbakl

I've always preferred the clamp on look, kinda like lots of rings on the hotshot guitarist's hands.