Integral Shank Tube Mitre Cutters available now.

Posted: May 11, 2014 | Author: ninelittletubes | Filed under: Uncategorized | Leave a comment

As some of you will have seen at Bespoked Andy Newlands‘ LAN71 tube mitre cutters have evolved and are now made with an integral turned shank for ultimate concentricity. These cutters are made from PM-M4 particle metal which is even tougher than the PM T-15 material that Andy has used until recently.

I continue to distribute the LAN71 mitre cutters, and would be pleased to hear from you with your cutter requirements.

A Visit to Reynolds Technology.

Posted: May 4, 2014 | Author: ninelittletubes | Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: butted tubing, frame building, reynolds technology, reynolds tubing, swaging | 1 Comment

Andy Newlands and I went to visit the Reynolds factory in Birmingham. Andy will be distributing their tubing in the US.

Here are some (not great) pictures that I took with my phone. My favourite machine was the reeler. It plasticly deforms the tube between two offset metal reels so that the internal butting mandrel can be pulled out.

The weirdest thing was, the whole factory smelled like Reynolds tubing!

Reeling Machine

Drawing tubes

Fork blade benders

Keith Noronha shows us some tapered tubes.

Swaging machine.

Racks of assorted swaging mandrels.

Feeding the machine..

Lots of tubing dies. Tubes are drawn through these to set the outside diameter. They have to be routinely checked and replaced if worn.

Always good to see a fly press.

A stack of tube mandrels.

Joe’s frame comes in for a repair

Posted: May 4, 2014 | Author: ninelittletubes | Filed under: Uncategorized | 1 Comment

My friend Joe called me to tell me that the messenger frame I made for him a few years ago had been vandalised. He had locked the bike to a lamp post in London’s trendy Shoreditch, and someone had smashed the top tube against the post putting a massive dent in it. I ordered a new top tube from Reynolds and cut through the old tube so that I could pull it out of the frame. Sorry for the smartphone photography!