Ebike price crash

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PH
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Re: Ebike price crash

Post by PH »

jo' bo wrote: 15 May 2021, 12:55pm But go on tell me what exactly is optimum about optima
And if it's so good what exactly happened to it?
Not a lot happened to it, small changes and a change in numbers to reflect it, the only real change is that Raleigh stopped making those sorts of bikes. It was pretty basic Cro-mo probably exactly the same as Reynolds 501, just badged exclusively for Raleigh. As an ATB tube set it was a little thicker walled than 531, seamed and butted*. There's tubing in the current Reynolds range that you wouldn't be able to tell the difference from, though the alloy might have changed to aid welding.

*Not sure it was always butted, mine were.
markjohnobrien
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Joined: 4 Oct 2007, 8:15pm

Re: Ebike price crash

Post by markjohnobrien »

It was butted but it was designed to be tig welded and only for Raleigh:

https://www.retrobike.co.uk/threads/ral ... tb.421755/

The difference with mine though is that it wasn’t made by any bit of Raleigh but by the superb frame building skills of the SBDU builders who had been absorbed into Raleigh Special Products - it was part of their custom build range.
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Raleigh Randonneur 708 (Magura hydraulic brakes); Blue Raleigh Randonneur 708 dynamo; Pearson Compass 631 tourer; Dawes One Down 631 dynamo winter bike;Raleigh Travelogue 708 tourer dynamo; Kona Sutra; Trek 920 disc Sram Force.
jo' bo
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Re: Ebike price crash

Post by jo' bo »

markjohnobrien wrote: 15 May 2021, 2:03pm It was butted but it was designed to be tig welded and only for Raleigh:

https://www.retrobike.co.uk/threads/ral ... tb.421755/

The difference with mine though is that it wasn’t made by any bit of Raleigh but by the superb frame building skills of the SBDU builders who had been absorbed into Raleigh Special Products - it was part of their custom build range.
I've fell for this hand built by British craftsmen line before, only to realise belatedly that the highly skill british craftsmen were turning out a vastly inferior product to japanese robots.

That's what sent triumph meridian to the scrap heap of history, its seem Raleigh special products followed them , for very much the same reason that they ran out of gullible people

In what way is the frame better than say the 2010 Carrera vengeance frame I'm looking at now, it's the bases of my current " special product " build and its rather good and hand built by Taiwanese robots, with out a hang over
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531colin
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Location: North Yorkshire

Re: Ebike price crash

Post by 531colin »

jo' bo wrote: 15 May 2021, 10:55am I have three completly different type specific bikes, as they do what they were designed to very efficiently,..........
I work in exactly the same way. For example, this morning was fine, with rain forecast later, and I was setting out on a mixed ride including minor roads, a bit of main road, and a few tracks.
So I just rode all 3 bikes! :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
jo' bo
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Joined: 8 May 2021, 8:21pm

Re: Ebike price crash

Post by jo' bo »

531colin wrote: 15 May 2021, 6:38pm
jo' bo wrote: 15 May 2021, 10:55am I have three completly different type specific bikes, as they do what they were designed to very efficiently,..........
I work in exactly the same way. For example, this morning was fine, with rain forecast later, and I was setting out on a mixed ride including minor roads, a bit of main road, and a few tracks.
So I just rode all 3 bikes! :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
I'd had just taken the xc machine for that, you may want to select better
markjohnobrien
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Joined: 4 Oct 2007, 8:15pm

Re: Ebike price crash

Post by markjohnobrien »

jo' bo wrote: 15 May 2021, 6:14pm
markjohnobrien wrote: 15 May 2021, 2:03pm It was butted but it was designed to be tig welded and only for Raleigh:

https://www.retrobike.co.uk/threads/ral ... tb.421755/

The difference with mine though is that it wasn’t made by any bit of Raleigh but by the superb frame building skills of the SBDU builders who had been absorbed into Raleigh Special Products - it was part of their custom build range.
I've fell for this hand built by British craftsmen line before, only to realise belatedly that the highly skill british craftsmen were turning out a vastly inferior product to japanese robots.

That's what sent triumph meridian to the scrap heap of history, its seem Raleigh special products followed them , for very much the same reason that they ran out of gullible people

In what way is the frame better than say the 2010 Carrera vengeance frame I'm looking at now, it's the bases of my current " special product " build and its rather good and hand built by Taiwanese robots, with out a hang over
You are clearly a wind up merchant, as another poster has stated, if you don’t understand the difference between a cheap and nasty Carrera Vengeance alu frame (which you have already called “junk) and a custom frame built by one of the top teams of framebuilders (at the time) in the country:

- Builders to pro teams, Tour de France winning teams, British and World MTB champions, and one of the frame builders made frames for Bernard Hainault for his tour victories.

- One of the best paint shops in Britain with ahead of the time rustproofing and excellent and hard wearing paint finish.

-Top consistency in build quality and much superior to Dawes (you are comparing crap British car companies to a profitable and innovative range of products from a cycle company).

Still, I can’t be bothered debating with a wind up merchant with nugatory knowledge of the subject.
Raleigh Randonneur 708 (Magura hydraulic brakes); Blue Raleigh Randonneur 708 dynamo; Pearson Compass 631 tourer; Dawes One Down 631 dynamo winter bike;Raleigh Travelogue 708 tourer dynamo; Kona Sutra; Trek 920 disc Sram Force.
jo' bo
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Re: Ebike price crash

Post by jo' bo »

markjohnobrien wrote: 15 May 2021, 7:07pm
jo' bo wrote: 15 May 2021, 6:14pm
markjohnobrien wrote: 15 May 2021, 2:03pm It was butted but it was designed to be tig welded and only for Raleigh:

https://www.retrobike.co.uk/threads/ral ... tb.421755/

The difference with mine though is that it wasn’t made by any bit of Raleigh but by the superb frame building skills of the SBDU builders who had been absorbed into Raleigh Special Products - it was part of their custom build range.
I've fell for this hand built by British craftsmen line before, only to realise belatedly that the highly skill british craftsmen were turning out a vastly inferior product to japanese robots.

That's what sent triumph meridian to the scrap heap of history, its seem Raleigh special products followed them , for very much the same reason that they ran out of gullible people

In what way is the frame better than say the 2010 Carrera vengeance frame I'm looking at now, it's the bases of my current " special product " build and its rather good and hand built by Taiwanese robots, with out a hang over
You are clearly a wind up merchant, as another poster has stated, if you don’t understand the difference between a cheap and nasty Carrera Vengeance alu frame (which you have already called “junk) and a custom frame built by one of the top teams of framebuilders (at the time) in the country:

- Builders to pro teams, Tour de France winning teams, British and World MTB champions, and one of the frame builders made frames for Bernard Hainault for his tour victories.

- One of the best paint shops in Britain with ahead of the time rustproofing and excellent and hard wearing paint finish.

-Top consistency in build quality and much superior to Dawes (you are comparing crap British car companies to a profitable and innovative range of products from a cycle company).

Still, I can’t be bothered debating with a wind up merchant with nugatory knowledge of the subject.
Non of that in anyway answered the question of inwhat way does this perceived quality manifest its self ?

I cant find anything wrong with either the build quality or the paint on the carrara, which is unfortunate as I've decided to remove it which will be quite,a job such good quality is it, but it's not landrover green so it has to go, the post 2010 carrara frame isnt aparently as good, no idea why, bit heavier and worse paint and not as good ali,something like that,

Apart from not breaking in two and going in more or less the direction I point it, I'm strugling to see what magic ingredient is instilled by these craftsmen that cant be replicated by a robotics
.nb triumph meridian, was a motorcycle company that made bike frames from renolds tube, before the crafty Japanese change to ali, so a reasonable comparison I thought
Bonzo Banana
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Joined: 5 Feb 2017, 11:58am

Re: Ebike price crash

Post by Bonzo Banana »

jo' bo wrote: 15 May 2021, 6:14pm
markjohnobrien wrote: 15 May 2021, 2:03pm It was butted but it was designed to be tig welded and only for Raleigh:

https://www.retrobike.co.uk/threads/ral ... tb.421755/

The difference with mine though is that it wasn’t made by any bit of Raleigh but by the superb frame building skills of the SBDU builders who had been absorbed into Raleigh Special Products - it was part of their custom build range.
I've fell for this hand built by British craftsmen line before, only to realise belatedly that the highly skill british craftsmen were turning out a vastly inferior product to japanese robots.

That's what sent triumph meridian to the scrap heap of history, its seem Raleigh special products followed them , for very much the same reason that they ran out of gullible people

In what way is the frame better than say the 2010 Carrera vengeance frame I'm looking at now, it's the bases of my current " special product " build and its rather good and hand built by Taiwanese robots, with out a hang over
It's unlikely a Carrera frame is made by robots as I think that is aluminium and the robots you see in bicycle factories are normally used for steel frames. Most bicycle frames made in the world are still steel, i.e. sold in Asia, Africa, South America and entry level models elsewhere. Steel manufacturing has evolved to the point where steel frames can be quickly and safely made by robots but aluminium and carbon fibre are much more labour intensive with carbon fibre being very labour intensive. I saw somewhere that it takes 700x as long to make one carbon fibre frame compared to a one steel frame (robot). Hence why basic steel frames can be as low as $5 from a Chinese factory, aluminium about $20 but carbon fibre about $80 factory door price. Those prices are about 3 to 4 years old when I looked into prices at the factories.

I personally think there were fantastic frame builders in the UK who did incredible work with steel, they evolved their skills over time but sadly the UK became too expensive to manufacture in. I remember the Nissan factory in Sunderland being rated as one of the most efficient in the world. There is no reason to think that people in the UK can't make incredible quality products. It's really down to industries evolving over time but of course those industries are mostly gone now. Taiwan has lost a lot of its skill base as many factories have moved to mainland China, Cambodia or Vietnam. The world always wants cheaper products. Those people developing great skills in Cambodia could be out of a job in 10 years when the factory moves to somewhere cheaper.
jo' bo
Posts: 121
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Re: Ebike price crash

Post by jo' bo »

Bonzo Banana wrote: 16 May 2021, 12:57pm
jo' bo wrote: 15 May 2021, 6:14pm
markjohnobrien wrote: 15 May 2021, 2:03pm It was butted but it was designed to be tig welded and only for Raleigh:

https://www.retrobike.co.uk/threads/ral ... tb.421755/

The difference with mine though is that it wasn’t made by any bit of Raleigh but by the superb frame building skills of the SBDU builders who had been absorbed into Raleigh Special Products - it was part of their custom build range.
I've work3d

I've fell for this hand built by British craftsmen line before, only to realise belatedly that the highly skill british craftsmen were turning out a vastly inferior product to japanese robots.

That's what sent triumph meridian to the scrap heap of history, its seem Raleigh special products followed them , for very much the same reason that they ran out of gullible people

In what way is the frame better than say the 2010 Carrera vengeance frame I'm looking at now, it's the bases of my current " special product " build and its rather good and hand built by Taiwanese robots, with out a hang over
It's unlikely a Carrera frame is made by robots as I think that is aluminium and the robots you see in bicycle factories are normally used for steel frames. Most bicycle frames made in the world are still steel, i.e. sold in Asia, Africa, South America and entry level models elsewhere. Steel manufacturing has evolved to the point where steel frames can be quickly and safely made by robots but aluminium and carbon fibre are much more labour intensive with carbon fibre being very labour intensive. I saw somewhere that it takes 700x as long to make one carbon fibre frame compared to a one steel frame (robot). Hence why basic steel frames can be as low as $5 from a Chinese factory, aluminium about $20 but carbon fibre about $80 factory door price. Those prices are about 3 to 4 years old when I looked into prices at the factories.

I personally think there were fantastic frame builders in the UK who did incredible work with steel, they evolved their skills over time but sadly the UK became too expensive to manufacture in. I remember the Nissan factory in Sunderland being rated as one of the most efficient in the world. There is no reason to think that people in the UK can't make incredible quality products. It's really down to industries evolving over time but of course those industries are mostly gone now. Taiwan has lost a lot of its skill base as many factories have moved to mainland China, Cambodia or Vietnam. The world always wants cheaper products. Those people developing great skills in Cambodia could be out of a job in 10 years when the factory moves to somewhere cheaper.
I've worked at the Nissan factory in Sunderland, and its notable for its robots , so yes a quality british product made by japanese robots

Just about all the cycle metal frames from main manufactures and all made in the same mechanised factory and most of these ate aluminium coz one irs better and two is the most cost effective tO use robots on so cheap

I've no idea what back street cycles makers in India use, but almost definetly not hydro formed ali

Carbon is indeed some what more labour intensive, so more exspensive, well apart from all the cheap carbon coming out of the same factories as the exspensive carbon, I'm not yet convinced its actually the future of cycling, rather than a race specific component, I suspect its largely irelivant to most cyclists apart from bragging rights

I'm not sure where your plunging into the discusion.

My point is that mass produced ali in mechanised factories is an exceptionally good material for cycles frames, the build quality on even budget bikes is exceptional

I belive its better than hand built steel, it's certainly no worse on any objective measure .

Subjective however is a different matter and people can do what they want as long as they dont tell me I'm wrong based on their subjectivity
hoogerbooger
Posts: 673
Joined: 14 Jun 2009, 11:27am
Location: In Wales

Re: Ebike price crash

Post by hoogerbooger »

Some people eh ! 1990's was the Zenith of sensible and reliable bikes. Too much fad and silly gimmickry being produced now that'll end up in a skip pretty quick.

I'm off out now on a reliable 1989 bike. Toodle pip.
old fangled
jo' bo
Posts: 121
Joined: 8 May 2021, 8:21pm

Re: Ebike price crash

Post by jo' bo »

Bonzo Banana wrote: 16 May 2021, 12:57pm
jo' bo wrote: 15 May 2021, 6:14pm
markjohnobrien wrote: 15 May 2021, 2:03pm It was butted but it was designed to be tig welded and only for Raleigh:

https://www.retrobike.co.uk/threads/ral ... tb.421755/

The difference with mine though is that it wasn’t made by any bit of Raleigh but by the superb frame building skills of the SBDU builders who had been absorbed into Raleigh Special Products - it was part of their custom build range.
I've fell for this hand built by British craftsmen line before, only to realise belatedly that the highly skill british craftsmen were turning out a vastly inferior product to japanese robots.

That's what sent triumph meridian to the scrap heap of history, its seem Raleigh special products followed them , for very much the same reason that they ran out of gullible people

In what way is the frame better than say the 2010 Carrera vengeance frame I'm looking at now, it's the bases of my current " special product " build and its rather good and hand built by Taiwanese robots, with out a hang over
It's unlikely a Carrera frame is made by robots as I think that is aluminium and the robots you see in bicycle factories are normally used for steel frames. Most bicycle frames made in the world are still steel, i.e. sold in Asia, Africa, South America and entry level models elsewhere. Steel manufacturing has evolved to the point where steel frames can be quickly and safely made by robots but aluminium and carbon fibre are much more labour intensive with carbon fibre being very labour intensive. I saw somewhere that it takes 700x as long to make one carbon fibre frame compared to a one steel frame (robot). Hence why basic steel frames can be as low as $5 from a Chinese factory, aluminium about $20 but carbon fibre about $80 factory door price. Those prices are about 3 to 4 years old when I looked into prices at the factories.

I personally think there were fantastic frame builders in the UK who did incredible work with steel, they evolved their skills over time but sadly the UK became too expensive to manufacture in. I remember the Nissan factory in Sunderland being rated as one of the most efficient in the world. There is no reason to think that people in the UK can't make incredible quality products. It's really down to industries evolving over time but of course those industries are mostly gone now. Taiwan has lost a lot of its skill base as many factories have moved to mainland China, Cambodia or Vietnam. The world always wants cheaper products. Those people developing great skills in Cambodia could be out of a job in 10 years when the factory moves to somewhere cheaper.
I'd lived and worked through the decline of british manufacturing, and with out an doubt is was a failure to invest in mechanization that did for them, partly as the bosses were to tight to invest but mostly as the unions, fought any robots/ working efficiency measures

It was rather the fact they had five blokes with flat caps and a hammer doing the work of one bloke when the rest of the industrialised world just pressed a button

I went round a local museum, and they have a milling machine made in the 1920s, which was still in use at a local firm in the 1980s, the museum seems proud of that, I see it as the fall of british industry in a nut shell
Jdsk
Posts: 24637
Joined: 5 Mar 2019, 5:42pm

Re: Ebike price crash

Post by Jdsk »

Manufacturing in the UK is strong, employs lots of people, creates wealth which can be taxed, and generates exports.

But it is shaped very differently from how it was.

Jonathan
jo' bo
Posts: 121
Joined: 8 May 2021, 8:21pm

Re: Ebike price crash

Post by jo' bo »

Jdsk wrote: 16 May 2021, 2:01pm Manufacturing in the UK is strong, employs lots of people, creates wealth which can be taxed, and generates exports.

But it is shaped very differently from how it was.

Jonathan
Unfortunely not till we had lost most of our manufacturing base, there is still a strong to likely chance that the stuff is manufacture else where and,assembled here

There are houses built on areas round here that were factories into the 1990s

Trafford park once the largestest industrial park in europe is a ghost town,,
ClappedOut
Posts: 585
Joined: 30 May 2020, 12:43am

Re: Ebike price crash

Post by ClappedOut »

Veered off topic :D

Other than zinc carbon ever ready leaking in 1980's and Sinclair C5, where there any other "ebikes"?

When did petrol motor assistance get outlawed?
Jdsk
Posts: 24637
Joined: 5 Mar 2019, 5:42pm

Re: Ebike price crash

Post by Jdsk »

ClappedOut wrote: 16 May 2021, 3:54pmWhen did petrol motor assistance get outlawed?
In the UK? AIUI never. The category with the lowest permitted power and speed is the moped. But the requirement for pedals was removed in 1977.

https://www.gov.uk/ride-motorcycle-mope ... quirements\

Jonathan
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