Heat-treated or no, I think 753 and other thin-walled tubeset are just too thin. The simple fact may be that 531 or maybe 531SL along with Columbus SL represented the best compromise between lightness and durability. What we have seen since is tubes that are made too thin, then hardened in some way to try to compensate for being too thin in the first place. I'm not convinced that there has been any real metallurgical advance which has really allowed a lower weight than 531 or Columbus SL without some undesirable tradeoff. To the extent modern steel frames are significantly lighter, it is less because of technical advances than because the public is willing to accept them as a throway item like modern aluminum frames, to be used 2 or 3 seasons, then discarded. It's perhaps not surprising that a public which trades in automobiles every two or three years will no longer expect that a bicycle last a lifetime. As with many things, British audax bikes seem to represent a small island of sanity in this regard. I was recently reading an online ad for a British audax bike (Thorn perhaps) which stated that they used a Reynolds tubeset which, while a few ounces heavier than some other tubesets, would produce a frame that would last more than a few seasons. Such a statement seems rather bold today, as most marketers seem to believe that a weight-obsessed public doesn't give a damn about durability. With the proliferation of tubesets recently, I'm not even sure which ones have adopted the thin wall throwaway approach and which if any may have a wall thickness comparable to 531 or Columbus SL. Tubing and frame ads don't typically list wall thickness. Anyone know of a listing of wall thickness for most of the current tubesets?
Regards,
Jerry Moos
Richard M. Sachs wrote:
> On Tue, 17 Oct 2000 09:39:01 +0100 "Hilary Stone"
> <Hilary.Stone@Tesco.net> writes:
> >Tange offered a tubing with 0.4mm butted section the Prestige SL set
> >at
> >the end of the 1980s and early Reynolds 753 was also this thin.
> >Regards
> >Hilary Stone
>
> these tubes cited here were thin wall and re-composed.
> heat treated, higher strength...
> the record and even the kl sets were simply the same
> 'ol 4130 stuff that colombo used throughout the line.
> only in thinner wall thicknesses.
> e-RICHIE