Re: [CR]Re: Hand made?

(Example: Component Manufacturers:Ideale)

Date: Mon, 10 Mar 2003 14:35:26 -0800
From: "Brandon Ives" <monkeylad@mac.com>
To: Grant McLean <Grant.McLean@SportingLife.ca>
Subject: Re: [CR]Re: Hand made?
cc: "Classic Rendezvous Mail List \(E-mail\)" <classicrendezvous@bikelist.org>

On Monday, March 10, 2003, at 01:57PM, Grant McLean <Grant.McLean@SportingLife.ca> wrote:
>I think the difficulty with this whole idea is that there is some derision towards cast lugs because they are somehow inferior to pressed steel >ones because they are "trying to be something they are not"

I think you're right Grant and it's something I just don't understand at all. ALL LUGS are formed before they get to the builder. You can carve up a cast lug just as much as a stamped lug and many folks do. Lugs hand-cut from tubes or sheet are another thing entirely and NO ONE does this for production. Were talking about production bikes not one-off samples, prototypes, or customs. Also 90% of cast lugs do have some hand work done to them before being used in a frame. Many are given a sharper edge or smoothed out, a point is rounded and another one is sharpened. Another thing to think about is that cast lugs are designed from a 3-D mold carved in wax. Stamped lugs are drawn in 2-D, stamped and formed by machine. So to me I think cast lugs are more "hand-formed" than stamped.

The next point I'd like to add is cast lugs are superior to formed lugs from a mechanical standpoint. Cast lugs are more uniformly round like the tube and don't vary in I.D. as much as stamped. Also if you measure the contact surface area between tube and lug the cast lugs generally have more area which means a better joint. Cast lugs also seem to have better and more predicable heat transfer than stamped. Formed lugs have two real advantages over cast beyond being much cheaper. Those are they seem easier to carve and are easier to bend to new angles. I'd say anybody who really cares about the differences get some lugs and start to study them. Never in the last 20 years have I seen the mass availability of lugs to the public so wide open. You can call Ceeway, Hank or Monica at Henry James, ETC. . .check out http://www.angelfire.com/ma4/racine/framebuilding.html I'm sure you could just ask the list and be buried with inexpensive lug offers. We've all learned how to look at lugs brazed and covered in paint, but until you've spent many hours holding bare lugs in your hand studying them you don't know lugs yet.
enjoy,
Brandon"monkeyman"Ives
SB, CA