Raoul said: Block chain is another story .
It is ancient , antique , and much more expensive .
Block chain was the original chain .
The rollers were developed later .
I don't think anyone has reproduced any block chain .
And if you have any block chain , save it for use on genuine 1890's safety bicycles . _________________________
That's not quite the right story. Roller chain is very old. An excerpt from the Renold website:
In 1873 at the age of 21Hans Renold, son of a burgher family in Aarau, Switzerland, came to England and found work in Manchester with a firm of machinery exporters. His independent and inventive spirit soon found expression in the purchase, in 1879, of a small textile-chain making business in Salford. In 1880 he invented bush roller chain ......and an industry is born Thus began the enterprise of which The Institution of Mechanical Engineers was to say in a memoir: "Few realise how extensive is the influence of Renold's inventiveness on both civil and industrial life throughout the world. Hans Renold's vision was not restricted to the prospects in UK industry. By 1915 he had already established selling arrangements in nine overseas countries. Sales subsidiaries were formed in Canada in 1920 and in the USA in 1921. These were followed by others aimed at developing the French, Belgian and Dutch markets and in 1928 a selling operation was set up in Germany. The first acquisition of a major competitor came in 1925, when Brampton Brothers Limited, with its French manufacturing subsidiary at Calais, was purchased and the operation merged with the manufacturing facility previously established in Coventry.
As to block chain, it was used by sprinters up into the 1960's, I think mostly for reasons of tradition. Regina, Renold, Brampton and Wipperman made fairly modern block chain.