There was another company in the '80s that actually indented the side of the tube where it went into and would be hidden by the lug and placed a pellet of brass there that would flow around the tube when heated later. I think this might have been Trek, when they went with their own cast lugs? Peugeot used rings of brass placed inside the ends of the tubes for their lugless bikes of the early '80s. That entire lugless frame series had a lot more to do with cutting manufacturing costs than producing a quality frame. They rode like wet noodles and bent into many interesting shapes under American riders.
Steve Barner, Bolton, Vermont
> Date: Sun, 1 Feb 2004 01:10:37 -0000
> From: "Norris Lockley" <Norris.Lockley@btopenworld.com>
> To: <classicrendezvous@bikelist.org>
> Subject: [CR]..was Phillips True Temper..NOW Flying the Flag for Raleigh
--SNIP
> Stephen Banner's reminiscences about working on these frames in the =
> bikeshop reminded me of a packet of "bronze slugs" that I have somewhere =
> in the workshop. These were given to me during a visit to Carlton's =
> workshops at Worksop, after the TI takeover. The sslugs are quite large =
> chunks of brazing material guillotined off the end of a bar. These were =
> put inside the frame tubes as near the lug-to-tubes joints as possible, =
> and after ensuring that there was enough flux to go round, the frames =
> were furnace-brazed in batches. I think Raleigh also experimented also =
> with "induction brazing(?) Given an even temperature at all the joints =
> the slugs would melt and flow through the joints from the inside to the =
> outside. Sometimes. as we know the brazing material didn't quite make =
> it!
--SNIP---
>
> Noris Lockley