1992 Didier Louis monocoque carbon frame mtb

[24pouces]

And now, the articles…
The US brand was Graphite Technology and named their bikes "bik". So, Mountain Bik and RacingBik

 

[novekili]

I Agree: Aegis!

 

[MuddyFrog]

Hi,

Thanks to 24 pouces, the scans of the reviews and the fact that we now know that the Racing Bik and the Mountain Bik were from Graphite Technology ( which is confirmed on the web site of Aegis ).

After researches on internet, below is what seems to be the story of what appears to be Aegis/Graphite Technology/Racing Bik_Mountain Bik/Didier Louis story ! I think we now can have some global view of the history of those bikes.

Here are the sources : the links go to the pages of those sites where I founded some informations.

Official site of Aegis ( online in spite of the fact the brand is now out of business )
bikeforums.net about Aegis and Trek
forums.roadbikereview.com Aegis out of business
Short bioraphy of Didier Louis on his official site, now in the racing horses business.
Patentbuddy.com
Bizapedia.com
Plainsite.org

Here are what seems to be the facts, with some remaining questions ( mainly about the french Didier Louis, from which Aegis doesn't say any word on their site... )

Aegis was ( went out of business in 2008 / 2009 ) an american factory of composite structures, established in Van Buren, state of Maine ( USA ). In 1973 they made tennis racquet for Rossignol brand.

They were contracted by Trek to produce carbon fiber tubing, for the carbon frame bicycle Trek 2500.

In search of more advanced technology, in 1986, Aegis, with the support of Trek, made the first all carbon monocoque frame. But thereafter the relationship with trek ended shortly.

Aegis patented a bladder-molding process to build carbon frames, and decided to produce their own carbon frame, not truly monocoque (onepiece ), but made of pieces fuzed togethers, this to guarantee precision alignement, sustainability, reliability of the frames.

Part of the members of the Aegis company, who wanted to build a full monocoque ( onepiece ) carbon frame went to west and established the Kestrel company.

To produce and commercialize those frames of their new technology ( fuzed carbon pieces ), Aegis founded Graphite Technologies ! And Graphite Technologies produced those frames for Basso, Peugeot, Iron Horse and Racing Bik !

In 1992, the french bicycles seller ( had a shop in Montreuil, near Paris, in France ) Didier Louis who was importer in France of the Racing Bik and the Mountain Bik bought Graphite Technologies. It seems he bought also the patents (?) look at (links at the beginning of that post ) Patentbuddy.com, Bizapedia.com, Plainsite.org, where Didier Louis Cycles usa inc appears as the patent owner in 1992. As he continued to sell them as Racing Bik and Mountain Bik one can think that those two brands were part of Graphite Technology ?

Shortly after, some 1 or 2 years after ( ? ), he sold Graphite Technology ? sold it back to Aegis ? sold back the patent ? I don't know, but what is sure is that Didier Louis abandoned the bicycle business and went to racing horses business ! End of Graphite Technology, Racing Bik and Mountain Bik ! But it seems that the frames were continued to be produced, at least for a while - by Aegis ? - because on internet I saw the frame of the Racing Bik with the Aegis logo.

In 1993 Aegis decided to introduce their own line of carbon bikes, with their own name.

In 2008 / 2009 Aegis went out of business.

I think what I wrote is ok ( don't hesitate to correct if not ) and find this history very interesting :mrgreen:

Regards

 

[cchris2lou]

here you go , a picture of mine and some history Mike found at the time .

mine is now just frame and forks .

viewtopic.php?f=12&t=3940&start=15