Sloping top tubes

[tintin40]

Trimble 1988

 

[GrahamJohnWallace]

FluffyChicken wrote:
The problem you are going to have is defining produced/production. One man making one bike is a production. Marin could be claiming mass production, but then you would need to define that. Cunningham, 'dale, Kona, Rocky would not be mass production with respect to the scale that Marin/Trek would churn things out.
(this is outside of defining 'MTB')

The Mountain Bike Hall of Fame website, states that the "First Production Mountain Bike Available-1978" had a sloping top tube.

1978 Lawwill Pro Cruiser.
One of the bikes that bridged the gap between BMX bikes and mountain bikes. The frame design was based on frame that Don Koski fabricated from electrical conduit and a Schwinn Varsity frame. Mert Lawwill had Terry Knight of Oakland build the frames. The bikes sold for about $500 new and were made from 1977 though 1980 (approximate run of 600 bikes).

http://www.completesite.com/mbhof/page.cfm?pageid=13

The earliest English (Rough-Stuff) sloping top tube bike that I know of, dates from about 1953. They were built to order, by Jack Taylor Cycles until the late 1970's

http://www.retrobike.co.uk/forum/viewto ... 40&start=0

 

[REKIBorter]

Parkpre started to use a sloping (dropped) top tube on all their mountain bikes from 1992.

 

[GrahamJohnWallace]

The early advocates of the sloping top-tube, as seen in the pages of Britains first mountain bike orientated magazine.

When the first mountain bike orientated magazine, Bicycle Action, appeared in June 1984, there was only one sloping top-tube mountain bike shown within its pages. That was Geoff Apps' weird and wonderful Cleland design. Cleland however only had a few few more months of trading before it ceased trading due to cashflow problems. They had effectively arrived at the 'mountain bike party' far too early and were forced to leave before even the Californian designed bikes became established. Variations of the sloping top-tube Cleland design continued to be made by English Cycles and Highpath Engineering but their marketing and promotion was not as high-profile as Cleland.

By mid 1985 the new English champions of the sloping top-tube was Overbury, first with their pioneer model and then their Wildcat . In fact Jeremy Torr of English Cycles accused Overburys of being influenced by the Cleland. Overbury's marketing was involved placing monthly adverts showing pictures of the Pioneer and Wildcat from early 1986. Readers could not help but notice the different shape of the Overbury frames compared to the hundreds of flat top-tube bikes shown.

In the Bicycle Action of July 1985 their appeared a picture of a new high-tech sloping top-tube bike. It had Muddy Fox logos because they had sponsored its entry into the Man v Horse v Bike race, but was in fact made in the US by Charlie Cunningham. Just like when in 1981, a Cleland was riden up Mount Snowdon by Nick Crane, the Cunningham recieved its own minor publicity coup when Jacquie Phelan rode it to victory.

Slowly within the pages of the magazine, sloping top-tubes were being seen more frequently. Eventualy they would become more fashionable and numerous than the Ritchey inspired, flat top-tube bikes.

 

[Dr S]

Isn't it funny how the big companies claim to have invented everything. Last week I read an old Fisher advert claiming Gary was the inventor of the mountain bike and the first to fit gears on one. I bet Russ Mahon and the Morrow/ Larkspur gang loved that. I also read the 25th aniv Stumpy book which states that Specialized invented the worlds first Carbon Fibre legged suspension fork in 1993. What year did the Pace RC35 come out I wonder?

:roll:

 

[Neil]

Bloody hell - had to do a double take - I was wondering what the hell Alan Partridge was doing with a mountain bike - casual sport attire was spot on, though ;-)

No canal boat in the background was a bit of a giveaway, though ))

 

[makster]

Bloody hell - had to do a double take - I was wondering what the hell Alan Partridge was doing with a mountain bike - casual sport attire was spot on, though ;-)

No canal boat in the background was a bit of a giveaway, though ))

Just needs a chevron action flash

 

[GrahamJohnWallace]

It does indeed appear possible that Alan Partridge may have invented the sloping top-tube. :roll:

 

[Neil]

It does indeed appear possible that Alan Partridge may have invented the sloping top-tube. :roll:

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