CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Resources
How a bicycle is made (1945)
(23 posts)-
Posted 12 years ago #
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:D Fascinating and i do love the posh tv voices.
Posted 12 years ago # -
super film, wish i could go to work in a factory, withy a striped shirt and dashing haircut ! Oh and the lack of safety guards on all the spinning and whirring machines are a clear indication that accidents dont happen in black and white factories !
Seriously i like it !
Scott doublebarrelledstiffupperlippedIknow my place,guvnor !
oops ! obvious error ! we dont have any factories in this couintry any more !Posted 12 years ago # -
Ahh, Raleigh. Is this Nottingham then?
Posted 12 years ago # -
Lesson learned. If I get a puncture, I head to Nottingham and find me a granny. She'll have my tyre and tube on and off in under two minutes.
Posted 12 years ago # -
The giveaway was the chainring, the crest on it, is for deffo Raleigh. Bikes and lace is what Nottingham was famous for. Yep, I bet some of the grannies could show us whippersnappers a thing or two!!
Posted 12 years ago # -
Also if you look on the wall in the office, half obscured is a sign that says 'Ralei'
Posted 12 years ago # -
Brilliant film !
Posted 12 years ago # -
Great stuff, spotted the Raleigh clues, yet one of the frames had "Rudge" on it, did/does Raleigh own that name?
Frighteningly labour intensive, and ppe obviously hadn't been invented :-o.
Posted 12 years ago # -
I had a Raleigh of about that vintage to ride to school on. When the chrome started to flake off the handlebars it did so in razor sharp flakes; once a year or so the cotter-pins would start clicking and have to be replaced; the mild steel rims didn't provide any braking friction in wet weather; the bearings had to be re-greased regularly; you had to back-pedal when changing gear with the Sturmey Archer three speed (which had a down-tube friction shifter) and the hang-tag proudly boasted that the workers got a whole week of paid leave each year. Yes, those were the days.
Posted 12 years ago # -
Really enjoyed that. Thanks for sharing.
Posted 12 years ago # -
I'm looking for a job as a tester, then later some of that relaxation they were talking about.
Posted 12 years ago # -
I like the slabs of steel being loaded at the beginning! Some of those old bikes feel like they're made from solid billets of steel rather than tubes!
Posted 12 years ago # -
It's amazing to whippersnappers like me that Raleigh pulled their own tubes, pressed their own lugs and handlebars, plated their own chrome and hardened their own steels all under the roof of their own factory.
Posted 12 years ago # -
Elf and Safety very appropriate for the age. A leather apron for the man doing the acid dipping. Not even gloves for the man drilling out the cranks.
Imagine how mind-numbing it would be to be the man putting the bearings into the hubs. 1,000 hubs filled in an 8 hour day!
I need to take a lesson in tyre and tube fitting from the ladies in the wheel department.
And how many bike manufacturers factory-fit a tool bag these days?
Posted 12 years ago # -
"Imagine how mind-numbing it would be to be the man putting the bearings into the hubs. 1,000 hubs filled in an 8 hour day!"
I talked to a man in the Raleigh factory whose job was to spot weld pump pegs on to a tube.
I asked him if he got to do other jobs -
"No"
One of the most impressive things I saw was the way that the rear brake cable was threaded through the main tube of a Raleigh 20 with a finely judged flick of the wrist to make the end of the cable appear through the second hole.
Posted 12 years ago # -
Great film. Love the white coat.
"..controlled from the administrative offices, the most important one is the drawing office."
How did they get that passed Accounts, Personnel and most difficult of all, Stores?
I guess welding on pump pegs was the 1945 equivalent of saying "I'm calling to ask if you are the home owner..." 1000 times a day.
Posted 12 years ago # -
Slightly more recent (via @TimDawsn)
.
"Adrian Demaid takes us through this documentary in which two different manufacturing methods for making bicycles are compared, one method from the 'Halfords' factory in Pontypool, catering for the mass market, and the other, handmade method, from Wester Ross Cycles in Scotland."
Inc. interesting shots of TdF!
.
Or YouTube http://fb.me/VMlVyqlI
Posted 12 years ago # -
@chdot: top video link is wrong. Very interesting video, looks like an old Open University course programme.
Posted 12 years ago # -
"@chdot: top video link is wrong"
Just doesn't work on some mobiles.
Posted 12 years ago # -
No, it's just the wrong URL for the embedded vid, the lower URL to YouTube is fine. I'm viewing on a Mac.
Posted 12 years ago # -
Posted 9 years ago #
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