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bicycle tubing: Columbus, True Temper, Dedacciai, Tange and Ishiwata. If you’re British, though, one name resounds: Reynolds.
    Alfred Milward Reynolds ran a factory making nails in Birmingham in the late nineteenth century. In his spare time, he obsessed about a problem that was then exercising the whole bike industry: how do you weld together thin, lighter-weight tubes without weakening the joints? Failure after failure led him to devise a tube with ‘ends a greater thickness than the body of the tube’, as the original 1897 patent for ‘butted tubes’ stated, but with the same diameter throughout, so saving on weight without compromising strength. It was a breakthrough for the industry. Bicycle manufacturers set about making the next generation of frames that were both strong and very light.

    The Reynolds company went on to make motorcycle tubing during World War I, wing spars for Spitfire fighter planes, tubes for bazookas, wheel rims for Rolls Royces and Concorde engine parts, but this archetypal Midlands manufacturing business always returned to steel bicycle tubes. In the alchemy of designing aircraft tubing, Reynolds stumbled on a manganese-molybdenumalloy that made wonderful bikes. In 1935, the company introduced ‘531’ tubing. It was considered revolutionary. Even now, British cyclists of a certain age go misty-eyed and look away towards the horizon just at the mention of ‘531’.
    For forty years, it was the benchmark of excellence in high-end frame materials. In all, twenty-seven Tour de France wins were recorded on Reynolds frames. Luminaries such as Anquetil, Merckx, Hinault, LeMond and Indurain rode bikes made from double-butted Reynolds tubes. The long association between the professional peloton and Reynolds was broken in the 1990s, however, when elite cyclists turned to carbon and titanium. But just when it looked like steel might be abandoned, Reynolds struck back.
    In 2006, the company discreetly introduced ‘953’ — a lightweight stainless steel tubing for racing bikes. It has propelled steel alloy back into the premier league of tubing materials. This specially developed, low-carbon steel alloy containing nickel and chromium has superior strength, which means the tube walls can be extremely thin. It is the new benchmark, ultra-high-strength, steel alloy for bicycles. It’s also resistant to corrosion. These outstanding properties make maraging steel, the group of iron alloys to which 953 belongs, useful in diverse fields — fencing blades in foil and épée, firing pins in automatic weapons, and in centrifuges for the enrichment of uranium.
    A final point about 953 is that the tubes are straight and round, or roundish. Most expensive, mass-manufactured, modern road-racing bikes have oversized aerofoil or oval-shaped, even curved, tubes. These may improve the performance of elite, professional riders. They may not. Either way, the bikes are ugly. Straight, round tubes may now be old school, but they look better.
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    The Reynolds 953 tubeset was sitting in an open box on the corner of a table when I walked into Jason’s workshop. It contained top tube, down tube, seat tube, head tube, two chain stays, two seat stays, two drop-outs and a brake bridge. I held one of the main tubes in my hand and caressed it with my thumb and forefinger. Its weight and sheen gave an impression of quality. I put it carefully back in the box. Jason explained why the three main tubes were slightly different diameters and shapes, with reference to their strengths and the stress that varying forces put on the frame.
    â€˜It’s the combination of tubes we believe is best for your bike,’ he said.
    Jason was pacing about, tidying and preparing the workbenches. An elegant single-speed, hard-tail mountain bike leant against a wall. The bulbous wings and grille of an MGB sports car peaked from under a dustsheet in one corner. In another, there was a large