A Bicycle is Born

All our bicycles start their lives in a small box as nothing more than a few tubes of steel. Another small box brings the lugs that will help hold the finished frame together.

Barry's favorite material is steel. He usually uses Columbus steel, imported from Italy, but he can also use Reynolds steel depending on the customer requirements and needs.

When a customer orders a new bicycle, Barry spends some time measuring them and finding out what sort of cyclist they are. He can then apply this information to the geometry of the new frame, making sure it is perfectly suited to the customer's specifications.

Contrary to most other framebuilders, Barry does not work with a jig, a guide, to build his frames. He has been in the trade for almost 50 years now and can work by sight only. His creations are perfectly balanced and will last decades. The only tool he really needs is a hearth for the brazing of the frame. The hearth at Witcomb Cycles comes from the old E.A. Boult workshop and was bought second hand in 1928.

It takes about 3 days from the opening of the box of steel tubes for the basic frame to be completed. The frame is then polished and shot-blasted, then returned to us for checking the quality, build, and trueness of the frame. At this point we add on any braze-ons such as cable guides, water-bottle screws, mud-guard and luggage rack eyelets, plus any other frame attachments that are requested. Again the frame is filed down and shot-blasted, then coated in primer.

It returns to the workshop for one last check, and then the long process of enameling the frames is ready to start but that's another story...