Steel Tubing Bicycle Frame

Bicycle construction was made considerably lighter and stronger when in 1885 the German brothers Max and Reinhard Mannesmann patented a process for making seamless steel tubing.  A solid cylindrical blank is fed into contact with forming rollers which grip and pull the blank over a mandrel which bores out the inside of the blank.  The diameter of the tubing becomes larger than diameter of the original blank.  This 1888 patent is for a version of their process in which the work of forcing the blank over the mandrel is accomplished by a feed device, so the rollers have to form the outer shape but do not grip and pull the blank.   The brothers founded the Mannesmann company, which grew into a huge industrial giant which is dominant in its field today, and valued at around $92 billion. 

Comments

[Kevan]

A small correction, the seemless tube production process does not involve flat stock being rolled and welded. Rather it involves using a mandrel to pierce a red hot cylinder of steel while it passes through a set of rollers. The resulting tube is then passed through many more rollers to produce the diameter required.

Kevan:

I think you are right. I have seen a copy of the original patent, so I'll have to read it and correct this post. Thanks for the comment.

Bob

Is the drawing supposed to be related to the patent? Because the drawing seems to deal with a suspension system. I just noticed the dates are different. So why is the drawing here?

The drawing is there because its hard to get an interesting looking drawing of a tube manufacturing process, and the original patent doesn't have any drawings. The link to the tube process is that the tubes were primarily used in the bicycle industry at first.