The Portland daily press., 1895-07-24
National League Standing
THE BICYCLE.
Cheap Machines Not Yet.-Paper Rims
Next Year.

Chicago, July 23 Chicago manufac
tures of bicycles have been stirred te
wrath by that nonsensical yarn which
misled part of the public into believing
that syndicate was to be formed to PRO
duce 400, 900 wheels next season and sell
them at $50 or less apiece. The produc-
tion of that number of Awheels next year
by factories not now established is simply
physical impossibility. In the first
not possibly be obtained, and the men to
put the material together even if it were
available are not to be found. These are
conditions that money cannot Influence,
and even if this syndicate had all the
dollars on earth they could not secure
material that is not to be had. One of
the best informed bicycle manufacturers
IN the country, pioneer in and stu
dent of the business and all it's conditions
and situations, puts the highest number
of wheels that can be produced in this
country next season at 500, 600. They will
already contracted for their material and
have engaged about all that can be pro-
duced, he says, and when that many
wheels are turned out the manufacturers
will have reached the limit of possibility.
r. Philip Gormully, the above mentioned
manufacturer, fails, therefore. to see
where the threatened syndicate is to find
material for it's 40O 600 wheels.
PAPER BICYCLE RIMS.
Paper rims will be put into bicycles
next season. First it was steel, then
wood and now paper. Not tissue paperFto
be sure, but paper nevertheless, and the
change is to secure what seems to be up
permost in the minds of all the bicycle
manufacturers just now-lightness in
construction. And the substitution of
paper for wood will not, it is claimed,
sacrifice a particle of the strength of the
wheel. On the contrary the paper, after
undergoing the process through which
it is put, has all the strength and life and
elasticity of wood when used in rims.
Furthermore it escapes the JOINT which
is necessary in wooden rims and deprives
them of some of their strength and cuts
off also from one to one and half points
of the weight of each machine Paper is
used in the manufacture of car wheels.
Why not in the manufacture of bicycle
rims?
An Indiana man is the inventor of this
new scheme or of this application of the
old scheme, and he is one of company
who are now establishing factory at
Laporte, Ind, for the manufacture of
wheels in which nothing but paper rims
will be used. The process as explained by
one of that company is this: Strips of
ordinary red express wrapping paper are
put on a reel and allowed to pass slowly
through Ia tank containing solution
which first soaks in and when dry hard
ems and stiffens the paper. 1t takes about
ten days for the solution to dry, but at
the end of that time it is claimed that a
paper rim made in this way has all the
strength, life and elasticity of a wooden
rim. The weight is good deal less in
proportion than that of wood and those
who have experimental with the paper
rims say they are destined to supplant the
Others Some manufacturers have sacri-
feed good deal in the way of strength
to lightness. Perhaps here is a chance
to tighten up the rims and add little
needed weight and strength elsewhere.