Writenride 

Hi,

I am looking for some Reynolds drawn 531 Tubing for Bates Cantiflex and Diadrant forks. Do you have any suggestions who has some to sell?

Thanks!

unterhausen

Is that the D shaped blades? I see people talking about them occasionally, but I imagine anyone that has some blades is hoarding them.

Andrew R Stewart 

I'm not old enough to know from personal hands on but I strongly suspect that the fork blades are common, for that era, 531 blades. Likely a 28x16 oval and around 1.1-1.3mm wall at the top. Besides the top oval shape, what is also likely different from current blades is that the tips were often of small diameter for a longer portion of the blade's skinny end. All the easier to bend this or that way

I might have a pair of 531 blades still but old 531 sets come up on EBay every so often. Do you have the crown and steerer already? Andy

unterhausen

I don't think I'm old enough to have bought any of them either. If only ebay had been around in the mid-70's. But looking at those bikes online it sure looks like the blades are d-shaped. Of course, the first thing that gained my attention was the weird rake. I don't know if you can make a regular blade look right. I don't even know how many 531 straight blades are out there of that vintage. I also wonder where you would get a crown.

I think we need an opinion from bulgie on this one.

Andrew R Stewart 

Or Doug Fattic. I forgot about the "D" cross sectional shape being a possibility. I know I have none of those blades in my small stash. Andy

Doug Fattic 

i have some Reynolds D shaped fork blades and matching crowns. They vary in rake and curve. In addition I have steerers from the same era. I got them with some of the framebuilding stuff I acquired when Johnny Berry's widow sold me a lot of her husband/s equipment.in 1975. I presume they are pre-WW-II

vintage cellar

Might we inquire as to WHY you would want that stuff ?

The old-timers I knew who rode Cantiflex said it rode rough and was not an improvement in any way over regular tubing. Just a gimmick in a long-ago era when gimmicks were what we now call "marketing BS".

If you just want it for novelty's sake, well fine. That sort of old stuff sometimes used to show up in the early to late 1990's. You might try and track down Hilary Stone in England. He is supposed to be retired but who knows what he might still have,
or know of.

I think Bates had an exclusive on those quirky designs and I've never seen or heard of Reynolds offering it up as a standard catalog item.

Good Luck !

PromptCritical 

Maybe https://framebuildersupply.com

bulgie 

Haha, I'm not that old! I doubt there were any cantiflex tubes made after the 1950s. Chances of finding unused NOS tubes? Less than zero is my guess.

They were larger diameter in the middle and smaller at the ends (to fit in standard lugs), seems like a dumb idea to me.

Pretty sure the diadrant forks were oval not D section. Probably the rapid-taper style where more of the length is small diameter suitable for bending. Another dumb idea.

unterhausen

That wasn't a comment on your age, because I'm pretty sure I'm older than you. But rather your interest in all the old, strange bike parts.