About
Italia Bici
In
our special Italia Bici section, Cyclingnews.com presents the finest
Italy has to offer in bicycles and cycling apparel. Each feature presents a
leading Italian manufacturer and its 2005 product lines, with special insights
into the design and manufacture of their products, including the input provided
by some of the world's leading professional cyclists.
In
these pages, we also meet the designers and driving forces behind some of cycling's
greatest names, and look at the history of companies that have shaped the sport
in the world's number one cycling nation.
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By Cyclingnews staff in Cambiago, Italy
Occasionally on our visits to Colnago World HQ, we are
invited into what we call "The Inner Sanctum", otherwise known as Ernesto
Colnago's office. Usually the door is closed as Ernesto Colnago is almost
always in meetings with the constant stream of people who come to Cambiago
to see him. Suppliers, dealers, racers, friends from the world of cycling
and on Saturday mornings, even the occasional kids' racing team of young
Italians who are brought to meet their team bike sponsor, Sig. Colnago
himself. Occasionally, a journalist even gets past the door and on the
occasion of Cyclingnews' Italia Bici 2005, we recently sat down on a
cold March day with Ernesto Colnago to talk.
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C50 head tube (L) Vs. Brand X (R) Colnago explains "(Brand X)
is an inferior grade of carbon fibre that is sloppily bonded to
an aluminum steerer tube. See the differrence in the monocoque
C50 headtube?"
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C50 head tube (L) Vs. Brand Y (R) Colnago explains "You can
really see the difference in the weave of (Brand Y) and the carbon
fibre we use in the C50 headtube."
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Colnago's CNC machined Ti Bottom Bracket shell insert (L)
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Colnago's CNC machined Ti Bottom Bracket shell inside the BB
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Colnago's Star fork, surrounded by Brand X (L) and Brand Y (R)
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Colnago notes that "you can see here with these forks, there's
carbon and there's carbon. See how thick the carbon fibre is on
my fork in the center, while the other two forks use a much thinner
material. I simply won't take chances with carbon fibre!"
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The first thing Colnago did was
reach under his capacious desk and pull out a newly painted and decorated
C50 frame to show us. "This is the new frame that we're sending to Oscar
Freire. We'll make a limited edition production run of this frame;
just 250."
Molto teams for 2005
After admiring Freire's new ride, we discussed
a topic that's still near and dear to Colnago's heart: bicycle racing.
"Do you know that we are sponsoring quite a few teams this season?"
Colnago asked. "In Italy we have Domina Vacanze, which is in the ProTour
and Ceramiche Panaria-Navigare, who will be in the Giro d'Italia. Of
course we will continue with Rabobank; we have been with them since
the beginning. Also in the Netherlands, we are with an interesting new
team called Shimano-Memory Corp that came from a fusion of a Dutch team
and the Japanese Shimano team."
Colnago continued his discourse, explaining, "We'll
continue to sponsor the Navigators Insurance team from America, and
our friend Gerard Bulens has re-focused the Landbouwkredeit-Colnago
team this season on young riders like Maxime Monfort, Nico Sijmens and
Sergy Lagutin. For the first time, we'll sponsor a team in Poland, the
Intel-Action team with some experienced riders like Piotr Wadecki, Cezary
Zamana and Tomas Brozyna. And we always like to support women's cycling,
so we have decided to work with Team S.A.T.S. in Denmark with a mix
of international riders like Rachel Heal and Danish riders like Trine
Hansen."
When we remarked on the fact that these eight top
level teams was a lot, Colnago laughed and said, "Oh I know... plus
we also sponsor two mountain bike teams in Italy as well as amateur
teams like Vellutex. It's a very big commitment this year; I can't think
of anybody who is doing as much in sponsoring as [Colnago] is." We asked
Colnago why the big sponsoring push this year, and he told us, "With
the ProTour this year, we needed to make sure that we were well positioned
and so we have two teams. The other teams fit into our marketing strategy
so there you have it. Over 500 frames! Plus special bikes for riders
like Friere, Hontchar, Boogerd, Sella... but we will learn a lot for
bicycle development and hopefully have many wins. So we hope this big
sponsoring push will be worth it."
Not All Carbon Fibre Is Created Equal
Colnago was rummaging around under his desk, a place
that is kind of like an inner sanctum within the inner sanctum and suddenly
pulled out a slew of carbon fibre bicycle components that had been cut
in half for a 3D exploded view. "There are a lot of bicycles around
today that are called carbon fiber and today I want to show you what
looks like carbon fibre and what is really carbon fibre!" exclaimed
Colnago. Ernesto has a long history with carbon fibre bicycles, going
back to his first one back in 1986, the Concept, which had a sensational
debut at the Milano bike show that year. "I wanted to do something different
so I developed a collboration with Ferrari Engineering, who helped me
create this first carbon fibre model," said Colnago. "The frame was
developed with the same engineers who developed Ferrari's F1 cars and
in the end, this model didn't turn out too badly! And it helped us learn
about carbon fibre construction. Back then it was unheard of to use
this exotic composite material to build a bicycle."
Colnago also pointed out to Cyclingnews that his
Concept model, which became the template for his future carbon fibre
bicycles, was never sold to the public, mostly because the integrated
universal gear change made the Colnago Concept just too heavy to market.
Three years later in 1989, Colnago wowed the bicycle
world again with the Colnago C35, a swoopy monocoque beauty that was
again developed with Ferrari Engineering. The C35 was a true race bike
and was used by some of Colnago top riders back then. Colnago pointed
out, "It's almost 20 years that we've been working with carbon fibre
and we have learned through this experience how to work with this material.
It's not that simple; you have to learn by trial and error how to place
the carbon fibre in such a way that it supports the rider properly,
absorbs the road vibration and has all the appropriate mechanical characteristics
to provide the best performance and lightest weight. I have to say I
am concerned at the trend that exists now to use inferior carbon fibre
to build bicycles. There are a lot of cheap frames out there."
Colnago compared carbon fibre to cloth, telling
Cyclingnews, "Of course, carbon fibre is woven, like cashmere wool.
There are many grades of quality of carbon fibre. To make a bicycle
out of 8 to 10 layers of high modulus carbon fibre is expensive! That's
why many bicycle manufacturers are willing to cut corners, to save money
by using a few layers of good quality carbon fibre, then using inferior
materials as filler. That's not the way we do it at Colnago; we have
been working with the same Italian supplier for carbon fibre, ATR, for
many years. They are the same company that supplies carbon fibre to
Ferrari, Ducati and others; and in the bicycle sector, they work exclusively
with Colnago."
Ernesto Colnago continued his fascinating discourse
on carbon fibre, explaining, "We decided to cut open some other frames
to see if what we suspected was true. And that's what we found; many
of these so-called carbon fibre frames use filler material or use an
inferior grade of carbon fibre material. But you can't see it from the
outside; one frame looks like another but they aren't at all!" Colnago
also called our attention to his bottom bracket design and construction.
"To fix the bottom bracket in our C50 frame, we designed a special CNC'ed
titanium insert that costs a considerable amount; just look at the way
it's made. But many of the inexpensive carbon fibre frames these days
just glue a threaded aluminium sleeve in the bottom bracket. That is
not the way we chose to do it. This is what I mean when I say there
is carbon fibre and there is carbon fibre. It might look the same, but
it isn't. At Colnago, we know carbon fibre and we've been working with
it for almost twenty years."
Colnago Joins the A-Team
Just back from the Taiwan bicycle show, we asked
Colnago about his decision to join the Taiwan sourcing consortium controlled
by Giant Bicycles called the A-Team. Colnago has become a A-Team sponsor
member, joining Specialized and Trek. Colnago told us right off the
bat, "we will source several mid-range models for 2006 in Taiwan. The
rest of our production will remain Made In Italy and will always remain
as Made In Italy. But we see that the the world of bicycles is changing.
Thanks to our collaboration with A-Team, now we can obtain high-quality
competitively priced bicycles that can bear the Colnago name."
Colnago further explained to Cyclingnews, "Of course,
a few years ago, I would have never considered taking a partner in Taiwan.
But now the time is right. I am the first Italian who has officially
decided to move part of my production to Taiwan. So I've joined the
A-Team because when I to do something, I always try to do it in the
most serious and clearest way possible. I am not trying to hide anything
here. Colnago wants to collaborate with the best Taiwanese companies.
At Colnago, we go ahead by small steps; we're a company that operates
in a high-end niche market are not looking to sell a lot of bicycles.
Plus, Colnago is synonymous with quality and production control and
with the A-Team we can produce high-quality bicycles in Taiwan that
maintain the standard of quality and design I've established at Colnago
over the last fifty years."
Colnago also told Cyclingnews that his Taiwan sourced
product would not be available in the US. "Most of our sales in America
are high-end frame sets so we don't believe that our new mid-range bikes
meet the market needs. They are destined only for Europe and Asia."
The Future Is Now
As we were almost out the door of Ernesto Colnago's
inner sanctum, he called to us, "Hey Cyclingnews!" and we turned around
to see something very special in Colnago's hands. "You wanted to see
something new?" he laughed and as Colnago revealed his latest capolavore
from under his desk, our eyes bugged out at the latest creation from
Il Mago di Cambiago. Ernesto swore us to secrecy about this new model,
but admitted that a prototype of Colnago's newest, most innovative frameset
would be in the Giro d'Italia in a few months. We'll be looking for
it!
Further reading
Colnago
website
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