cleland:start
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Cleland Cyclings Limited
For over a century cyclists have been modifying bikes to perform better offroad. Britain especially nurtures eccentrics who make the imaginative leaps which keeps society thriving. Geoff Apps of Buckinghamshire, England, solved the offroad problem and created a worthy mountain bike prototype in 1979 with direct inspiration and consultation with Gary Fisher and Charlie Kelly 1). However well placed his Range-Rider and Aventura were:
Apps sold a few but missed the mountain biking wave. cyclinguk
One person can not make a movement, nor a new market. He did, however, influence many British bike makes who followed.
Geoff Apps wikipedia
1979 Range Rider
Most Cleland cycles were designed around 650B wheels with a few 700C (29er) versions produced.
Rough Rider wordpress
The Birth of the 29er
29ers are now the standard mt. bike wheel size 2). Old 26“ are now nearlry non-existent as 650B's flew by them in 2013 which were then overtaken by 29” in 2018. By the way, 29“ wheels are smaller than 27” wheels. In fact, they're the same size as traditional 700c road rims. 26“ became the standard merely because BMX bikes experimented with larger rim sizes which created a market for many “balloon” tires with treads.
Geoff Apps was a bit too ahead of his time in 1980 when he shipped samples of 650Bx54 Finnish Nokian Tyres to Kelly and Fisher in Marin. 3) Despite Geoff Apps, John Finley Scott and Tom Ritchey's efforts to make larger rim sizes standard, lighter weight and cheaper 26” took over the market.
check this: 4)
1982 Aventura wordpress
Production Notes
[1]. No info available. It appears that small quantities were made each year until 1984.
cleland/start.1617510848.txt.gz · Last modified: 2021/04/03 21:34 by gchandler