Here is a a Jack Taylor curved tube built by Colin Laing. For those of you who don't know, Colin Laing is a builder originally from the UK, now living in the U.S. who has been building for over fifty years. He apprenticed with the Taylors in the 50's and i'm sure many other people before going on and building bikes under his own name. Check him out, he's got a website.
To get to the point, when Norman Taylor retired he gave some tubes and decal sets to Colin with permission to build their frames if and when he was inclined (i think that's how the story goes). After a lot of snooping around I found him and asked him to build a curved tube for me. I felt a bit tacky asking him to build a frame of someone elses design when his frames are as nice as they are, but he didn't care a bit and was a pleasure to deal with.
I gave him very vague frame size specs and somehow the bike rides and feels great for me. I think built up with early 90's Mavic components the bike weighs around 19lbs (it's really light).
He may have a few old Jack Taylor 531 tubesets if anyone is in the market for a very nice knock off with a rich history. Or have him build one of his originals before he retires for good. I think I'm going to.
Here are some photos for those interested.
Nathan Cozzolino
SF, CA