True Temper was a well known manufacturer of high quality gardening and construction tools and equipment long before they became recognized for their bicycle tubing. They also made (and still make)golf clubs plus fishing rods and other sporting goods.
Here's a link the the gardening and construction tools site:
I'd either heard or suspect that TT was producing a lot of the heavy walled tubing for Schwinn in Chicago too.
I have an OT/KOF 1992 Paramount OS that I bought as an NOS frame last year. It had been hanging on the wall at an old Schwinn dealer's since 1992. I was told by the Waterford folks that it was one of the last frames produced before Schwinn went under.
The frame is made of lugged OS True Temper OX Tubing and built up to an under 20 Lbs. bike with conventional components and sewups.
From what I understand, the TT OX tubing is seamed as are/were most TT tubing. Changes in tube manufacturing technology 20 years or so back allowed the production of seamed tubing that's almost identical to in mechanical properties to seamless DOM (Drawn Over Mandrel) tubes.
Link to Henry James' discussion of TT tubing:
http://www.henryjames.com/
Chas. Colerich Oakland, CA USA
Norris Lockley wrote:
> Only having read about this material, I have very little knowledge of the
> products. However I have formed the impression that it is widely used by
> custom-framebuilders in the States ie KOF builders. A visit to Henry James'
> website shows that some very interesting series of tubes are available.
>
> On another site - the European one that reflects the state of the world's
> bicycle industry, I have read that the parent company of True Temper has
> recently filed for Section 11 bankruptcy, but that the company now thinks it
> has managed to arrange a refinancing of its burgeoning debt..
>
> Are the company's tubes widely used in the American bike industry..and would
> the company's demise be a great loss the KOF custom-builders?
>
> Another company in a rocky state is MAVIC..curently owned by the Finnish
> company Amer-Sports, that bought the iconic French manufacturer from Adidas
> not too long ago, who in turn bought it from the sporting goods manufacturer
> Salomon, not all that long ago either.
>
> MAVIC has just been put up for sale....Sales have been declining recently,
> probably due the fact that the Finnish owners knew nothing about cycle
> wheels..and to their decision to farm out some of the wheel manufacturing to
> Romania - hence quality problems - instead of letting the inhabitants of the
> small town of Chatillon-sur-Chalaronne, NE of Lyon, continue doing what they
> had been doing so successfully for decades.
>
> Offers around 100,000,000 euros on a post-card to Amer-Sport, Helsinki,
> Finland. To date only one company, a Taiwanese one, has shown interest.
>
> Norris Lockley...Settle UK