Bike brands you don't hear of anymore

I also had a fleet of 30+ of these, bought daft cheap when the brand stopped iirc.

Reece. An Excocet no less.

Mongoose has disappeared to all intents and purposes in the UK, with no importer.
Still exists in the US, at least their BSO range. Dunno if they’re still making ‘proper’ bikes.

Chris Akrigg is sponsored by them, they seem to hold up to his riding ok 😆

I hang my head in shame…

Dekerf are still definitely making bike and made some for Chromag recently.

Bob Haro* sold up afaik, now works in advertising.

*Childhood hero and still the greatest BMX’r in my eyes.

I also had an Al Carter, mine was a Cascade, black with paint flecked on it a la Jackson Pollock. It got stolen once but I got it back the same night as they just dumped it over a fence into the train tracks and a stranger fished it out and called it in. Loved that bike

My first mtb experience was on a borrowed Al Carter. So awesome I never looked back 🙂

Elan

Sugino, Onza, Mks, Ritchey, Irc,Kalloy apologies if they have been mentioned earlier or still selling loads

My first mtb experience was on a borrowed Al Carter. So awesome I never looked back

My wife had an Al Carter Pro. Tough build and well equipped.

Bike wasn’t bad either.

Can’t believe I typed that. 😳

Holsworth
Claud Butler
Elswick
Sun
Rattrays
Kalkoff
Gitane
Falcon

I was going to say Al Carter and scrolled through all the other crap pages just to check it wasn’t mentioned. Al Carter Sidewinder (Pro?), first mountain bike with some “trick components” – had shimano (GS?) “trigger shifters” which were a huge eye opener for me and I rode it miles and miles and miles. When I moved to Grenoble my Mum kindly shipped it out to me. It was largely unloved because I was a cheap-ass student but I spent a whole summer doing 5+ hours a day on it and less than 10 minutes a week looking after it. Looking back I love it now, though I never showed it, and I think it was finally left in the yard of the building I rented the apartment in when I moved on. I’m very very sorry about that.

EDIT : Am now awash with nostalgia. It was obscenely yellow and I’d set off from my apartment, blast up the road to Uriage (past the roadies – it was 20 years ago..) then continue on and hang a right up a mentally steep rocky section that I only managed to get up without putting a foot down about 10% of the time. It was then a run along some fairly fast tracks until I got to the top of a mentally long singletrack back down to Grenoble and then road back across Grenoble to “home”… *sigh*

Haro are still knocking out BMXes, as are Sunn. A lot of big name companies are stopping distributing in the UK due to being a small marketplace 🙁

Beaten to it but Mongoose – Chris Askrigg.

Does Jerry Seinfeld still have his Klein?

Are Kinesis still around?

Grafton
Topline
Bullseye
Ringle
Mountain goat
Mantis

Coyote (may have been a subsidiary to another manufacturer)

My mate bought one with a flexi stem on early 90’s, apart from that it was pretty well specced with xt stuff.

I was going to mention a few old BMX names from the 80s, but see they have come up at least once: Haro and Diamond Back. Both of these used to have a bit of cache when I was a kid.

And I see, also, that someone has mentioned Peugeot road bikes, so that just leaves me:

Atala

and

Miele

EP-X

Carbon and belt drive in 2000

Darkside, Slovak company responsible for some terrifyingly hardcore frames.

https://m.pinkbike.com/u/bado/album/darkside-frames/

schmiken – Member

Fuquay.

I had the pleasure of meeting Greg Fuquay and having a good old chat about MTB design, as well as getting the opportunity to ride one of his creations.
Once I’m a millionaire, he’ll have the displeasure of being dragged out of retirement to build me a titanium hardtail, the likes of which we discussed 20+ yrs ago. 😀

Proglex and USE. I still have a use carbon post. Daren’t use it.

Ammaco (my Dad used to have a hybrid/MTB one with able drum brakes. The name is still there but they are churning out £129 full sussers.

Peugeot, (MTB, not road) I had a full susser Origin (3?) around about 1998. I’m sure my mate had a nice hardtail as well.

RSP (Raleigh Special Products). I’m sure they used to do bikes, now just a components brand.

Ammaco (my Dad used to have a hybrid/MTB one with able drum brakes. The name is still there but they are churning out £129 full sussers.

My first dream bike was an Ammaco freestyle king, in chrome. The twin top tube was awesome for no handed stands. 😀

Have we had trimble yet?

Orbea
Not massive in the UK anymore

RSP (Raleigh Special Products). I’m sure they used to do bikes

Yes they did. A friend has a Raleigh SP Torus FS titanium bike with triple clamp rigid forks on it. It’s on RetroBike if you like that kind of thing

http://www.retrobike.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=374862&p=2788026#p2788026

Saracen are still in the bike game. This year’s DH World Cup junior winner rides one.

Feebal – still have the t shirt from Bike 2001.

Same here, brainchild of the martins I believe.

Brooklyn machine works (still make components?)
Karpiel

Stratos (of mx6 gold triple clamp DH fork fame)
Bullet bros xyzxx forks
Hannbrink (still going just making strange little fat bikes rather than mtb forks)

USE are very much alive , maybe better known now for exposure lights.

But make some very nice seat post and bars still

Superstar BMX, probably still going I just dont get the magazines anymore. Not to be confused with the purveyor of cheap brake pads and rubbish BB’S.

Always wanted one because it has my name on the frame!

Superstar Parkinson:

univega bikes, don’t see them about anymore.

Newrobdob where did you hear that nos it’s lovely

Extralite? Boulder? I seem to remember seeing a really nice Boulder at a race at Lyme park in the early 90’s.

Anyone mentioned Univega yet?

🙄

Univega?

Come on guys what’s about

OVERBRURY’S

My 1st 2 mtb was a cross fell bike bought 2nd hand from a lad at school then a pioneer frame new from them
It was a amazing frame at the time .

Univega?

Still going (like a lot of these in this post) just not in the UK

Univega

I will always miss Klein, innovative design, exceptional quality and (harsh) ride.. but it was an XC bike so hey..

Trek really handled all thier acquisitions with the same blanket “absorb and take away the brand out of the marketplace” practice.

Disgraceful, but blame lies with the owners for selling out.

Scanned through but haven’t seen either Kirk (cast magnesium frame) or Formula (sponsor of Deb Murrell)

Orbea
Not massive in the UK anymore

I’d say the opposite! Probably at their peak in the UK just now, the new enduro bike has been very popular and saw a lot of press.

LeMond..

Didn’t Greg buy that back ?

Although I can’t find a website for him, but this article from 2014 suggests he’s making them again.
LeMond article