Cinelli Columbus Doves Cap

The story of the most famous steel tubes in the history of cycling began in 1919 when A.L. Colombo founded his steelery with the ambition to “to do business in iron and steel and make a fair and honest profit”.  In the 1930s Colombo created the name Columbus for cycling specific tubes: producing the first reinforced tubes with a tapered thickness made of molybdenum chrome steel in the history of cycling, as well as the first cold-rolled elliptical fork blades. 

In 1977 Antonio Colombo separated Columbus from the main steelery A.L. Colombo in order to concentrate solely on high-performance cycling tubing.  The result was the history of cycling as we know it: legendary tubesets AIR, MAX (first tube-set to break the tradition of conventional diameters and introduce concept of orientated ellipses and differentiated sections), SL, SLX, NIVACROM (EL and Genius), Altec, Starship and Spirit right up to the most 2009’s XCR, the world’s first ever seamless stainless steel tubeset which allows for the production of a steel frame competitive (and out-performing in some categories) at the highest level of the sport on all levels: weight (sub-1400g), rigidity, fatigue resistance and of course the remarkably superior handling of steel.