We had great fun on our steel touring tandem but it was heavy! We wanted something lighter, fun and contemporary to ride and easy to travel with…we had holiday plans!
I found manufacturers of high spec carbon fibre tandems in the USA…and had to have one! The light weight, clean designs and stylish looks were a striking contrast to our traditional steel tandem. This seemed to be a bright new world of tandem rides and lifestyle and we wanted in!
Photo: An early adventure on our steel tandem on the west coast of Scotland.
Just before the first covid lockdown our village was connected to broadband internet for the first time and we could communicate properly with the online world at modern download speeds. The lockdown brought free time that needed a purpose so learning about carbon fibre and bike frame building became a new online learning passion. There was lots of information online and I followed many peoples posts about their bike frame building, eventually finding the courage to ask some questions. Maybe I could build a carbon tandem myself? Techniques, prices of tubes, geometry, components, and how to do it all, were all somewhere on the internet.
Photo: We wanted a contemporary carbon tandem design.
Tavelo Tandems 