Bicycle Research Products is one of the many new bicycle businesses which started up to fill the need for bicycle parts and tools during the 1970's bicycle boom. Bob Force and Don Milberger were coworkers at the University of California Radiation Laboratory (now the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory), in the Electronics Engineering department at the "Bevatron" proton accelerator. Becoming interested in the new ten speed bikes, they decided to get involved. In 1971 they opened "The Bicycle Shop" in Concord, California selling Mercier and American Eagle bicycles. The shop soon became known as a "professional bicycle shop" importing Campagnolo, Cinelli, Colnago and other products before there were US distributors. They also began making custom frames and forks as well as repairing and painting framesets.

Bicycles were hard to come by and parts and tools were almost impossible to obtain. Fortunately metalworking was a hobby so they made their own tools which were soon in demand by other local shops. Distributor reps learned of the tools and asked that their companies be allowed to resell them. The tool business became the tail that wagged the dog and the bicycle shop was closed after 18 years to allow full time in the manufacturing business.

Bicycle Research is truly a manufacturer which does its own design work, makes its own tooling, writes its own computer programs and does much of the machining in its own machine shop. Casting, plating, anodizing, heat-treating and some high volume production work is done by outside vendors. All of our vendors are picked for the quality of their work and on the recommendation of our other vendors. None of our outside work is done by low bidders!

In addition to standard tools such as cone wrenches, cluster tools etc. Bicycle Research makes many tools, which were new to the industry and in many cases are still made only by BR. Among these unique tools designed to make the bicycle mechanics life easier are:

Brake Boss Mills-two sizes of hollow milling cutters for the sizing and repair of cantilever brake bosses.

Bearing Punch-a piloted punch for removing the "second" sealed bearing from a hub or bottom bracket.

Chain Ring Tool-a special tool for straightening chain rings, sprocket teeth etc.

Cluster Vise-a non-slip vise to hold clusters for disassembly.

Cup Press-a press for quick installation of "American" bottom bracket and headset bearing cups.

Frame Blocks- three sizes of heat-treated aluminum blocks for rolling dents out of frame tubes and for holding tubing in a vise. Accurate enough to be used in building frame jigs.

Nipple Drivers-special offset screwdrivers for screwing nipples onto spokes while building wheels. (See New Product Release April 2004.)

Rim Saver-special pliers to remove dents from bicycle rims.

Sealed Bearing Removal Kit-a set of expanding collet drivers that will remove all commonly used sealed bearings from hubs, free hubs and bottom brackets, even if you cannot get to the back of the bearing.

Sealed Bearing Install Kit-an acme-threaded press with adapters to install all commonly used sealed bearings in hubs, free hubs and bottom brackets

Slide Hammers-three sizes of slide hammers for seating bearing races on fork crowns.

Thread Chasers-thread chasers to correct damaged threads on axles and crank arms.

Tire Seater-the first tool on the market used to pull tight fitting tires into the proper seat in the rim. This tool works with all size tires used on bicycles.

Bicycle Research Products are sold world wide through wholesale distributors in the bicycle trade. While many of our products are intended for the professional bicycle mechanic, there are some that are consumer tools. These may be purchased from quality bicycle shops.