Redline

September 10, 2021

It's hard to grasp nowadays what a significant brand Redline was 40 years ago. Like SE, everything LOOKED right, but unlike SE, Redline's owner Linn Kasten actually had great business sense and they sold a lof of bikes.

You may not know it, but the tubular cranks that sit on your bike right now are direct descendants of Redline's 1980 Flight Crank, which changed the game completely. Before that we had to choose between one piece or alloy three piece road-derived cranks - neither of which were up to the job without flexing or bending. Byron Friday was the product tester there and this is how Redline came up with such durable products like the Brute stem (as a time when Ashtabula single-stems were standard) and the use of chromoly tubing on forks and the iconic V-bars.

The very first BMX Action magazine (July 1980) I bought from Smiths of Wigan on Mesnes Street had John Crews on a Redline racing at Chandler, Arizona and this mag got me amped on BMX at a time when I was racing morocross on a CR125. Little did I know that not much more than a year later I'd be racing BMX at Chandler myself courtesy of Chuck Robinson.

Redline by then had Stu Thomsen, Bill Griggs, Greg Hill and a powerhouse of a team, amazing bikes, a great look and of course - those Flight Cranks - which pretty much EVERY Pro ran no matter who they rode for.

Throughout the 80's Redline continued to innovate with a more affordable version of the Flight Crank - the 400 - as well as the forklifter bars and stem. As the decade came to a close like all BMX manfufacurer's business became tough due to a decline in the popularity of BMX as the focus turned to mountain bikes.

Anyway - fast forward to September 2021, we had a customer 500a in which we'd just completed and had a Proline 24" for a customer. I knew we had a couple of frames here for a few years waiting to build but were under pressure to get the 500a out to it's owner but Adam here pulled out all the stops to get the Prostyler and the Proline build double quick while Jim here got these fantastic images. The only thing I messed up on was giving Adam the wrong pedals to put on the Proline, these should have been MKS BM-7's and they have been fixed now for the product photos of the bike.

Photos: Jim Taylor Photography.