Behind the scenes at top engineering firm
The guys who created glorious three-spokers for Sheene and Lawson are back and they’re growing fast
Dymag are world leaders when it comes to lightweight wheels
Most British motorcyclists know the name Dymag. The Wiltshire firm were founded in the 1970s and sprang to prominence with their distinctive, three-spoke magnesium wheels which graced the bikes of racing greats such as Eddie Lawson and Barry Sheene before the brand went on to pioneer carbonfibre in the 1990s.
And although the original concern went into receivership in 2009, Dymag are now back, bigger than ever and targeting expansion through car and bike original equipment (or OE) production in
addition to their road, race and heritage business.
Bought from the receiver in 2009 by Chris Shelley, who ran the company between 1993 and 1997, Dymag resumed production with a skeleton staff in 2011, working out of a solitary unit on an industrial estate on the outskirts of Chippenham. “I just didn’t want to see Dymag disappear,” says Chris.
“All the old team were doing different things. I approached four of them to see if they were interested and three came back: the carbon guy, the design guy and the production guy. And that was the
most important part of getting it all up and running again.”
Since then an ambitious plan of doing not just bike wheels in magnesium, alloy and carbon for road, racing and heritage machines, but also targeting the car market with advanced carbon wheels has seen the firm grow substantially. Dymag have now spread to six further units across the same industrial park and now have 36 staff.
They already supply OE wheels to more than one supercar manufacturer and a relocation with further expansion is due next year.
Dymag produce around 1000 motorcycle wheels a year (sales are up by 40%), mostly carbon or alloy (although around 100 magnesium wheels are also still made annually, primarily for the heritage market). With carbon banned in BSB and WSB, race output is primarily alloy, with Dymag’s UP7X seven spokedesign a common sight across UK paddocks.
The future, though, is carbon. “We were on our own in carbon for 15 years,” says Chris, who has a pair of carbon Dymags on his own Triumph Tiger 1050.
“It’s probably the largest performance improvement you can make on a bike.” And with Dymag’s CA5 model weighing in at just 4.5kg, almost half that of an OE wheel, he has a point. In one test, he says, when they swapped OE wheels for carbon, their test bike was two seconds a lap faster at Castle Combe. As for the expansion? “We either grow or die,” says Chris.
“The future and all our investment is in carbon-fibre. The ambition is to move into OE in cars and bikes by gearing up to have a highly repeatable business. The hope is to double the size of our business by this time next year.”