Friday 5/14/10

As usual I spent the afternoon in the shop today. It was tough because it is a perfect day for a ride. The one negative thing I have run into about building bikes is that it takes up a lot of my spare time and there is so much riding to do and so little time to do it in.

At any rate as you can see by the above pics I worked on the rear dropouts as well as the Seat cluster.

These dropouts are going to be beautiful because they are stainless steel and I will polish the face of them and they will not get painted. That way as the wheel is put on and taken off over the years the paint will not get chipped. This is a great feature and well worth the small extra expense.

Tomorrow I hope to braze on the seat stay bridge and perhaps the chain stay bridge.

Tomorrow is also my wedding anniversary. I'll most likely cut my work day a bit short.

Finally looking like a bike!

Well, Friday and Saturday have come and gone. I feel pretty accomplished with the frame this weekend. Friday I got the chainstays brazed in and cleaned up the inside of the bottom bracket.
Saturday I started work at 8. The first thing I did was chase the BB threads and faced the BB once again. Actually the first thing I did was pick up a cup of decaf. Then I reamed and faced both sides of the head tube. Next I moved on to the seat stays. Unfortunately even though I remembered to bring the camera to the shop I forgot to take pictures as I went. Hopefully I'll get better about this. I wish I could afford to hire a photographer to come in and follow me around and document everything. Boy, would he be bored! Gary stopped in today and was nice enough to take a few pics of his bike and email them to me.
In the pics above you see an almost completed bike. Next you see me brazing up one of the seatstays and the bottom pic shows how the seat stay was fit. I wanted the pics in a different order but they came out this way. Better luck next time. Fortunately I am better with a torch than I am with a computer.
Next week I will start finishing off some of the details. I'll be sure to get some close ups then.... I hope.

When it Rains it Pours II

When it rains it pours

So the parts coming from England appeared to be lost forever. April 21 I called Nova Framebuilders supply in CA. They now carry the same parts so I re-ordered them and asked them to over night them via the USPS. These parts also were lost in the mail. I tracked them for 4 days and there was no change. I called Nova again to re-order and they checked the tracking and they showed someone signed for them that morning who's name I didn't recognize. Well I came home from work this past Friday and the parts were at the door. I don't know who to thank. Later that same day the parts from England arrived. When it rains it pours. I spent Friday afternoon and Saturday working on Gary's bike. You can see the progress through the pics.

Some days are more productive than others. My parts that I'm waiting for from England still have not arrived. They told me they sent them by air mail. I think they must have been put on a freighter first. One that has to stop in China perhaps. I spent Friday afternoon cleaning up the chain stays and prepping the seat stays. Saturday morning I finished up the forks. Until the parts show up I'm high and dry.

I decided at that point to come home and work on the design for a 29er single speed. This will be my first foray into the world of Mountain bikes. I need to go out and buy the forks or at least get the dimensions so I can bring them into the design. I imagine that there will be quite a few things that I will have to research to get the first bike right. I'm looking forward to the challenge!

You may have noticed there are no pics. That's because I went to the shop without the camera again. I have to get into the habit of bringing the camera. I'll try to stop tomorrow and take a couple of pics and post them. What's a blog without pictures? A blah?

Busy Day

My day started at 5 am. I won't bore you with the details. I went to Granby bike for a ride with Paul Mikkelson. He is a local man raising money for the American Heart Association. I had contacted my Amigos and asked them to come out and support Paul's ride. I also asked them to ride their Bowen Bicycles if they had one. Marketing-Marketing-Marketing!

They offered several different rides for people at different levels.

50 Mile

25 Mile

20 Mile Rail Trail

10 Mile Rail Trail

Since I'm riding tomorrow I chose the 25 mile ride. I rode with a nice guy named Bob and our own Noeleen. Noeleen has made marked improvements on the bike.

The rest of the Amigos rode the 50 mile ride.

After the ride I went back to the shop and worked on Gary's forks. Gary stopped by later in the afternoon and took some pics. One of the picks from the last blog was compliments of Gary and the one above is as well.

While I was out doing this stuff my wife Margie was busy with her first day at the races at the Hop Brook Dam in Middlebury CT. She had a good day coming in 2nd in her class and catagory.

Pass the Fork please

A fork is a fork is a fork. No! The fork is an integral part of any bike design. It is a big part in how a bike handles. The fork for a touring bike is far different than the fork for a race bike. Other factors to consider:

What size wheels will be mounted to the bike?

Will there be fenders?

What style and size brakes will be used?

Threaded or threadless headset?

Will there be a rack mounted to the fork and if so what kind?

In this case Gary wants to run 700x28's with the possibility of mounting fenders.