Big Bike Little Bike

So Joe’s bike is finished (completely since these shots were taken) and I’m waiting until I get back from vacation to do the paint. It seemed like it might be a little labor intensive so I didn’t think I should rush it. Here are the current shots. The next ones will blow your mind.

 
 
See the full slideshow.

The Major Taylor Association’s annual George Street hillclimb was this past weekend and everyone was so fast!! The winning time was under 23 seconds by Rich Hollenbeck. Which basically means he averaged 15 miles an hour up an 18 percent grade. Crazy. We had a good Circle A turnout with myself, Hilary, Brent, Ken, and the Burkes. Congratulations to Liane Burke for getting 3rd!

  
  


I also did a couple of repaints including this Moser track frame that has been around the block. I’ve seen it exchange hands several times and it has definitely seen some wear and tear. I was happy to get it back to riding condition again.

 
  

And Adam finally came by and built up his bike. He put all SRAM Red on there with a nice set of DT wheels. The final weight with the pedals was 16.5 pounds! Can’t wait to hear the full ride report.

  

The front end of Chris’s lugged cross frame is in the jig and ready for brazing. He’s a tall fellow so this one’s going to be big. I carved a couple of cutouts on the bottom bracket shell to match the Richard Sachs lugs. I’m liking the way it looks like a hungry baby bird (or is it just me?). Here’s the status as of now.

  

I finished a little fillet brazed stem for Steph’s bike this week as well. I’m not really psyched on the tiny stainless bolts I put on there so I’ll probably switch those out.

  

Rick built up his flatland frame which is hot. Well, as hot as a brown bike can look.



And finally, our good friend, former roommate, and future Circle A rider, Adam St. Germain, got 4th in the men’s 2/3 race in this year’s Cox Classic in downtown Providence. This year the race tortured the riders by partially sending them up Waterman and then down Angell. It didn’t seem to phase Adam (or Gabe Lloyd who got 6th). Nice job guys! Hannah was on site selling cupcakes made from scratch. And everyone else just laid around in the grass. Myself included.

 
 

So much has been happening in January! Where to start. Well, Stephen’s bike has been assembled, Micah’s bike is ready for parts, Hilary’s frame is completed and built up, Sarah’s coming up next with a cyclo-touring machine, Joe’s Viking decals finally came in from the UK, and Ricardo’s 3RENSHO is ready to be rebuilt. Phew.

Stephen came in yesterday with his Specialized to migrate the parts over to his Circle A. Everything went smooth and today was gorgeous so I’m sure we’ll hear the verdict on how it rode very soon. Here are some shots of the finished frame and the making of it.

   
  
  
 

Micah’s frame was also completed recently with the most original color scheme I’ve seen in a long time. It’s a metallic eggplant, coral panels, and gold bands. Looks AMAZING! This one was built up with Dedacciai Zero tubing and Paramount lugs. Here’s the finished product and as usual, the slideshow.

  
  
  

I also built a bike for my girlfriend Hilary’s birthday. It wasn’t a surprise because I had to get measurements to design the frame. The frame is built with Columbus Spirit for Lugs tubing (thanks Richard), Paramount lugs (thanks Kirk), and an old set of Reynolds 531 fork blades (thanks Owen). I did some fancy-shmancy vent holes in the head tube and some old styling cut outs on the BB shell. I also used the ultra-svelte single speed dropouts that we have cut over in Pawtucket. I brazed some stainless plates on them and then polished them up. The lace design was her idea and came out very classy. We actually went to the fabric store to find a nice lace pattern, scanned it in, and made an EPS file out of it to cut the vinyl mask out. Our old Roland vinyl cutter is somewhat of a relic so it wasn’t too happy with the intricacies of the lace. There’s an extensive slideshow of the build here.

   
  
  
  

And finally, cross season ended over a month ago and I haven’t even mentioned that it totally changed my life. I need to personally thank everyone who made my first season so much fun including Jack, Hannah, Dan, Adam, Scotty, Scott G., and NBX. I never knew beer and bikes went so well together. So as a result, my plan for 2008 is to start off riding mostly flatland, move onto the road bike mid-summer, and then ride cross for the fall and winter. Year-round on a bike sounds like fun, right? Here are some choice shots from this season for your entertainment.

 
 

This week was dedicated to building a track frame that will be traveling halfway around the world to Hong Kong when it’s done. I was unaware of the fixed gear bike culture in Hong Kong but was made aware by Brian Fu who will be the proud owner of this Circle A. There was one non-standard request for this frame which was that he wants the bars to be able to spin 360°. This requires super long top tube, steep seat tube and head tube angles, and little to no rake on the fork. Exciting stuff but the challenge lies in the restrictions of it being a lugged frame. Lots of grinding and shaping to get the right angles. It’s made using Henry James’ lugs, Paul Components’ dropouts with integrated tensioners, and Columbus’ new Spirit for Lugs tubeset. Here are some pics of the progress so far.

 
 

So I should’ve mentioned this here BEFORE it happened but today was the big Nightmare Before Christmas Halloween Alleycat here in Providence, RI. I’m sorry I spaced. There was a great turnout nonetheless. Mike Bike won it and chose a Circle A repaint as his prize. Hannah was first for women. Congratulations! I brought out the cross bike and rode almost the whole race with Marty from Geekhouse. It was such a good time. Bobby runs a tight ship. Keep up the great work!

 
 
 

Emily wanted to see some pics of my built up cross bike on here so here they are. It’s only been raced once so far (unless you count the alleycat) but that will be changing very soon. Clearly built up with lots of Ritchey stuff and a Campy Centaur drivetrain.

 
 

Hannah’s paint is finished and I’ll add pictures to the gallery soon enough. But for now, here’s a sneak peak at the finished product.

 
 

Last September I had built a frame for Dan Langlois but never had the chance to take pictures of it. After a season of cross and doing a bunch of traveling, the well-used frame returned to the shop. so here’s a shot of Dan getting it back together. I painted a stem to match it as well. The cross season technically starts on Sunday for Dan with a race up in Agawam, MA. Good luck, man.

Speaking of bikes returning to the shop, this red star fade bike has been making the rounds. It’s temporary home is for now at the shop. The original owner bent the seat stay and he sold it to a friend who had us replace the stay and repaint it. I should say right now that I will never do a paint job like this again.



Two more cross bikes to do this week including one for Jack at the Hub and one for ME! Yes, me. I will be thoroughly testing one of my fillet brazed cross frames this year. Can’t wait. More pics to come soon.

So life is crazy. And I’ll share some of it with you in two fun little slide shows. On Saturday, three of us drove to the town of York, PA where we rode our flatland bikes in a parking lot for 5 hours (after driving for over 14 there and back). It was an amazingly fun time and I have the sunburn to prove it…and the pictures.

Then, as soon as I arrived in Providence on Sunday afternoon, I headed downtown to the Cox Classic to watch some friends try and kill themselves with speed. They came close. Here are the shots of that.

And the shop is coming along nicely. I’ll have more shots of our progress very soon.