Archive for August, 2008

For Sam I’m making a demountable touring bike with S&S couplers. This one is going to be fully lugged, with front and rear rack mounts for loaded touring. So with the couplers, you need to cut your top tube and down tube and braze them in, so I got special True Temper tubes with long butts so that I’d be brazing to the thick part. Here are some shots of the couplers, and brazing them up to make the tube:

  

This frame is also going to use capped seat stays, brazed to the outside of the seat lug, for good tire & fender clearance. Some builders use cast caps, to which we say, bah! They’re heavy and artless. So we take our seat stay and file in a channel; then we braze a section of seat tube scap onto it, and grind it smooth.

  

And here are some more pictures of the frame in the jig. You can see the 7 degree sloping top tube and the low bottom bracket for stability.

 

I’ve also been working on a tandem rehab for Matt, on an old Schwinn Twinn. I know. That’s how they spelled it. See:

 

It’s getting a full repaint, with new fenders, racks and an 8 speed internal hub! I’ll have more pix next week of the fancy components, but here’s the painted frame and new fork:

  

  

So the last week featured two exciting pick-ups. Casey had been working in Appalachia, fighting mountaintop mining, and was en-route to the Cape when she rumbled up in her grease-powered Mercedes. Accompanying her was old friend and comrade Francesco, who rides this bad boy. Here they are with their various non-petroleum powered vehicles:

And here’s a shot of Casey’s bike – she brought her beloved Brooks saddle to put on, and now she’s ready to rock:

And yesterday Paul picked up his mountain bike, Cuchulainn – he’ll be joining Mark and Liane on the trails of western CT soon!

Here’s what he’s in for, courtesy of Liane:

Also check out our new projects blog, soon to be linked to the home page. And here’s a bike rack I built for my local pub, the Scurvy Dog: