AJ’s TOURER, PAINT & REPAIRS
Sunday, April 19th, 2009
We’re still waiting on the belt drive parts for Eric’s Taxi bike, stay tuned!
I finished AJ’s touring frame and just got the Nitto racks he’ll be using; I’m working out a fork low-rider attachment, and he’s working on paint selection! Here are some pix of the frame in progress; note the crown carving & custom hanger for the rear canti brake adjuster.






I also did some more paint work for Marty at Geekhouse; first another belt drive bike, this time using an S&S coupler to get the belt thru the frame, and then a road bike with a carbon fork:




Our friend Bob brought in a single speed Sillgey frame on which he wanted a derailleur hanger installed, here are some shots of that:




And last but not least, the good folks at Harris Cyclery brought us a well-worn Rivendell Quickbeam. It had been in an accident and needed a replacement fork, and they asked us to switch over the low-rider rack mounts from the (bent) orange fork to the new green one, and repaint the new fork and original frame. I had to fashion a makeshift jig to get the mounts parallel to each other, and in the right spot, here are some pictures of that:




And here’s the finished product, with new decals courtesy of Harris:






Next: hopefully, finally, belt drive in action; finishing AJ’s; and Viva la Reba!
NICK’S MONOSTAY, and ANT & KONA IN THE HOUSE
Sunday, November 23rd, 2008
So last week I started on local yokel Nick’s lugged fixie with monostay. He’s using the very cool and ornate Richard Sachs lugs. Here’s some as the front end is getting brazed up:
And here are some shots of me getting the monostay jigged up. It’s a cast piece that we braze to three sections of seat stay. On the right you can see where I’ve brazed a piece of seat tube onto the top of the monostay so it can’t punch through the seat tube (I’ve seen it happen!):
Soon it’ll be time for paint. Speaking of which, I had the pleasure of painting one of Mike Flanigan’s fantastic ANT’s. Here it is, reminding us that nothing looks as hot as gloss black, until you get finger prints all over it…
We also did some work on Mike’s Kona – removed a horribly stuck seat post, updated the braze-ons, and repainted a lovely pearl, with the original decals from the UK:
And finally, Adrienne’s bike went out the door, kitted out with Sram Rival components and Shimano medium reach brakes:
Next – finishing Nick’s!
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COUPLED TOURER and SCHWINN TWINN
Friday, August 15th, 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:





