Few quick shots of Arne's TA fork

20mm through axle, built with tapering blades. This is actually something I've never done before, but I think it came out looking pretty neat. Note that the ugly-ass bolts in the binders are the ones I use when welding/brazing, they will be replaced with nice pretty ones before the fork goes out.



I'm sort of working on two frames at once right now, which is usually something I try to avoid, just because I'm easily confused. Going to work on finishing up John's FS bike (pictures to come) today and tomorrow while I wait for some parts for Arne, then move on to that project.

Happy belated Thanksgiving...

We spent the holiday in the emergency room (everyone is ok now) so it wasn't exactly a blast, but c'est la vie.

I'm working on some fairly interesting stuff this week (Arne's belt-driven fixie, John's 29" DH/Freeride bike) so I'll try to post lots of picture and such.

In the meantime, check out this cool (if depressing) interactive map of diabetes rates in the United States. Go Colorado!

Socks are here! Plus, sock/shirt and sock/shirt/hoodie deals!

I decided to remove the writing on the sole, in the interest of maximum comfort (and because it seemed silly to have writing on a part of the sock that you'll never see when wearing it). Here's a picture of the finished product:


The online sales for shirts/socks/other apparel is going to be handled (from now on) by Alchemist - I can't deal with packing and shipping socks and such all day, so they will take over, UNLESS you are having a bike shipped to you - if that's the case, let me know what you want, and the items will be included on your final invoice (and will ship with your frame/fork/whatever).

Belt drive ala Paragon

Early shots of Arne's frame - this is the split for the belt drive. Basically, I just drill the dropout for the M8 bolt, and bolt on the coupler (there are two sizes, this is the larger one, for oversized seatstays). It (along with the dropout) is stainless steel, so the interface does not get painted/powdercoated.





It's pretty simple, works well, and adds about 20g of weight. Nothing super exciting, but people ask me about this all the time, so I figured I'd post a picture or two of how I do it. For what it's worth, I'm still not a big fan of the belts for anything but townies - everyone I know who's tried one on a mountain bike has ended up back on a chain after dealing with constant skipping, popping, weird noises, and alignment nightmares.

This is an urban/CX setup, with SUPER beefy chainstays to minimize frame flex. In fact, the frame is going to be something of a tank - but it'll be fun to tool around town on, and hopefully the belt will work just fine for that.

Sunday photos, and random stainless first impressions

First off, here's a picture of Wolfgang's 36er townie in all it's glory. It's kind of funny how *short* it looks with those big wheels. It's got a dynamo/light setup, Schlumpf drive (2 speeds) and according to Wolfgang, rides great. Sweet!

Anyway, I digress. Got in some inspecting of the KVA stainless tubes (no pictures, they just look like shiny metal tubes, so I didn't see any point) and here are my initial impressions:
-Weight and butting seem to be right to spec. Fantastic. I've already gotten a lot of questions about weight, and I'll say this: a frame built from these tubes won't be much/any lighter than regular old OX platinum. It's 7/4/7 butting, mostly, with 1mm head tube. So the big advantage is the stainlessness, not the weight.
-The finish seems quite nice. It remains to be seen whether it will look good post-welding, or post heat-treating, but as of now, I can imagine riding a bike made from this without doing much of anything in terms of brushing/sanding/blasting. We'll see for sure after I actually build something with it. This is rolled/welded tubing (ie, it's made from a piece of sheet metal rolled into a tube), but the welds are not visible, at least to me.
-The tubes have some weird flat spots/markings on them (at the ends) that are a bit disconcerting. These seem to match up pretty closely with the butts, so I'm assuming they're connected with that process in some way. I will ask about this - the flat spots at the ends are fairly obvious from up close, and I'm not sure about whether they affect the strength of the tube or not. My calipers aren't accurate enough to measure the difference in wall thickness, but it's got to be at least somewhat significant.

Weekend quick tip

So my pal Pisgahproductions doesn't like zipties (commie!) We found what we *thought* was a good solution - run full length housing (or a hose, if anyone ever makes a hydraulic brifter) for his rear brake through some little double loop eyelets, like you'd find on an old-school road bike.

Problem is, the eyelets turned out to be too big, so the housing was going to bounce around like crazy. On a whim, I mentioned that we could use the conventional ziptie guides and that he could use safety wire instead. I used to safety wire my dirtbike grips on to keep them from coming loose (inexplicably, no moto people had figured out to use lock-on style grips at that time), and it works well for pretty much anything.

I thought this was something everyone knew about - I used to attach all kinds of things that were in danger of coming loose with safety wire. But apparently it's not commonly used on bikes, and I'm not sure why. Anyway, that's your weekend tip - safety wire rocks. And no, you don't *need* to have the special pliers, it's just nice if you're doing a lot of wiring. For a bike, use do it with some needle-nose. Remember to wear some safety goggles when you clip the ends!

Photos for Todd

Well, hobbling around the shop is painful enough that I've decided to spend the afternoon doing computer work (sitting down hurts less). So, first up, some photos for Todd. This is a fairly conventional 29" geared frame/fork combo with s-bend, plenty of tire clearance and shortish stays, and a direct mount front derailleur setup. Nothing earth-shattering, but it should be a solid and fun ride, and that's the goal.

In other news, the KVA stainless tubes came in today. Have just unwrapped and ogled a bit, I'll do a post about them next week at some point.

Stupid back...

Sorry for the lack of bloggage this week, I threw by back out a bit yesterday and working has been a bit difficult. I've spent a lot of time soaking in Epsom salts, taking ibuprofen, and reading Jerome K. Jerome.

Still hoping to finish Eric and Todd's frames today (if I can hobble well enough to manage it) and get them to the powdercoater on Monday.

Back on the stainless bandwagon?

Some of you may recall that I spent some time playing around with Reynolds 953 a few years ago. Long story short, I wasn't happy with the tube butting profiles, the manufacturing quality, or the customer service (let's just say I ended up a lot poorer, and with a frame that IMO isn't safe to ride, due to a sudden change in the recommended welding process on their part).

So I washed my hands of the whole thing - the 953 ends up as expensive as ti anyway, and as everyone knows, I'm about a grouchy and anti-ti as it's possible to be.

Now there's a new (American) company making stainless bicycle tubing: KVA. My friend and super master framebuilder (I'm not worthy!) Dave Bohm did the test work on these tubes in person (before they had even figured out how to butt them), so I'm pretty confident that it's not junk.

The butting (as of now they're only making road/cross tubesets) is a nice standard 7/4/7, so while it'll be hard to miter, it won't be *stupid* hard. Enough material for a standard cross or road frame at the ends, not so silly thin in the middle that it'll dent too easily. I'm hoping they do some 8/5/8 stuff in mountain bike diameters/lengths soon, but we'll see.

The price isn't bad, either - about $400 for a full tubeset, with dropouts and brazeons adding $50 or so. When all is said and done, not ridiculously more expensive than conventional steel, and about half the price of ti. I'm not sure how finishing it will work out - my guess is that a lot of people will want it raw/industrial looking, so that saves a few bucks on the powdercoat as well.

In any case, my friend Kris got himself on the waitlist and volunteered to be the guinea pig, but I was too excited to wait, so I went ahead and ordered the tubes yesterday - I'll post again with some impressions when they're here.

My dream is a stainless steel tubeset that isn't weight/road bike-focused, but instead durability/mountain configuration - 8/5/8 or even 9/6/9 butting, nice big diameters, and lengths long enough that I can (natch) build 29ers. Maybe in a few years that will be a reality.

Waltworks in der Schweiz

No, not you, Redcoat. Thanks to Daniel for the pictures. The bike will have a matching WW fork soon (not that there's anything wrong with that *sweet* Igleheart!) - I had to build a new one after Daniel made a bit of a mistake cutting the steerer on the first.

I just paid $50...

...for a pair of socks.

Of course, they're the samples for the new Waltworks Bicycles socks. And they are rad:
-Super comfy, designed for cycling, with a nice 5" cuff.
-Awesome bamboo fiber/nylon/lycra mix (about half bamboo) that is (no joke, I tested this) pretty good at keeping your feet from getting stinky, even if you, say, don't change them for an entire 24 hour race. Don't ask me how I know this - let's just say I had ONE bamboo sock (I don't match my socks much) and one non-bamboo one... and the results were horrifically obvious.
-Original WW missing-tooth guy logo.
-Made right here in Colorado with environmentally friendly materials and processes.

I'm trying to decide whether to keep the embroidered words on the lower part of the sock. I'm not a huge fan of unnecessary stuff like that, and I'd rather have the underside of the sock free of lumps (though honestly it's not really noticeable - I'm wearing the socks now).

I don't have a precise ETA for these, but they'll be available for sure by early 2011. They will probably be sold mostly through the Alchemist site, but WW frame/fork/whatever customers can also get them directly from me to save on hassle/shipping. Expect cost to be $8-10 a pair. We may do a t-shirt/socks package deal of some kind too, I will need to talk to Jeff about that.

126.9!

I've finally broken the 1:27 Kilo mark (horribly, pathetically slow). Thanks to Nick for the idiotic looking picture...gonna be a long road to 1:20, I think.

And no, I'm not sure why my helmet is not on straight. Normally I wear some sweet clear safety glasses, too, but I left them at home.

Random for-sale post

So I built myself a new track fork, and I like it a lot, so I don't need the old fork anymore. Maybe one of you out there on the interwebs can use it:
-370mm axle-crown (ie, standard road bike fork length)
-43mm rake (again, dead standard)
-Unicrown blades, 1 1/8" steerer that's 11" long
-Fine for anyone up to 200#
-Clearance for up to about a 28c tire, but not any bigger
-Lifetime warranty
-$75 unpainted, or $100 with a nice black powdercoat. Or trade me something interesting, or make me an offer.

Note that there's no brake drilling, but I can add that for you for $15 if you want it. Otherwise, a great lightweight fork for your fixed gear or track bike. If you want a picture, drop me a line and I'll take one (tomorrow, when the shop is above freezing).

Couple random shots for Eric

I've taken to turning down the bottom portion (where the TT and seatstays join) of my seat tube sleeves on the lathe. This is mostly because it's a PITA to get the mill scale off the tubing, and the lathe can do it for me while I do something else. It probably also saves 2.4 grams or something. Whoopdee doo.





This will be a road/cross/tour bike, with disc brakes and some light rack capability, as well as clearance for pretty big (35) tires and fenders. Sort of a Swiss Army Knife setup. I'm a HUGE fan of the Paragon low-mount disc dropouts for this kind of bike - they keep the brake caliper out of the way of your rack really well. Plus they are just cool.

In other news, I rode a 1:27.3 Kilo today. That's .2 seconds faster than my old record. Must be the new fork. Humorously, I wasn't looking where i was going when starting my sprint on the apron and almost hit Nowork's bike. I think I can hit 1:25 just by improving my godawful starts...1:20, though will take some actual power improvements. It would be interesting to ride on an actual 250m (or longer) track (maybe even one that isn't plywood) to see if I was faster. I have a really hard time holding the black line in the turns (and you have to do 16 turns on our mighty 126m track).

New track fork

Today was probably the last nice day of the fall, so I caught a quick ride at Marshall with Wu, did some work on Eric's new cross bike, and slapped together a new track fork for myself out of scrap tubing I had sitting around - some cool .049" streamline tubing, a steerer that had a kinda short butt, and some random 1/4" plate (the dropouts, which kinda suck). The only part that actually cost money was the crown race. Cool.

I would do a lot of things differently if I was doing it again (mostly use better materials), but this should be a good replacement for my crappy unicrown, which has way too much rake (43mm). This is 34mm, much better - trail will be back up the low 60s, where it should be. I'll have to re-learn how to corner, of course. The streamline tubing should be good for like, at least 5 seconds off my kilo time... yeah, right. For the curious, the fork is about 900 grams with an 11" steerer. Nice and heavy, not that it'll matter on the track.

Weather's supposed to suck tomorrow, so maybe I'll get a chance to try her out with Nowork at the track.

Weekend recipe: Green Chile Stew

As many of you know, I grew up in NM and have a great fondness for green chile. I've always wanted to find a good vegetarian green chile stew recipe, and this one is pretty awesome, IMO. I serve it over quinoa.

Green Chile Stew

2# seitan or tofu, cut into 1cm cubes
1/4c flour
1/4c butter
10 cloves of garlic, crushed
3c of veggie broth
1c of hot salsa (whatever you've got around, I use the stuff I make myself)
3tsp dried oregano
1tsp ground cumin
3 small potatoes, cubed
1 can hominy
2c of diced hot green chile
1 onion, diced

In a big pot, melt the butter, then fry the seitan/tofu for a while after rolling it in the flour. Dump any remaining flour into the pot as well.

Now dump in the onion and garlic, fry until the onions are getting transparent.

Add all the other ingredients and simmer for a couple of hours, or until the potatoes are cooked.

It's not Nellie's GC sauce, but it's darn good. Give it a try.

Weekend recipe

Nowork track part 2

Well, did an intense hour on the track with Nowork (he took the picture) today. He seems to like the new bike quite well - nice and stable on the straights, dives into corners nicely, etc. Then again, he did most of the design work himself, so if he hadn't liked it - tough cookies!

The track was deserted. We've had a really warm fall and it's not helping their business. I really hope they survive... it's a great resource for cyclists around here to have.

Also, I'm announcing my official goal for the winter (remember the 200 pound bench press?) - this year I'm doing a 1:20 Kilo. For real. As of now, my best time (which I tied today) is 1:27. 7 seconds is a lot.

Yes, I know. I suck really badly. And my "goal" time is still shockingly mediocre. What can I say? I sit 8 feet in the air and weigh 145 freakin pounds.

I haven't decided if I'll allow equipment modifications (aerobars? aero wheels? skinsuit with vaseline rubbed all over it?) but since I really suck, I probably won't spend any actual money on this goal, just effort. We'll see if I can do it...

Nowork's track bike

...yes, I'm still alive. Slow on the blogging front, as I'm still recovering from the double whammy of getting Luis' frame done for the second time and my 34th birthday yesterday (I went to the climbing gym and for a run and the dentist for about the 10th time in 2 months. Awesome.)

And this is the frame that caused it, because this is what I was building and forgot to remove the spacer for the BB shell when I started on Luis' frame. Looking good so far - we'll see what Nick thinks of it on Friday when he shells me at the track as usual.