Current Work

The waiting game...

No baby still. Due date came and went this weekend.

We are hoping things will all happen naturally but after 10 days it will fall in the hands of the doctors. It is difficult for both Andrea and I since we are hesitant to start something that might get interrupted and put on the back burner. I have Shawn's bike completely fixtured and would love to start welding it but don't want to get a phone call mid way and walk away. I still might go for it since it could literally be days which I don't want to waste. Here are some pictures of Shawn's bike awaiting me to clean the tubes and prep them for welding.

This past weekend was also D2R2 which to me looks like a great event and hopefully next year will attend. Lucky for me the baby did not arrive on the day of the event so in the future I will avoid it being a birthday weekend!

Cheers and again if there is a downtime it is because my baby is born.

-Drew

Clarification

I think I was a bit too technical in my last post so this is a simpler explanation.

When I build a bike I tend to braze drop outs so I can obtain an organic flow from stay to drop out. This transition is very important to the look of my bikes. Titanium requires a bike to be completely welded and this has a totally different look in the drop out area (not saying that is bad, just different from what I like or prefer). I was very focused on this area and wanted to make an aesthetic that was not just a welded stay to drop out. This is where I was unsettled and not happy with results. These results were not speaking in terms of anything other than making me happy. In fact numerous people looking at my work along the way said "wow that looks cool!". I begged to differ, it just did not do it for me. Anyway I hope this might read easier. It is difficult to explain.

Thanks for reading.

Cheers,
Drew

Keeping Aesthetics

Well I spent a week plus trying to make myself happy with a Ti rear assembly and ultimately I gave up.

One of the unfortunate things about Ti is in a normal world it cannot be brazed (it can be brazed but the real way to do it is in a controlled chamber that is oxygen free which is unrealistic) and since it cannot be brazed I need to make some compromises or find solutions that will maintain my aesthetic. What I did was make a bunch of constant diameter rear ends out of steel so as to not toss a slew of Ti. I tried bullets, 3/4", 7/8", 5/8" (for seat stays), hoods, plate style and a few other things but at the end of the day (well week actually) I did not like any of them and junked the project.

Steel offers more than one option in a nicely tapered seat stay and chain stay that can be bent to whatever clearances I want (also not easy without the correct tooling). Ti does not have these offerings so I need to get to work on getting Ti in the tapers I want to maintain the look of my bikes. I need to be happy with the end product and excited to build them. Once I tossed the rear ends for this steel beta bike I felt so much better. I maintained big tire clearance (which is not for everyone but needs to be available), clean lines and most of all a super nice transition into the drop out. This is the big issue with me, I love the look of a finished drop out.

I have some friends in the right line of work that are willing to give it a go and we are going to work on tapering some Ti tubing. It puts the project on hold for another day but I still need to build the 3 bikes that I had in the queue that were going to be beta bikes (beta being the loose term used--basically bikes for people I trust to give me quality feedback). One is Ed's new geared 29R (with a tapered headtube, pressfit 30 BB and a direct mount front der), then Shawn's geared 29R and lastly Adam's 29R single speed. These guys are animals on the bike and ride really hard. I figure it is a good opportunity to try out a few of the new items on the market and see how I like them. The direct mount thing seems like a really slick idea. I am already a huge fan of the pressfit 30. This will also be the first hardtail I make with a tapered fork.

One would think of the week as wasted but I felt it was a good project and I am glad I got it out of my system. I don't like having an opinion on something without fact to back it up. Now when people ask "why don't you make Ti bikes?" I can answer with honesty.

Here are some photos of Ed's bike after I bailed on the constant diameter stays and went with what I know and love:

If there seems to be a sudden lack of postings assume my baby was born and I will be back in a month or so.

Thanks for reading.

Cheers,
Drew

Guess that bridge

Jeff sent me some photos of his road bike all built up.

It is rare that I do not see a bike to completion so when I get photos of them it always makes me feel better. The ride report is the icing on the cake. These photos are rather cool so I hope Jeff does not mind me sharing them with the world. The bridge is somewhere in N.J.