What a joy spring can be. Today it’s about 80* with a light breeze………… a perfect day to build a JKS. This one is for a gentleman named Irv and it’s coming along well. Yesterday I cut the lugs and brazed the chainstays and fork tips in and today I got all the main tubes cut and mitered and brazed, and the front triangle cleaned and aligned. It’s now ready to have the rear end added tomorrow.

By this time tomorrow I should be near done with the frame and then it’s on to the fork.

Now to go enjoy that warm sun and light breeze with an easy spin.

Later,

Dave

As you may have noticed I like taking very close up and detailed photographs of my work. I guess this stems from the fact that that is how I see the frame much of the time. When working on a frame you start by looking at the whole with all the tubes sitting in the jig and then you transition to seeing just the little details that you are fussing over. I love this part. Once all the little details are taken care of you can stand back and see it again as a whole and the whole process comes full circle.

Here are a few shots of a frame I sent of to Joe Bell’s yesterday seen from my point of view.

Have a great long weekend and please remember the reason for all the mattress sales and BBQ’s. Thanks to all who have served. We owe you more than I can say.

Dave

Well we had new snow less than a week ago but today it was 90*. Spring in Montana means you can have most any kind of weather. I look forward to it cooling off a few degrees in a hour or so and then getting out for a spin.

I started a new bike today – a classic all rounder with long point lugs. I really like taking the Pacenti lugs and cutting them way back and just making long simple points with them. I’ve cut Pacentis a good number of times, in a good number of ways over the years but nothing pleases me like a set of long, lean, and elegant points. I have the tubes for this bike all mitered and ready so tomorrow morning I’ll cut the lugs and then braze the front triangle together.

I work alone as most of you know and this makes having good music to listen to paramount. I’m a huge Tom Waits fan and not too long ago stumbled on a live recording he made recently. It’s from the “Glitter and Doom” tour and I have to say this is a must have for the Tom Waits fans out there. You can find it on the NPR music site. It’s about 2 hours of live recording and the quality is very good. I for one love it. I listened to it today while building a fork and I was in gravel voiced heaven. Check it out here –   

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=92916923

Over and out.

Dave

This is a frameset I just finished for a very nice woman from the Bay Area of California. The rider is not a big person and needed a sporty bike with all day comfort and the ability to mount a rack for light day touring. 

Many lighter riders have a hard time finding a frame that isn’t too stiff. I realize that might sound odd and so many feel that the stiffer the better but it’s just not true. Most smaller frames are built with the same tubing that would be used for a much larger and heavier rider and this coupled with the fact that frames get stiffer as they get smaller means that the light weight rider ends up with a frame much stiffer than than a larger, heavy rider uses. It doesn’t make much sense to me.

This frame, like all my frames, is not only made to measure in size but also in stiffness. It uses smaller tube diameters for the top and down tube which will give a smoother ride and the chainstays are made thinner to reduce weight and add the right amount of flex for the size of the rider and use of the bike. Lastly the Terraplane stays have a more radical bend to work better with this rider’s weight.

The frame ended up being in the low 3 pound range and should last a lifetime. As of this morning it’s off to JB to get a subtle yellow paint scheme. There will be more shots of it when it returns.

Thanks for looking,

Dave

I think it was well over a year ago when I was first approached by some book publishers from Australia to take part in a project they were working on. They were publishing a book about custom handmade bicycles and I was excited to take part. After sending them lots of photos and going through a written interview process I waited to hear from them. Well just recently I got my copy of the book and I think it turned out well. 

For those that like looking at coffee table bike books this one is pretty good. It has some of the worlds best builders featured along with lots of newer talent.  I see that Amazon has it in stock and I’m guessing that other places do too. Here’s the link to the book on Amazon. Cut and paste this into your browser - 

https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss__1_8?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=custom+bicycles+a+passionate+pursuit&sprefix=custom+b

Stay well,

Dave

Thanks to all who expressed interest in the 57. I’m pleased to say it’s found a new owner and is headed off to JB for him to work his magic.

Stay well.

Dave

P.S.  Here’s a photo of the girls waiting for the real spring to get to Montana.