I made a little progress on the fixed-gear frame this weekend. This has been a slow build because its not for anyone in particular and what started out as "just gonna build a simple fixie frame because I had some track dropouts laying around", has turned into a one-off-fest. I was just gonna throw some drop bars on this thing but then I decided to try my luck with some handmade aero bars. With a little steel stock that was laying around and some airplane strut tubing from the Spruce I brazed up my first set and they're not so bad. Let me change that, they're bad, they're "jam beef-mondo bad." I built them fairly quickly and on Saturday morning I was cleaning up the brazing when I decided to test the strength. I mounted them in the BB shell fixture on my alignment table and grabbed them on the ends and put a little body weight on them. I felt a little bend in them before I got the entire $1.60 that I weigh on them. Where the aero tubes were brazed onto the stem tube was folding inward, stem was too light. What do you expect, I'm an ex-racer, I want my bike to weigh nothing. Damn, not good, screwed-up, wasted time, yeah I was pissed. Pffff, garbage can. Wait just a second there hotshot, you can fix these. So I ripped the bars of the stem, cut the stem tube off about one inch in front of the steerer clamp and used that as an inside lug and slid a larger beefier tube over it, and then re-brazed it with a mondo fillet. The stem is the "beef", the fillet is "mondo", and the "jam" is just something that sounds sweet, "jam beef-mondo bars." Now you can do tricep dips on 'em. If you hit a car with these something is gonna get scratched. I included a couple of pics of the fork. I still haven't brazed the crown race ring on yet. I'm out of silver and i can't order any until my new credit card shows up. Apparently someone got the number off the old one so its best just to change. You can see the cut-outs I put on the inside of the fork blades so you can get an average sized tire in there. I've made a couple of mistakes during this build but they were easily fixed and educational so no big deal. Got a few more fine details before its completed but it will be done before long. I cannot for the life of me figure out how I want to paint this thing. Racey. Chao.
I made a little progress on the fixed-gear frame this weekend. This has been a slow build because its not for anyone in particular and what started out as "just gonna build a simple fixie frame because I had some track dropouts laying around", has turned into a one-off-fest. I was just gonna throw some drop bars on this thing but then I decided to try my luck with some handmade aero bars. With a little steel stock that was laying around and some airplane strut tubing from the Spruce I brazed up my first set and they're not so bad. Let me change that, they're bad, they're "jam beef-mondo bad." I built them fairly quickly and on Saturday morning I was cleaning up the brazing when I decided to test the strength. I mounted them in the BB shell fixture on my alignment table and grabbed them on the ends and put a little body weight on them. I felt a little bend in them before I got the entire $1.60 that I weigh on them. Where the aero tubes were brazed onto the stem tube was folding inward, stem was too light. What do you expect, I'm an ex-racer, I want my bike to weigh nothing. Damn, not good, screwed-up, wasted time, yeah I was pissed. Pffff, garbage can. Wait just a second there hotshot, you can fix these. So I ripped the bars of the stem, cut the stem tube off about one inch in front of the steerer clamp and used that as an inside lug and slid a larger beefier tube over it, and then re-brazed it with a mondo fillet. The stem is the "beef", the fillet is "mondo", and the "jam" is just something that sounds sweet, "jam beef-mondo bars." Now you can do tricep dips on 'em. If you hit a car with these something is gonna get scratched. I included a couple of pics of the fork. I still haven't brazed the crown race ring on yet. I'm out of silver and i can't order any until my new credit card shows up. Apparently someone got the number off the old one so its best just to change. You can see the cut-outs I put on the inside of the fork blades so you can get an average sized tire in there. I've made a couple of mistakes during this build but they were easily fixed and educational so no big deal. Got a few more fine details before its completed but it will be done before long. I cannot for the life of me figure out how I want to paint this thing. Racey. Chao.
This is looking pretty interesting. Kind of want to ride it.
ReplyDeleteHey Steve, whats up. Yeah its definitely gonna be one of a kind. I don't think Thor Hushovd could flex these bars. I still have a few more little features in store for it. Check back. Have a good holiday.
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