Now Thats a Cone!

My blogging and frame building has been a little sporadic here lately.  I got caught up on my orders the other day and have been using my time to build a couple of frames that are unique to me, basically frames I've never built.  I'm half way into two frames because I'm waiting on a bottom bracket shell to get engraved on one and I needed a part machined in order to work on another.  That big cone on the left is what I was waiting on.  In addition to the first mixte-style frame that I'm working on I started on this cross frame thats gonna have a tapered head tube and disc brakes.  This head tube is much bigger than it appears, a little heavy, but also pretty sexy.  Are we talking about bicycles or women?  I forget.  Its 2:30 a.m. on a very rainy Wednesday here.  I went for a ride yesterday evening, rode fairly hard for an hour or so, and went to bed early.  That lead to waking up in the middle of the night hungry and now I'm unable to sleep.  Anyway, the lower diameter of this "sexy" headtube is pretty wide and I needed a much larger cone in order to hold it in the jig.  The cone on the far right is what came with my Bringheli jig. It works for up to a 1 1/8" head tube.  The middle one is a cone that I had machined in order to accommodate an integrated style head tube.  And of course the big one on the left is the new one.  Its a nice piece, quite the hunk of steel.  I'm guessing it weighs close to 3 lbs.  More than a rock-laced snowball.  Kids do the darndest things.  Did you ever have a potato fight?  Someone always gets hurt in those. 

Do these seat stays look special to you?  They didn't look special to me either on Monday morning when I started mitering them, however these here seat stays were the absolute hardest, most difficult, nail-biting, pulling your hair, pain in the arse seat stays that I have ever mitered.  For no particular reason I just could not get these things to fits right. For starters, they are s-bend stays and you have to be very careful to get  both stays even.  Imagine having two S's, (not sure how to spell S's), one is laying perfectly flat on the table while the other is tilted a bit.  See the potential problem, not to mention if one 'S' sits higher than the other.  Now add the fact that these are slotted to fit the dropout style.  Anyway, I've mitered stays like this before in less than an hour but these took me most of Monday to get right.  Funny thing is, during this whole conundrum I kept worrying that they were gonna be too short before I got them to fit  the frame and I would have to start over, fortunately though when I did finally get them dialed in (at 4:30 Monday afternoon) they fell right on the mark.  All is well that ends well.

Perfect.  While I've been bouncing back on forth on these two frames I've also been working on a new website as well as some MEECH cycling apparel.  I'm working to step my business up a notch.  Building bike frames is not near as hard as building a market for them, or so I've found.  I know there are some builder's out there, much more experienced and famous than I, who have 4-5 year waiting lists and are potentially making a six-figure salary but I don't think that speaks for the majority of us.  I may have to get a part-time job just to support my job.  So be it. Frame building is worth it.  Nothing good comes easy.  As I was laying in bed listening to the rain I was thinking about frame building and how to make my business better, how to make life better, and so on.  The thought arose that there is always some price to pay for just about everything.  Hence all these little sayings, like, 'nothing is free', 'you get what you pay for', and 'you've got to give a little to get a little.'  Then I thought, "Well, in order to get a lot you must have to give a lot", and ultimately, "If you want everything I guess you have to be willing to give everything." But what is everything? Who would want everything? I'm sure Jesus already covered this somewhere in the bible.  Maybe the eternal life that Jesus spoke of is "everything." I have no idea. Its late and I'm just drifting. Good luck with "everything."  "Hey bartender, mas Tequila!"  I'm just playing, I never drank Tequila, its vile.  Who the hell would want to drink something with a worm floating in it?  Goofy Mexicanos.  And the freakin Americans want to drink the stuff so bad that they sniff salt and suck lemons just to get it down.  What kind of drink is that? And whats with those Greeks?  They put the Olympics on a couple of years ago, it wasn't even that good, and now the whole world is still paying for it. Clowns!  How many more people can I offend? How much money can the governments waste? Greed, scandals, war.  The older I get the more war just looks stupid to me, nothing but a waste of good life and resources.  But then I know that sometimes in life there are occasions where you have to fight, its inevitable. So I've got a plan.  "Oh no, not another one of your plans."  Yes Virginia, another brilliant plan. When countries have disagreements, instead of wasting all those resources and sending a bunch of kids out there to fight their battles for them, how about if just the presidents of the conflicting countries fight each other, kinda like a boxing match or MMA fight. We could host them in stadiums around the world, like the World Cup, sell tickets, beer, souvenirs, throw in PayPerView.  It would generate billions of dollars. Who wouldn't have tuned in to watch a fight between George W. and Saddam Hussein?  It would've been the fight of the century.  You could have some preliminary bouts as well like Iran and Israel, throw North Korea in there somewhere. You could also give smaller, poorer countries a shot to better themselves like Nicaragua and Morroco.  They would play the underdog, the long-shot, with big odds. You know Vegas wants in on this, unfortunately the mob probably does to.  Can't be having fixed fights.  My  plan was to save lives and generate money, and at least make the man who's doing the talking put up or shut up, and put an end to these 10-year wars. However we might just end up with exactly what we have now, big guys picking on smaller guys. What?  All this jabbering and I'm back to Square-1.  This is absurd.  I think I better just stick to building frames.  One things for sure, it would  change the campaigns  for the presidency. They'd need speed, strength, and some 6-pack abs to get a vote, and maybe they wouldn't end up looking so pathetic. I bet alot of countries would be beggin for illegal immigrants then. I imagine President Obama could hold his own with most countries until you start messin with those Latinos. Those guys can fight. !Que peligrosos! I'm going to bed now. My name is Dimitri by the way.  Yep, you guessed it, greek. Chao, or avtio.