About Me

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Back in my hometown of Jonesboro., Arkansas, United States
My name is Dimitri Harris and I have been building frames for over 9 years now. I learned the basics after spending two weeks with Koichi Yamaguchi. He is one of the most interesting people I have ever met and I am thankful to have worked with him. Since then I have just been building one frame after another and learning as much as possible along the way. I build steel fillet-brazed frames that go by the name of MEECH, which is an old nickname that I have had since I was a kid. I build mostly cyclocross frames because I love their versatility however I also do road,single-speed, and mountain bikes as well. Custom frames start around $1400. All the frames are handmade by me here in Jonesboro, Arkansas. I am insured and guarantee all of my work so if you are in the market for a custom steel frame I would be glad to build it for you. I am also building frames from carbon fiber so if you would like to ride a prototype frame give me a shout. Thanks for stopping by. You can email me at meech151@hotmail.com or call (870)897-6703 or visit www.meechcustombicycles.com Thanks.

Thursday, March 9, 2017

When Paint Schemes Go Awry

The last time I posted I believe I said something to the effect that the next time I post it would be with some color. Well, it took a while but here it is. After seeing a few Van Halen posts on Facebook I decided to incorporate a little EVH voodoo into one of my frames. It turned out to be a little harder than I anticipated. I think painting a bicycle might be a little harder than painting a guitar but I wouldn't tell Eddie that.  On second thought,
yes i would!

This was how it turned out after the first time I completed it and it just didn't seem to meld, however, as I'm looking at it here a couple days later it doesn't seem so bad. The head tube design, which I had no actual design at all wasn't even close to working. The paint job was good however it looked like it belonged on 3 different frames instead of one. After spending so much time trying to get this thing right and then to finish and realize it the paint scheme didn't really work like you thought it would was devastating at first, but what do you do? Shake it off and give it another dig. It took 4 tries to get the fork right, not to mention I got talked into some primer that didn't jibe with my painting products. That really messed things up from step one. I laid down the first color of base coat and it immediately started cracking and looking like a spider web. Took a long time to diagnose the problem but we finally figured it out and fortunately it was nothing that I was doing. That's always great to hear after you've beat yourself up for a week. The primer incident was a lot of the reason it took so long. Anyway, all water under the bridge.

Here's the "do-over" as we used to call it when we played football on the playground. I feel much better about it now. A buddy of mine even said that it looks just like me. Was that a compliment? Not sure. Anyway, I'm still not sure it's done. I think it needs some black where the top tube and down tube meet the seat tube and then also on the other side where the stays connect. Geez! When will I be able to move on?

Image result for eddie van halens guitars



3 comments:

  1. How tall is he? He may want the bike when he see's it! Maybe be will trade the guitar for the bike. I've never ridden a guitar. Are they fast? What a sweet frame. Craftsmanship is beautiful as always.

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  3. I would make him an even swap for his Frankenstrat guitar even though I feel that paint job is a little better than his. I know that he didn't suffer as much painting that guitar. Thanks!

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