arrange disorder

2010-01-10T08:15:00.010-05:00

this entry is a composite based on posts from two very similar threads about the framebuilding trade -

>>> I'm new to this forum, but have been involved with others and have spent countless hours
>>> looking at various custom builder websites the past month.:adore: There seems to be a lot
>>> of great, talented builders. How did you guys choose which builder to go with?

buy a frame from a professional framebuilder who has some degree of experience
and a history in the trade, the sport, or both atmo. the electronic era age has made
it possible for many who have short term work periods and outputs seem like career
veterans. find a way to filter through this.

>>> I've heard you say this before, and I agree with it. That being said, say I found a 'new'
>>> builder whose personality jived with me. They seemed to know what they were doing,
>>> and their work spoke to me.
>>> How would you objectively judge someone who's new to the scene?
>>> Thanks for the info.

i'd wait until they weren't new atmo. these are vehicles,
not macrame. i say that with respect and love.

>>> I agree, but playing devil's advocate...
>>> So if that was the way everyone went around doing things, how would they get their start?
>>> First working for a bigger parent company and then branching off and using their history to
>>> market themselves?

since there's no accredited house of learning nor apprenticeships as such, well - yeah, ya have to
learn somewhere before you operate. don't make me state the obvious because it tends to alienate,
and that's never the intention atmo. how do you choose others with whom you spend money? your
physician, accountant, home appliance contractors, etc? they didn't just "start working" without first
developing a skill set, a routine, some level(s) of expertise...

>>> Slightly OT, but going in this direction...
>>> Why aren't there more apprenticeships offered? Impatience? Lack of opportunity? I'm
>>> assuming that that's the right way to learn, no? When these guys get out of apprenticing,
>>> are they still "new," or are they established?
>>> I think I've read an answer on this before, but I can't recall it (or maybe it never existed).

there never were any to speak of atmo. the term is misused to the nines. and the reason we
have what we have now is because of the internet, and the fantasy that comes when looking
over the electronic fence and trying to appropriate a career when one has zeal but no training.
framebuilding has always (999999.9 percent, that is) been about folks wanting to do better,
or finer, or with less restrictions, or fewer managers, or simply wanting to tell the conventional
market and industry to get the eff outa' my face. most cats, at least at the front end, got sick
the eff of the routine of the workplace and left. what they began with was an experience level,
some connections, and a fresh attitude - and were now their own boss. but most importantly,
they all had been through the work stations, and the repetitive drills, and all things in between.
they didn't learn the basics in year one of their eponymous (i LOVE that word) firm's existence.
they didn't start a business with 20 frames under their belt. shut me up already. and they knew
how to make frames, period. they simply made them for themselves now rather than for the man.

these are different times atmo. industrial frames in the last 20 years have become so incredibly
well designed and made that any need for a trip to a frame shop is not for the same reason it may
have been a generation or so prior. in the pre-MTB era, it was unthinkable to get a good bicycle for
racing from the rank and file LBS because most of them (the bicycles) sucked. over the course of
20 or so years, while all of that did a 180, the number of folks building frames suffered as a result.
many simply vaporized atmo. the newer crop, those from the internet and forum era, have another
calling altogether. most have built and incredibly small number of frames, either before they went
commercial, or since. the business they are in is a unique model. actually, i don't know what it is.
no matter.

some of us do what we can to plant seeds and nurture a few bright lights. i believe the door is
slamming shut on the number of folks that can pull off the "...handcrafted frame" in this era and
still make a career of it. enthusiasm, blogs, picture pages, and the like can only sustain so much
atmo. i often make analogies to latin; an interesting language with some special needs that demand
a grasp of it. framebuilding is not unlike that. with the fine (and getting finer) wares being made en
masse, the road to a frame shop will be narrower and narrower as time passes, and only the best
and the brightest will make the cut. these are different times.

>>> I thought some of you might enjoy this, which just popped up on Competitive Cyclist;
"I worry that our industry is being polluted by inked-up indie rock kids who spent a week at the UBI (the framebuilding equivalent of the poetry workshop at your local library). With zero basis in anything measurable (be it something heartfelt, something visible, or something feel-able on a ride), they charge 80% of a Serotta/Sachs. Where are their stories of apprenticeship? Where is the evidence that they've had consistent reps on the jig with good results? Where is the admission that theirs is a craft that will improve over time therefore now, in the teeth-cutting stages, hey I'll sell you a frame for $800 since I'm new here and covering my cost of materials is a win-win?"

apprenticeships in the traditional sense never did exist in this trade atmo. what we had (or i should say
"they" had) was more akin to local boys doing day rate work after school or between race weekends.

>>> Of course this is all predicated on being single and debt free like I was when I started
>>> building but if I had it to do again, I’d beg for a job from IF, Seven or Serotta. Those are
>>> the three domestic builders I admire the most for quality and have the volume needed to
>>> really learn what you’re doing. I’d work for free if I had to sweeping floors and fetching
>>> lunch until I had a chance to prove I was worth paying. If needed, I’d live in my car while
>>> I worked my way into a paid position. In short I’d make whatever sacrifice and effort was
>>> required of me to get into one of those companies and work through the ranks. In my opinion
>>> there isn’t a better way to become a Framebuilder. Dave Kirk is the perfect example. Once
>>> you're a Framebuilder it's a whole different thing to become a small business owner.

we have to remember one thing atmo. the need to have a frame made (now) is not what it was
then. in the pre 90s era, all frames were made by hand, even the factory ones, and all the folks
who depended on the sport to earn a living raced on bicycles that were made by hand. since that
time, the shift to industrial made has all but supplanted the needs and markets that once existed.
there was a time that, no matter where you begged for a job, the units were made by real people
doing real hand work. whether they loved the job or could work at another station than the one
they were manning is another story. those types of places really ceased to exist once the mtb era
changed the industry forever. and forget about the branding and all the offshore stuff atmo; that
just puts the carrot further out of reach for a noob. as far as i am concerned, the market spoke,
and in this era, industrial made is more than good enough. prices are decent. bicycles are attractive
and in good supply. racers win on them. makers and lbs cats earn a living. i hate to keep saying
it, but the framebuilding gig is, for the most part, not unlike a dead language. it works for a core
group, but the need for it to grow larger really hasn't been there for a long time. atmo the thinning
out process has already begun. eyes wide open atmo.

>>> if the market has spoken then the noobs should respond. address it with modern materials
>>> and technique. modern doesn't have to mean crap. how do i put this delicately, do you wanna
>>> be a successful frame builder or to you wanna replicate antiques and art in a space already
>>> being thinned. no offense here but richie said thinning out has begun, why try and compete
>>> in a space as a noob that is being thinned? create a new space. get creative, take a risk and
>>> turn some heads.

atmo i believe the issue is not so much about materials and aesthetics, it's about being
in business as a noob rather than someone with some dna in the chosen vocation. bicycles
are not art and they are not craft. even the beautiful ones are vehicles used in traffic on
open roads. this discussion can't overlook the responsibility and liability that comes with
selling someone, anyone, such a vehicle atmo.

>>> so then i can only ask, when the market spoke, what did it say?

like i said (wrote) several times already over the years, it said that the
need to see a framebuilder for that bicycle that works well (enough), is
designed well (enough), and has a modicum of aesthetic flourishes that
allow the purchaser to feel like he's not riding a flat black painted ford
from the 1940s - that need is not what it was back before the industry
went so, well - industrial made. there was clearly a time when it was
impossible (and even laughable) to think that the bicycles at the LBS
were good enough and all one would need to fulfill a passion, do an aids
ride and achieve a PB, race, do a PBP, and, dare i use the word - etcetera.
a framebuilder once was the point man for high quality, better fit, and
personal attention. atmo that era started to vaporize when the ability
for manufacturing bicycles as well as they have been made for at least
15 years now supplanted our niche from being in the mainstream to placing
it in the margins. that's a lot of words, and a long-winded way for me to
say what i say each time this subject comes up: framebuilding as a career
path or as a viable commercial pursuit is more tenuous now than ever before,
and it's only because of the internet do folks think that there's more to it
than really is there. some can bring enough to the table to get a slice. most
can't and won't.

>>> i couldn't agree more. sounds like the bar is raised and the language is dieing because it
>>> fails to adapt. my point is that its a bigger challenge today. meet it with something that
>>> challenges the manufactured bicycles.

it fails to adapt because it's no longer relevant because it fails to adapt atmo...

whatever comes or happens next won't include a framebuilder. it will come
from a think tank thingy that attempts to deconstruct one established 'way"
and replace it with a hipper, unique-er, rarer version and sell it for more cashmo.

>>> IMHO this whole "explosion if U.S. framebuilders" will fizzle down in the next couple years,
>>> but by 2025 there will be a new revival of folks desiring a nice handbuilt product. Of course
>>> only time will tell.

atmo a framebuilder is and always will be someone who has come up through the industry and sport,
knows what goes where from working at various stations, and has spent time taking orders to file 200
of this and tack up 400 of that, yada yada blah blah when am i gonna shut up about this bsmo etc? a
framebuilder becomes what he is when he's finally gone through the motions, taken all the cues for the
sub-assemblies, and realized he's sick of working on the inside where his ideas are stymied and the man
is always on his case, and then leaves, skill sets and experiences in hand, in order to stake him claim as
an individual. atmo building a frame doesn't make you a framebuilder, and i am here to take heat for stating
this with such conviction. there are many, many beautiful, well crafted, over engineered, better-than-they-
have-to-be-made bicycles out there produced by folks who have gone through the learning curve systematically.
these cats are framebuilders atmo. and ps when my studio is finally done, i'll go back to being one too.

2009-03-29T12:50:00.008-04:00

mined from this thread -

the organic nature of frame building - taking a pile of parts, some tools, experience,
and a vision - has always confounded me atmo. i'm way more comfortable with it now
than i was when i started. but it often made me squirm as i was trying to figure out the
dance. no two are alike. and some parts of one can be so very right, while the rest of it
is just good enough. getting it nailed from end to end isn't possible, and i surrendered to
that notion years ago. in some ways it's like the accuracy of a quartz watch compared to
the idiosyncrasies of a mechanical one. i say in some ways, because i really don't know
watches well enough to know why a drug store example may keep more accurate time
than one labored over by a skilled watchmaker. oh, and in many ways i don't care. but i
do know about frames, and no matter what you bring to the table, and no matter how hard
you try, or how on your game you are, no two are alike. alas, duplication and repeatability
are just dreams atmo. is it okay to articulate these differences and even celebrate them?
since i can't seem to get to that elusive other side, i reckon it is.

>>> so, i submit for your critique this dropout shot right out of the dunk tank. how much
>>> work would you builders do before checking this off the list & moving on?

i'll answer that by pasting in this thought - one that hit me so deep that i xeroxed it
and added to the cover of our handmade wedding invitations back - what, 13 or so
years ago atmo!

>>> Even things made by machine are not perfect. It's all a matter of resolution. As is
>>> everything in life.

nails it atmo. and there's something to the routine of picking up yet another pile of parts
and making them fit yet another work order that, on one hand is a chance to redeem
oneself for all past flaws, and on the other hand realize that it's not worth the effort since
the material always tells you what it will be. 'would make a good koan brothers film huh.

>>> Is that a double meaning/fruedian slip - the spelling or misspelling of the name "Koen".
>>> Koan -
>>> koan |ˈkōˌän|
>>> noun
>>> a paradoxical anecdote or riddle, used in Zen Buddhism to demonstrate the inadequacy
>>> of logical reasoning and to provoke enlightenment.

yes - you get me like a book atmo. 'was intentional. ps and it's coen brothers iirc imho.

>>> then what was my slip?

hi - no slip. i was saying that you had me right with the double entendre. that means
two entendres in french.

>>> Cool.........thanks for explaining that in a way that's not patronizing.
>>> That means not being talked down to.

is it okay to articulate these differences and even celebrate them? since i can't seem
to get to that elusive other side, i reckon it is. well - i am not sure if there was thread drift,
or if the question was addressed and i'm too obtuse to see the answer. but my reply to
my own post is that it's okay to celebrate them. there. i said it.

>>> It's the result of that striving towards the ideal that is worth celebrating -

i'm a striving fool bro' atmo.
and i'm havin' a celebratin' situation -

>>> ...as we say in surgery after we've fixed something but still have that desire to make it
>>> 'look perfect'. Not to say one shouldn't always strive to improve one's work, but you can
>>> really mess something up trying to make it look perfect.

agreed atmo - and in most cases it's the head that gets messed.

>>> watch a good pro mechanic work on a real team bike.
>>> bang, bang, bang done.
>>> works well enough.

>>> never confuse slow with good.

unless you're engaged in casual sax atmo.
thanks for all the replies to my thread.
that's a wrapmo.

2009-03-29T12:40:00.002-04:00

mined from this thread -

>>> I have come to an epiphany- Give me lugs on my bike!

>>> I am quite sure there is a lot more into a great riding frame than just the method of
>>> joining the tubes but is there magic in lugs?

no atmo.

>>> Are not lugged frames generally constructed with steel alloys that do not tolerate well
>>> the higher temps associated with welding (tig) thus they are brazed at low temps whereas
>>> tig welded frames (853) tend to actually gain strength at the weld. This difference in the
>>> steel and buttings could contribute to the perceived difference? Hey, I'm only regurgitating
>>> what far more knowledgeable folks than I have stated, hope I got it right.

forget the stats and the jargon atmo. lugs are part of a joining process. if you
need them in yours, they serve a purpose. once the assembly is complete, they
do nothing and allow you to feel nothing - unless it's visceral atmo.

2009-03-29T12:31:00.007-04:00

mined from this thread -

i'm a longtime effete elitist who clings to tradition and heritage, and when i read
shit like this i cringe atmo. i remember when i was a junior at peddie and ruing that
my final year there would have girls on campus. i was against the coed thing then
and there, and believe some practices in life are the way they are because they work
well, are not broken, and don't need fixing atmo.

i'll keep my ties, thank you very much...

>>> i couldn't agree more. the tie stays in the picture.

>>> David Brooks's column yesterday was related, in a strange sort of way. It discussed
>>> individualism and institutions. Regardless of whether you love or hate him, Mr. Brooks
>>> always brings an interesting perspective.

gets it atmo -

"New generations don’t invent institutional practices. These practices are passed down and evolve.
So the institutionalist has a deep reverence for those who came before and built up the rules that
he has temporarily taken delivery of. 'In taking delivery,' Heclo writes, 'institutionalists see themselves
as debtors who owe something, not creditors to whom something is owed.'"

>>> Sorry, I couldn't resist a snarky comment. All you traditionalists might have a look at page
>>> 477 of A History of Harrow School, 1324-1991. Gotta love "Those who hope to rule must
>>> first learn to obey...".

learning to obey was an honor and a gift atmo.
and a privilege too.
no joke.

>>> I'd wear a tie every day if that would fix something.

the tie is a freaking metaphor atmo.
sheesh.

>>> Further, what the article originally described was the death of a ritual, ATMO. I did
>>> not read it, nor any of the initial responses of on this thread as a statement in favor of
>>> wearing suits and ties every day. Rather, there certain times and places where old rituals
>>> are important.
>>> Brooks sums it up well in the closing lines of the column I referenced, "Institutions (could
>>> also substitute the word 'ritual') do all the things that are supposed to be bad. They impede
>>> personal exploration. They enforce conformity. But they often save us from our weaknesses
>>> and give meaning to life."

>>> However, the sense of belonging and common purpose stayed with me, and certainly
>>> increased discipline and scholarly endeavors through my life.

thank you atmo.
again, the OP wasn't about the tie it was about rituals.

2009-03-29T12:23:00.003-04:00

mined from this thread -

>>> Is it counter productive to ask a custom frame builder to build around a certain pre-fab fork?

wars are fought over less important issues atmo.

>>> I know the introduction of pre-fab forks has a lot to do with cutting down on labor and
>>> imperfections for LARGE builders, but is it outrageous to say that carbon forks are - lighter,
>>> stronger, track better, and are perhaps more compliant? For all out race performance
>>> purposes, can anyone say that the best steel fork trumps the best carbon fork. And if so, why?

>>> All of Richards 'cross machines, for example, have steel forks. Is it that you believe steel
>>> has superior properties to carbon? I can't imagine your steel cross forks are some really
>>> odd rake that is unavailable, but maybe it's simply about fit, which is the highest concern.

i don't use CF forks for the same reason i don't use CF rear stay assemblies or
have my frames made by maxway - i'm the framebuilder atmo. forks-as-SKUs is
a fairly recent phenomenon and a true stepchild of the cycling industry's growth
into a subset of the sporting goods world. if i relinquish control of any part of
my manufacture, it's most likely due to market pressure and or manufacturing
costs. thus far i have set up boundaries which keep me immune from these.
i have often said that buying into the whole CF (or any material...) fork is like
sending up a white flag. thanks. but no thanks. atmo i'm steadfast in my opinion
that framebuilders/framebuilding lives outside the lines, and that making decisions
that result in forks as accessories is for others, not us. when i believe that someone
besides myself can do a better job of deciding where the front wheel should be
on a frame i make, or how it should ride (or even look), i'll turn the lights outmo.

ps i just lost 4 more friends atmo.

>>> Personally, I don't see the issue as black and white.

the issue isn't black and white, it's green atmo.

>>> I'm guessing you are talking Al Gore green are you?

i'm talking jerry mcguire green atmo as in, show me the money.

>>> Never again. As much as I enjoy holding Richard's feet to the fire...if I were to do it over,
>>> I'd never build around a fork on a full rigid bike again. Not saying it's wrong for builders
>>> that do, God knows I did it plenty, but I wouldn't do it now.

hey mister hindsight is 20-20 man if i were to do it over again i would have
pursued my education and not done a bike gig atmo. but like - whatever. so
talk to e-RICHIE about this "...build around a fork" issue you're posting about.
to use the OED's most appropriate diction to ax you: what the fuck are you
talking about, willis?
signed,
e-RICHIE

>>> It means they either used a fork I built or they could get their frame elsewhere.

Archipedia 3.18 atmo -

2009-03-29T11:54:00.008-04:00

mined from this thread -

>>> I struggle with this every year as I prepare for NAHBS. Do I stop everything and build
>>> some crazy thing I'd never normally sell in order to attract attention. Or do I keep on
>>> building customer bikes and bring an examples of what I regularly build?
>>> I've decided I should be who I am and bring the bikes that are moving thought the queue
>>> at the time. I'm selling myself as much as I'm selling frames. Sure I'll put a nice build together
>>> and be sure to take a frame with a cool paint job but overall they are exactly what I'm selling.
>>> The problem is I feel like I get lost in the glare of a bunch of "concept" bikes.

>>> Anyone else struggle with this?

no atmo.

from day one nahbs was supposed to be reality based. if others stray and
wanna pander to the please-look-at-me stuff, well - that genie is out of the
bottle. sad. the show, or maybe even the trade, is at a shark jumping point
atmo. it has grown to a point that its consuming its own and could possibly
get vegas-y in a new york minute. how to defend against this? listen to your
inner framebuilder atmo. i said this from day one - the awards thing and the
desire to individuate (these) are deal breakers. my ideal was a display, not
a competition of sorts. a museum atmosphere rather than a trade show one.
before anyone fires a salvo at me, all of what i typed here is consistent with
my atmos since houston nahbs one point oh.

>>> If Einstein would have just stuck to being a patent clerk because that's what he did
>>> everyday the world would be a poorer place for it.

let him go to interbike atmo.

>>> Get your genres straight.

i meant "...an interbike for patent clerks" atmo.

>>> What should a show bike be?
>>> Clean.

you want sex or love?
it's a rhetorical question atmo...

>>> The problem is I feel like I get lost in the glare of a bunch of "concept" bikes.

which came first - the best-of trophies or these "concept" bikes you mention?
yeah. ya' know where i'm headed with this atmo.

>>> Ive said it before and I'll say it again, the awards are a huge part of the show. The
>>> attendees love it. It caps off the entire weekend. Sorry all the builders hate them
>>> so much.

mebbe the attendees need a show atmo.
North American Attendees Who Like Awards Show
ps and before you go all hormonal, you know how i feel about you atmo...

>>> Any thoughts?

yeah - no awards atmo.
we are there as peers and equals, mutually supportive of each other and the trade.

>>> One other thing that no one has mentioned is the blatant campaigning on one builder's
>>> behalf, by another builder, to win an award. I know this happened in the past. One exhibitor
>>> goes to all his builder friends and urges them to vote for builder A because they feel he
>>> deserves some props in general. Not that builder A's bike is the best in that category but
>>> that the supporter feels it's time to have this guy recognized. Builder A didn't even know
>>> this was happening and certainly had no part in it. He just thinks he "won".

was this one of those track bike things atmo?

>>> I don't think it was competing in the 120mm class. Banana.

sure - make yet another joke about a serious issue, an issue i am invested in and
vocal about since the early days in houston atmo. these awards are gay. and they
send the wrong message. we can talk about the chads, and the cronyism, and the,
er - president's choice. but at the end of the day, all you, dave kirk, want is the truth
huh. well i have your inner framebuilder truth right here atmo: you can't handle
the truth! son, we live in a world that has walls. and those walls have to be guarded
by men with guns. who's gonna do it? you? you, carl "i am so" strong? i have a
greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. you weep for sacha and you
curse the itty bitty tricycle. you have that luxury. you have the luxury of not
knowing what i know: that greg townsend's best of show paint award, while tragic,
probably saved lives. and my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to
you, saves lives...you don't want the truth. because deep down, in places you don't
talk about at parties, you want me on that wall. you need me on that wall. we use
words like alignment, stem angle, and atmo...we use these words as the backbone
to a life spent creating something. you use 'em as a punchline. i have neither the
time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under
the blanket of the very entertainment i provide, then questions the manner in
which i provide it! i'd rather you just said, "Just sayin'" and went on your way.
otherwise, i suggest you pick up a weapon and stand a post. either way, i don't
give a damn what you think you're entitled to!

>>> If you have a "judged" category fine offer a playbook I think there will be folks who
>>> aspire to be the kings and queens of this aspect and will have followers.

ruff ruff atmo -

>>> this crap is wearing me down and I don't like it.

MY REPLY:

>>> I'm really glad we can all find humor in it.
>>> me? not so much.

don't get all me me me personal about this and shit atmo. we appreciate nahbs and
the effort behind it. your decisions are not always the best ones. we view the awards
thing as a bad one, or at least one deserving of discussion - which is what we are doing
after carl started the thread. i have been against these since day one, and have put my
money where my mouth is by never allowing my bicycles to be judged once nahbs left
houston. the others can make their choices atmo. the show isn't perfect. some of us who
care about it and have accepted it into our daily routine are allowed to have strong opinions
and we are voicing them here.

2009-03-29T11:52:00.000-04:00

mined from this thread -

>>> So with all the debate between the builders about the pros/cons of the NAHBS awards
>>> what do you Joe average consumer think of them? I know that awards don't always go
>>> out to the best bike per say, but sometimes to the hip "in" bike.

the awards are about attention.
folks who crave it, enter the fray and hope to get some.
the show wasn't conceived for this.
it was and is a vehicle for the niche.
shining a light on the individual is a distraction atmo.

this is my POV from day one, and it remains so.

i am one of the show's and DW's advocates and have
no second thoughts about having a dissenting opinion
once in a while atmo.

2009-03-29T10:43:00.004-04:00

mined from this thread -

>>> On the 25Seven blog Rob Vandermark, founder and President of Seven Cycles, claims that,
>>> "a big number of US “frame builders” source their bikes from China." Does this claim have
>>> validity? If so, to which "framebuilders" is he referring?

define framebuilder atmo.

>>> I guess that's my question: is he talking about brands like Salsa or Felt that everyone
>>> knows are outsourced, or is he talking about actual builders, the sort who put their name
>>> on the downtube?

how would i know? i never even knew he had a blog. and why does it
matter? folks should be able to make money. subcontracting in my
industry is and has always been commonplace - the norm. whether
it's 2 regions over the appenines or in asia, it's still how business gets
done. otherwise no one would ever have bicycles to sell at the LBS atmo.

>>> In the big scheme, it doesn't matter. I'm sure outsourced bikes ride fine. Yet, honesty
>>> and transparency are at stake. If someone deliberately represents their frames as being
>>> built in-house when in fact they're made in China, that's a lie. I don't like being lied to.
>>> Paying extra for a lie adds injury to insult.

do you feel this way about everything or just frames? for instance, my
american brand jeans were not made in san francisco. etcetera. how much
emotion really needs to be attached? it's all just stuff. unless a company has
a sign or a tag line that says everything it sells that has its name is made in
the next room, what kind of information would be enough atmo?

2009-03-29T10:40:00.002-04:00

mined from this thread -

>>> I talked with a builder who is weighing the wisdom of attending a show with its attendant
>>> costs (pun intended) when: the economy is scary, he has quite a wait-list already, traveling
>>> in winter is iffy, he will betaking time off from building and family.
>>> I know it's fun to get together at these shows for builders and fans alike. Les and I were at
>>> San Jose. I'm not sure that there is a sound business reason for some builders to attend if
>>>they already have all the business they can handle.

it helps the niche. we took that POV before nahbs 1.0 and just because
we have work doesn't mean we shouldn't work to support others who are
in need. without the support year after year, the trade might need another
jump start in 2017. folks forgot about some lean years. let's avoid them by
keeping nahbs nahbs, and supporting it atmo.

2009-03-29T10:32:00.004-04:00

mined from this thread -

>>> Define 'best'. Most US bike riders would probably take one of those bikes over a
>>> hand made steel bike. Just saying.

the journalist couldn't, so i doubt anyone else can atmo.

>>> Agreed, including the 'experts' here. Why do people have such a problem with bikes
>>> that are built in Asia??? Carbon bikes are great, steel bikes are great. Some buy a bike
>>> for it's artistic value, some want cutting edge technology. It's personal preference.

did i mention anything about asia atmo?

>>> The reply to you was also a reply to the OP.

why to me? i didn't mention asia atmo. nor did the article iirc.

>>> I should have been much more clear so as not to confuse you, sorry. I guess my reply
>>> was to the OP's mention of Taiwan. Again, I can see how my post would have been
>>> extremely confusing. For the record, I have never seen eRitchie say anything bad
>>> about Asia.

yes - so, thanks, i accept your apology atmo.

>>> there isn't anything in this industry that is cutting edge. compared to the industrys who
>>> are doing real "cutting edge" stuff, carbon fiber and steel might as well be the same thing.
>>> you might as well call it "space age" or "defense grade" or...well take you pick of marketing
>>> term of the decade.

fuck all that shit atmo.
when the bicycles start pedaling themselves, it'll be cutting edge.
until then the playing field is almost always even.
we have one bicycle to climb the hill.
and another to descend.
and one for coffee runs.
sheesh.
did mancebo's bike even make that VN listmo?

reality sucks.

2009-03-29T10:05:00.006-04:00

mined from this thread -

we set this place up so that builders could chat with builders and folks who
were interested in the thread(s) could also jump in and add some flavor (but
not steer the conversation off course). now that we've all prepped for, done,
and counted our money from nahbs, i thought i'd start a thread about this very
board. we have some several dozen professional builders who are signed in to
create threads, and legions of others who can read and post.

how can this board best serve your frame-ish needs atmo?

>>> i'm not sure..........honestly, not to sound elitist, but i'm not into telling people where to buy
>>> flux and silver vs. brass threads. what's left? bulk material purchases? insurance co-op? i
>>> hate to use the word but this would start sounding like things associated with a "guild".

eh i dunno - i'll tell folks anything and share almost any resource atmo.
i type quick, keep it brief, and get back to my pinball machine. all the
posts in the world can line up, but folks still gotta do their own work.
and - if it gets too repetitive or contentious, i'll make mention of the
search engine atmo. later - must start drinking now.

>>> Speaking of business, do the independent framebuilders prefer to run the whole show
>>> from end-to-end or would some prefer to just build and leave the business/selling/
>>> marketing side to someone else?
>>> Is the most enjoyable part the actual building, or perhaps the satisfaction a builder gets
>>> working with individual customers and incorporating different ideas (ie. planning/
>>>brainstorming), or perhaps just seeing their bikes being ridden/raced?

i'm a loner and over the years have controlled everything. it's only in recent
times that i have conceded a project or two (as in, a print ad or similar) to
someone else. once a control freak, etcetera. and in most cases, ideas and
concepts percolate for months, even years, before they become reality. some
examples would include logo revisions, ways to run the teams, and terms of
business. at the end of the day, the framebuilding process is the easy part,
but finding ways to promote and sustain the business eventually became part
of the routine. at this point in my life, it's the sum total that gives me the
pleasure. i do consider all of it to be part of the creative process, not just
the time spent at the bench atmo.

>>> You could even pose questions to your customers about what they enjoyed about their
>>> experiences with the builders. That'd seem like good business for the builders.

that's true, but the general discussion boards usually have those
topics. that subject has some dot.com overlap issues and i'd rather
see more impersonal stuff talked about. the relationship between a
maker and a client is one that should be respected, and calling
them out, here, may cross lines atmo. no matter. we want more
builders talking with builders, and if it happens that clients chime
in about stuff, we'll see where it leads. thanks atmo.

>>> I'd love to see that discussed here and be a part of it if it came to fruition. I'm building
>>> frame number three and have an eye toward, perhaps, hanging out a shingle at some
>>> point. (Yes, I know three frames does not a competent frame builder make. I'm talking
>>> distant future here folks
>>> Presently, I make my living as an electrical contractor, actor and musician. My contractor's
>>> business liability here in North Carolina is less than $800 a year.
>>> Seems inequitable that I'd need to pay upwards of $1,500 or more to build a handful of
>>> frames per year for commerce.
>>> I feel that a co-op would be a godsend for those of us who might like to build at more than
>>> the hobby level, but not as a full-time occupation like our artisan friends here.
>>> What say ye?

i might be in the minority here (and there) but i'd rather see you make the
commitment and join "us" rather than find ways to appropriate some of the
professional needs of our trade and filter them out to those who are treating
it like a craft (note: that's me generalizing atmo). unlike some other handmade
goods that serve, shall we say, more decorative elements, a bicycle is a vehicle.
while no one has established minimum standards for framebuilders, having a
policy is one way to show a modicum of responsibility. i am fully aware that
some don't have the cabbage, and others think they make too few to matter,
and others say theirs never fail, and we also have the cat who simply doesn't
want to play ball with the man. no matter how you couch it, making a bicycle
that someone else will ride comes with a price. i can't see how the insurance
industry can come down any lower than $1500 per annum, and i don't even
think they should. there are not many full time pros and even fewer
hobbyists. no matter how many frames one makes, atmo the cost of entry at
$1500 a year for product liability seems reasonable. one can always elect to
fly naked and take the chances. i alienate many when i articulate all this, but
am committed to seeing the trade in a positive light. to me, insurance is part
of that equation atmo.

>>>I think Bill's point was that an electrical contractor pays ~$800 a year, and faulty
>>> electrical work can cause injury and death about as easily as can faulty frame building.

if there was as many framebuilders in the states as there were
electricians in my county, i am sure the rates would be spread
out further and hence lowered atmo.

>>> It would seem that lower insurance rates would be beneficial to all builders, unless
>>> perhaps established builders view such costs as a barrier to entry for potential competitors.

nah. i can't fathom that any professional (or anyone at all, for that matter) would feel that way.

>>> A larger number of builders should only cause the rate to go down if increasing the
>>> number of frame builders decreases the per-builder insurance pay-outs. I guess that
>>> would be true if either the additional frame builders did not proportionately increase
>>> the number of frames built, or they increased the average skill of the builders and so
>>> that the per-builder risk decreased. Perhaps there's effectively a surcharge because of
>>> additional risk due to the insurers' inexperience in the industry, but it seems to me that
>>> there's little difference from a liability standpoint between frame building and general
>>> metal fabrication. I haven't priced it, so perhaps metal fabricators also pay 75% higher
>>> insurance rates than do electrical contractors.

atmo if/when we are classified as welders, the premium is reasonable (or i
should say, others might consider it reasonable) but the cavaet is that the
liability extends to the frame. if/when it is altered in any way (as in, assembled
into a bicycle) all bets are off. i spent about 10 years in this grid and i was
warned against selling bicycles (as opposed to frames). atmo it simply is not
worth the anxiety involved because whatever we are assessed, there will
be those who say it's too much and it supports that barrier of entry POV that
you mentioned. it's a business, there are many ways to amortize the premium
over a 12 month period, and cats do it all the time. sometimes i wonder what
folks (not you harry) would pay if it were a donation amount to keep the wolves
away from the door, so to speak. insurance isn't for us, it's for the fellow who,
god forbid, may have lunch served through an IV tube. atmo in the big picture,
a grand or so (for liability) is chump change. and the ones who have their
agents combine policies with theft, homeowners, fire, and others can further
reduce that premium by having the local agent gang up all the categories.

>>> The fixed costs of a one-man factory do not lend themselves to much cost cutting or
>>> layoffs. While it may not be sustainable and it certainly affects other framebuilders, its
>>> not that crazy.

when things were slow-to-a-halt-like slow here i conceived my Strada Immaculata
frame line. i offered them through my dealer network, sold almost 40, and the project
resulted in increased sales and appreciation for my Signature frames atmo. it was a
true learning experience for me, and humbling as well.

>>> $1200 is not too little for a custom frame, in the least.
>>> Some builders may only be able to crank out 2-3 frames a week, but I know plenty of
>>> folks(and they are the ones with the $1200 frames) who easily build 2-3 frames a day.

agreed 100% but atmo the OP's point was about someone who is in the
2-3 frames a week category, not the other. therein lies his concern.

>>> No one man shop custom builder is building 2-3 bikes a day, unless they're pre-sized
>>> bikes. Interacting with the customer takes as long or longer than building the bike.

i learned long ago that you can be wholesale or you can be retail
but you can't be both, especially if you are making something by
hand and rarely are two items the same. and atmo in this business
no two clients are the same.

ps somehow the grammar at the end of that there first sentence
leaves me cold, but i hope you get the spirit of my point.

2009-03-29T10:02:00.002-04:00

mined from this thread -

>>> OK - please discuss thoughts on/merit of types handbuilt bicycles: "stock", "production"
>>> "semi-production" "semi-custom" "bespoke" "limited run" and why not just "handbuilt"...

i'm not going to help things here and i believe the line will always
be shades of grey, but if you/your brand exists to fill orders that
precede the build, you are one of us. if you make stuff for the LBS
world (or similar), even if you do "offer" a one-off, you're one of them.

for the record, i have long been of the belief that most of the big
houses can make a higher quality unit, albeit with less of that love
and soul shit, than many who toil in cold, dimly lit workshops. atmo
the romance that's part of the framebuilding lore is misplaced. some
folks make some beyond excellent frames regardless. many of these
cats do it for themselves first, not for their clients.

ducking.

2009-03-29T09:59:00.003-04:00

mined from this thread -

>>> I was wondering how racing fit into the business models of various builders on the forum.
>>> For the purposes of discussion individuals have been categorized based on my perception
>>> ...no offense intended.

my racing and sporting interests preceded my getting on a plane to
london and starting all this. nothing has changed. the racing comes
first atmo. framebuilding was something to do during the week atmo.

>>> I think everyone started out racing and moved into selling. What I wanted to try and
>>> spark was a discussion about how it fits in now. Your racing has to influence your product
>>> and it influences those who buy what you make.

they are inseparable atmo.
folks don't buy frames; they buy framebuilders.

no shame implied.

2009-03-29T09:53:00.002-04:00

mined from this thread -

>>> It has to have support from all exhibitors and then it will grass roots outward...

speaking of roots, since we have 10-12 months to discuss it, i propose
trying to get some of the genie back in the bottle and making nahbs a
framebuilder-centric event, a retreat of sorts, as opposed to going the
other direction and becoming even more of a consumer affair and trade
show. but that's just me atmo. no need for convention centers, high
costs, and carpeted aisles. ps for the record, i'll go with the flow, and
am only expressing my personal opinion here. in short (yeah, right) let's
take it more to a museum aesthetic and away from the car show look.

ducking.

>>> the "less is more" approach?
>>> I think the bar has been raised for the industry.
>>> I think the surroundings, i.e. the carpeted aisles, the pipe and drape, etc.
>>> have a professional appearance and help to keep the bar raised. Its a professional
>>> look for the attendees, one I think they appreciate. just my opinion tho.

then it's even so far.
one vote for austerity.
one vote for schmaltz.

>>> Define "schmaltz" please?

excess.
distractions.
inconsistent signage.
3 color piping.
framebuilders pretending to be "industry".
bowling trophies.

2009-03-29T09:49:00.002-04:00

mined from this thread -

>>> Seems like poo pooing the awards for various reasons is pretty popular.
>>> I'll feel a lot more convinced of the poo pooer's sincerity when one of them
>>> wins an award in NAHBS 2010 and refuses the award citing their principles.
>>> Personally I would be excited and honored to win an award and just just try
>>> to believe that I won because my work was judged as fairly as possible to be
>>> the best in that category at that particular time.

i won 2 awards at nahbs 1.0 without even knowing there were
awards in the works. as a result of that, and kinda sorta being
blindsided by the ordeal, i refrained from "entering" any bicycles
in any nahbs awards since atmo.

>>> Thanks so much for you insight, it's invaluable and I get what you're saying.
>>> After starting this post last night I started thinking about the judging process
>>> and started wondering how much involvement the builders themselves had
>>> originally in the criteria used for the judging. Maybe this is a discussion that
>>> could be had.

my belief system is that judging at all is inherently wrong.
not illegal, or unethical, or immoral. just wrong. build for
yourself and then judge. rinse. repeat. atmo.

2009-03-29T09:41:00.005-04:00

mined from this thread -

>>> Inexperienced and unfit riders + ignorant and unscrupulous fitters = the blind leading the blind.

"I was equal parts racer, psychologist, best friend and worst enemy.
The last part because sometimes I needed to find a diplomatic way to
convince a zealous client that - of the two in the relationship - I knew
best with regard to what went where and how to accomplish it."
atmo

so, tell me about your relationship with your mother...

>>> how's this:
>>> sublime happiness is being with 2-15 other folks that ride beautifully, can ride an echelon,
>>> a rotating paceline, can take pulls at a consistent tempo, and that look gorgeous on the bike.
>>> after all, this among many other things, is an aesthetic experience...

there's nothing wrong with effete elitism atmo.
practice makes perfect.
E2 card carrying member here...

>>> Is it too much to ask for a fitter who can/will tell me if I'm sitting on the
>>> bike properly? Seems like that's often a missing piece of the puzzle, no?

be the fitter atmo.
yes, i am serious.
not everything is or can be tidied and packaged for consumption.
ride. make notes. what's hurts? do any parts wear fast or ache?
the saw, if it looks good, it prolly is good is more valid here than not.
but nothing replaces what and how you feel.

2009-03-29T09:37:00.002-04:00

mined from this thread -

>>> Oh I know who Richard Sachs is, I just didn't know who e-richie is. Now I am embarrased.

that's silly atmo. we're a safety net for all of life's broken dreams.
i hope the cats here lit up the room for you, and shed some insight
re your original concern. meanwhile, the thread gave me some room
to work on new material. i thought the isis isisn't thing was some of
my best work ever. must run.

2009-03-29T09:36:00.001-04:00

mined from this thread -

>>> I'm about the same size as E-Richie, and our saddles are 12cm lower than yours...
>>> 11 is right in the range for your size. That's why bigger frames should have
>>> shallower seat tube angles than small ones...

protractors are the tool of the devil and john schubert atmo.
lose them. go get a steel rule with millemeters. linear rules.

2009-03-29T09:33:00.001-04:00

mined from this thread -

>>> Curious to read what y'all think about extremes as regards bike positioning.
>>> "Set the bike up as agressive/aero as possible and learn to ride it" vs
>>> "Set the bike up so the rider can comfortably put out the most power and
>>> that will be the fastest in the long run (biomechanics trumps)"

well then i guess i stand by my earlier re that you set the
bicycle up to work with the rider's strengths, suppleness,
and limitations atmo. off the point, but not really, is that
some folks don't want to compromise on design elements
and won't make all bicycles for all peoples. that's why god
invented comfort bicycles atmo.

2009-03-29T09:23:00.007-04:00

mined from this thread -

>>> I guess my point is that it is too judgmental to see poor fit/form ON
>>> the road and simply assume that it is the result of an incompetent "fitting".

i believe it's incompetent fitness that's being judged most atmo.

>>> I suppose it's a chicken and egg thing. If they aren't out there riding in
>>> the first place, how are they ever going to get fit?

>>> I occasionally run with my better half, and about a year ago on our local
>>> route there was a rather large woman lumbering along. I made a wise
>>> ass remark after we went by, and being the better half, she said back,
>>> "at least she's out here doing something about it". About a month ago
>>> she came in from her run and asked me if I remembered the "wide load"
>>> lady that we'd seen. She had run into her again, and she's lost over 100
>>> pounds and is doing 6-10 miles a day.

it's all academic, and over the backyard fence, and that jane austen texas
crap about all of us being fodder for each other atmo. this issue isn't about
fitting or fitness as much as it's about folk driving porsches who really can't
even use the remote key without a manual. we are not talking about cats
who are out of shape, or having a platinum card. the subject is look how
badly they look on the same bicycles we race on. it's clear cut atmo. the
industry sells folks the wrong bicycle, and then cashes the check. we all
have a certain image of ourselves and our niche, as well as the trappings
we want to surround ourselves with to keep a comfort zone. calling others
out is a varsity sport, but all we're doing is venting, not naming names or
posting pics of the actual violators!

"For what do we live, but to make sport for our
neighbors, and laugh at them in our turn atmo."
Jane Austen Texas

2007-05-25T09:10:00.001-04:00

from a thread about making/tooling new lugs, etcetera...

> Just out of curiosity.... How difficult is it to cast new molds
> of lugs to be used for steel frame construction? I am asking
> because there seems to be a limited amount of 1 1/8" head
> tube lugs that would allow for the greater selection of new
> carbon forks to be used. Thanks.
if you have a design that's finalized in solidworks or similar program,
then consider that it's just shy of 6K to get the three tool molds created,
and then you'd need to order a minimum amount of parts (about 300, at
least) for it to be cost effective.

one thing to consider is this - 1 1/8" is a dimension created by industry
in order to standardize things. it has its roots in the mtb era and it got
that way because mtb-ers were often using road parts (headsets, fork
steerers...) to make their bicycles. growing the spec 1/8" seemed to
shut alotta people up. the spec (1 1/8") further became a norm when
nonferrous materials made their way into the market. it's perfect
for that!

now - most lug folks also feel that the frame and the fork area single
unit, and should be designed in tandem, and even made in total by the
same builder. as such, there is no reason to make1 1/8" steel forks
because by and large they are heavier than need be. so, the same guys
that would think "lugs" would also be thinking "1 inch" and steel, at that!

the only cat that i know who has entered the fray is llewellyn with his
slant 6 lugs. he intro-ed them 2 or so years ago. they are a good design
and i would think that dazza did it more for the money than for a true
conviction that 1 1/8" is better. and good on him for taking the initiative.
i hope he makes a pile!
> In my opinion the 1 1/8" road fork is an answer to a question no one
> asked. There is a strength advantage with 1 1/8" but any 1" road fork,
> properly built, has no strength issue as it stands. The 1 1/8" fork is
> heavier. There is no performance advantage.The real advantage is
> for the manufacturer. They can use one process and one set of tools
> for both road and offroad.
and
> yes, 1-1/8” leads to one process which leads to economy of scale
> which reduces costs for everyone and improves quality. Regarding
> a heavier fork, that would be the manufacturers fault if it's true. The
> larger steerer has an advantage of added stiffness which in turn allows
> for thinner walls without reducing overall strength. Sounds like some
> should take advantage of this basic physics if no one already has.
> I see no downside to the larger fork other than to traditionalists.
> Honestly, I'm not trying to crack on you Dave, or on Richard who
> similarly loves 1" forks. Heck, I like them too. I just don't get the
> banter that larger steerer tubes, much like larger handlebars, are
> bad. I have two different lugged frames that use super OS pipes
> (similar sizes to Slant Six). Had to order the lugs from Peter at
> Ceeway since no one in the US offered lugs that sized at the time.
> Both frames use a carbon fork (sorry) and meet my every expectation
> - noticeably stiffer in the bottom bracket than my regular OS frame
> built with ZeroUno (not the thinnest tubeset around as you know)
> yet the frame is slightly lighter. I say yes to super OS tubes, larger
> steerer tubes. Now if I could only build a frame as nicely as you guys…
ed -
if i could make a fork with 1 1/8" steerer specs and have it weigh
the same or less than what i use now, i would. it would also have
to have the longevity of the forks i make now. the issue of "...stiffer
due to the added 1/8" (on steel units)" is not one i can relate to.
i have spent years riding and racing, and the column diameter
is not a spec where i can discern any changes in how the bicycle
or the fork feels.were this solely about nonferrous materials,
and/or what i would do from an entrepeneurial standpoint had
i the inclination, it'd be another story.
> Richard, Let me say this another way, the larger steerer could
> be made thinner without giving up strength. The thinner tube
> would make the fork no heavier than a 1" steerer. This same
> principle is what allows OS frame tubes to be lighter, than
> regular tubes for any given frame stiffness.There were some
> posts on the Framebuilders list recently where the topic of
> 1-1/8" steerers came up and several people had some good
> information. One person stated that the True Temper MSRDLT1
> steerer was as light as most 1" steerer tubes since it uses a 0.045"
> wall at the top and 0.065" at the bottom. Another guy stated:
> "Howdy Listers,Wondered if anyone had any experience using
> 1-1/8" x 0.049" (1.24mm.) cro-mo tube for steerers? Calcs give
> 17.7% greater moment of inertia and 10.6% less weight than a
> 1" x 1.6mm. steerer and a yield load in excess of thirteen thousand
> pounds. Obviously this begs the question of why most 1-1/8" steerers
> are 2.3mm. wall at the bottom. Thanks for reading."
> http://search.bikelist.org/getmsg.asp?Filename=framebuilders.10702.0035.eml
> Correct me if I'm wrong Richard but don't you use 1.6mm straight
> gauge steerers? Food for thought...
i know all this (and, btw - that was andy newlands' quote at the end).
the point is why re-tool for the steerer and all the adjoining lugs when
what you have now yields the same results? tell me - would a stiffer
or stronger steerer (the 1 1/8" in steel...) solve a particular problem
that we all have now? atmo, no. what it might do is allow for some
builders that build for the market rather than base what they do on
their own learning curve - it would allow them to say, "yes, we offer
a 1 1/8" steel fork in our lugged frames." but then why do they do it?
because the market has drawn them in. capitalism has a way of
drawing the marginal into the mainstream. to wit, there is no issue.
there was an issue back when 1 1/8" started because mtb-ers were
(wrongly) using road spec in their off-road forks and headsets.
ah - the worst of all worlds collide! otoh, for market-driven units that
are sold at the lbs, standardization is a good thing. but just because
the framebuilding community doesn't lie down and embrace it (the
steel folks, that is) doesn't imply we are luddites. we all make frames
that are modern, of 21st iterations of proven materials and
methodologies, and we are not forced to jump through hoops
just because the folks at forks R us are using another dimension
which is only 1/8"different than what most of use.
> I can think of nothing to add to this. Some folks have a way with words
> and some no have way. You have the way. Thanks for putting it into
> good words.

2007-05-25T08:41:00.000-04:00

from a thread about waiting lists...

> Builders like Sacha are not doing anything wrong by having
> a long waiting list, rather they are doing something right in
> that they are building frames that people want. In my view
> the long wait is more a reflection on the people waiting; it
> take a special kind of person to wait years for a frame. In the
> end I don't think it's about the metal, it's about the builder.
> Some people place a lot of value on being associated with these
> guys (Sachs, Bayless, Sacha, Weigle, Moon, etc) and again, it
> should not be held against the builders. Truth be known these
> guys are way underpaid for the work they do. Problem is that
> if they raise their prices to where they belong based on supply
> and demand, people will rebel against them and call them greedy
> - thus damaging their reputations. Stuck between a rock and a
> hard place.
this issue seems to have its own life, especially in the past 2-3 years.
there are a small amount of builders who have long lists; mebbe
10 to 15 are past the 2 year mark. none of them (us) are volume
guys. i'm stuck in the 5-6 a month rung. if you added it all up,
it does not total a large amount, demand-wise, despite the fact
that it is a demand. across the hall at the serotta forum*, this
subject boiled over last week. my take is that the makers are simply
"making"; the issues wrt the wait lay at the feet of those propping
all things "handmade frame"on various sites and message boards.
online chat has created a freaking tsunami of a demand that has
never been seen before. i know as recently as 2003, my wait was
less than half what it is now. and this issue is hardly about price
because nearly all of us are not able to lock in a selling price - and
this has not slowed the demand. and again - that demand is incredibly
small, numbers-wise, when you tally up all of our clients-in-waiting.

none of us are milking the system, if you will. we are simply responding
to a small but growing market segment that does not want to shop at
the mall. and i know that each of us is doing what we can to spread
the wealth, for lack of a better term. out of the ashes of prior nahbs,
i decided to always mention/add a list of peers in any email replies
that i send to prospective clients. yes, it is nice to get more work, but
there is no reasonon earth some of us have so much when others are
at 12-14 months. directing traffic and interest at these folks is the
right thing to do. allof us are benefiting from an internet zeitgeist
of sorts; the message boarders essentially helped drive our backlogs
up. now we with the long waits are trying to drive it up for "our pals".
> I just don't see the cost/enjoyment benefit that it would bring me
> compared to a lower cost frame that I waited a shorter amount of
> time that rides and feels close enough that I would never know
> the difference.
well in a perverse way, i don't get the fuss over cavier or g.i.a. diamonds,
or even a birkin bag from hermes, yet folks spend all sorts of money
and throw all sorts of props at such things. so - it all does makes sense,
but only if you get it atmo.
> Once again Richard, you are leading the way. Share the wealth.
right -
you prop us, we prop them.
http://richardsachs.com/nextwave.html
> The other thing that I can't understand, and this is just my
> perspective, is why anyone would pay so much for a frame that
> is substantially heavier than the "cutting edge" materials on the
> market. I mean, I agree that Vanilla's and Sach's ARE beautiful
> frames...but I want a tool that I can ride without worrying about
> and I want a frame that is sub three pounds.
huh?
you're gonna quibble about what is essentially no more than a
6-8 ounce difference? i don't know what you have or have been
lifting, but the true difference between the species is not that
much. a frame is stationary weight, not rotating, and unless you
plan on bench pressing your bicycle 100 times, you wouldn't ever
recognize that 6-8 ounces unless a scale was used.
> My point was that a bike is a tool. The tool performs it's task
> "better" if it is lighter for the some strength and ride quality.
> I, and I'm saying "I" (I'm not claiming others should feel or
> do the same as myself) don't understand the desire for a tool
> that is, in one respect (weight), inferior to others that cost less.
> And I wouldn't want one. I DO think Sachs and Vanillas ARE
> beautiful bicycle frames. I'm just personally not interested in
> owning or riding one.
i feel ya'.
i'm just saying that the difference is weight is one that i'd wager
you'd never discern unless a scale is present. the same difference
in rotating weight is another story. i come from a racing background;
i'm not saying all this just to say it. regardless, i wouldn't wanna
tank a frame that costs alot and was hard to get, and in all my years
of tanking ('cross included),i have never needed to replace a frame,
tweak a dropout, or get a new fork. components - they are another story!

added:
catching up here...
wrt to these (types of) posts:
http://forums.roadbikereview.com/showpost.php?p=966406&postcount=16
i budget 6-7 slots a year for my 'cross team and these slots are
projected forward through all of my forecasted delivery quotes.
it's all part of the whole. the team sponsorship beganin 1982 and
i've never missed a season, thoughit wasn't 'cross-only until five
or six years ago. and a factoid that i often own up to, the 'cross
frames are batch built and carry few, if any, ofthe hand wrought
details that my road frames have. iow, they are truly tools, and i
normally spend no more than a day making each. the race thing is
close to me, and i don't think i'd be able to enjoy the business without
the sport,since i was racing before i built my first frame.racing is
part of who i am and what i do. thanks for listening. seriously.i
would have replied to the generalizations and this specific post
in real time had i read it more carefully.

ps i just saw this one -
http://forums.roadbikereview.com/showpost.php?p=966628&postcount=22
many thanks for this.

2007-05-24T21:54:00.000-04:00

from a thread about questions to ask a custom builder or maybe to ask yourself...

> The custom bike process is about you and what you want, not
> about what the builder wants to build for you. If the builder tells
> you they won't build something you want, that's when you should
> look somewhere else.
this is news to me.
the custom bike process might involve what you want, but the
custom frame process normally allows for abuilder to get a 'fit'
dialed in, but the resultant measurements that dictate how it all
works are left to the builder, until you have designed bicycles
(for different folks and for a myriad of applications), you're best
to leave it at the door. framebuilders of any degree of experience
know far more about what goes where than the client who is solely
concerned with fit. and if the concern even veers toward how it all
works, the maker still has a better grasp of how it all performs in
a 3d plane.
> Some people want some strange things built, who is the builder
> to disagree with them if that's what they want? Before it's built
> the buyer has to sign off on the build anyway, releasing the builder
> of liability if the buyer doesn't like it.
i know few commercial builders that would build something they
don't believe in and just dismiss it all with a signed release. why
on earth would you make something you couldn't endorse?!
having said that, i expect folks to add a builder's name!
> As for the word “custom”, that can be tricky to define. As far
> as I know, most so-called “custom” builders are not really a
> true custom builder at all. I would call them semi-custom production
> builder. For me, a true custom builder can do a lot more than just
> building the same frame geometry with different dimensions.
> Some favorite builders talked about on this board cannot even
> fulfill a simple request, let alone building a one of the kind custom frame.
ya' got that right atmo!
personally, i don't consider myself a custom maker at all, despite
the fact that all orders precede the build as a matter of fact, the
last time i 'let' a client in on the design process was circa 1978
after a national team rider, club mate, and close personal friend
had one made, and then - despite getting to the top rung here in
the states - had a miserable time of it at the tour del'avenir which,
at the time, was the tdf for international amateurs. it's a true story,
and it's buried in this link:
http://www.richardsachs.com/articles/rsachsriv.html
see the paragraph that starts,
"I think the line in the sand came when one of my clients..."
to wit, the framebuilder adeptly designs a bicycle to suit to particular
fit needs (if any) of a client. otherwise, he makes the frame that he
makes and knows, rather than stand there andbe a welder-for-hire.
that's my professional opinion atmo!
> So essentially buyers should just shut up and let the builder
> build what ever bike he feels like?
no not at all.
quite the contrary -
we listen!
> A custom builder may know how to build a bike, but in reality
> knows nothing about the buyer. The buyer may not even really
> know what they want other than a piece of eye candy that will
> be envious to their peers.
the builds knows about the buyer by asking, taking measurements,
exchanging emails and phone calls, and riding with him/her if he/she
pays a visit.
> However, just because an individual doesn't know how to weld
> a bike or pick the proper tubing doesn't mean they don't know
> what they need in a frame. To assume that all buyers are idiots
> and should bow down to the builders expertiese is egotistical.
i think you are either projecting, or tryng to put words in my mouth.
> As far as getting the "Fit" dialed in, that can be done with a fitting
> at a LHS, or just from riding a lot and making adjustments as you
> go along. The more you ride the more you know. The builder doesn't
> have to be involved in the "Fit" process, in fact some custom builders
> are not involved in it at all because they have a fitting done by somebody
> else and have the dimensions sent into them.Besides "Fit" is a personal
> preference. Some builders like laid back angles, other like steep angles.
> That's part of the process of picking a builder. If you know you need
> steep angles and you go with a builder that likes laid back angles you
> are going to butt heads.
builders don't "choose" angles willy-nilly or for the sake of a
trend; angles are chosen to yield the proper position as well as,
in the case of steering, yield the correct trail and "feel" for the
order at hand.
> If you ask any rider that has been riding for several years they
> can tell you at a minimum, what TT length and STA works best
> for them.
and if that is the case, the builder replicates them. heck, i know i do.
> As a builder you build what "YOU" think will work, howver what
> works is greatly debatable. You have your idea, other builders
> have theirs and customers have theirs. If you don't want to build
> a bike for somebody don't. It's a pretty simple concept, however
> at the same time, I would expect you would be talked about in a
> negative fashion by that prospective customer.You obvioulsy feel
> that you know so much more than the customer that it sounds
> like you don't take much of their wants into consideration. You
> make the bike you "think" they will like, not the bike they are
> asking for. If it works for you, good for you.
i think you've misunderstood my reply, so i apologize for being
so succinct. anyway - i'm off for a ride.
> This is what he said, verbatim:
> "the custom bike process might involve what you want, but
> the custom frame process normally allows for a builder to
> get a 'fit' dialed in, but the resultant measurements that dictate
> how it all works are left to the builder, until you have designed
> bicycles (for different folks and for a myriad of applications),
> you're best to leave it at the door. frame builders of any degree
> of experience know far more about what goes where than the
> client who is solely concerned with fit. and if the concern even
> veers toward how it all works, the maker still has a better grasp
> of how it all performs in a 3d plane."
> You can take it however you want it, but to me that says the buyer
> should give the builder their dimensions and what they want it to
> ride like, then be quiet and let the builder do his thing.
i kinda sorta did say this, but without the hyperbole. and ps -
you kinda sorta said you agreed with it above in post 15...
you: "This I agree with, which is why you don't see many buyers
specifiying tube sets, diameters, etc."
> They know better in every way because the buyer is an ignorant
> dolt that doesn't know anything about the building/fitting process
> of bike building.
but i NEVER said or implied this!
> I see this a lot from "Experts" who deal with hobbyists (not
> just in cycling). The "Experts" feel they are far beyond the
> level of knowledge of the hobbyist and they don't like people
> stepping on their toes. Those at the highest level of anything
> generally have huge egos regardless of how humble they may
> appear.The reality is most serious hobbyists know quite a bit
> about the whole process, from how bikes are built to the fitting
> process and what their needs are. To make the assumption
> at any level that a rider doesn't know what their needs are is
> egotistical because it says "I'm smarter than you are when it
> comes to this so listen to me and not what your body tells you".
as i posted, the decisions i make (wrt rider fit) are based on
a collaboration between the client and myself.
> Regardless of what anybody says, when somebody decides
> to get a custom made bike it's about the "Buyer" and not the "Builder".
actually, it's about the buyer and the builder. that's why, after
what is usually exhaustive research, the buyer commissions
the builder. these are not impulse purchases. there are no surprises.

> To an extent I agree and to an extent I disagree.
are you a blonde?
> There seems to be this "Ora" around frame builders that
> they are mythical beings and are the only ones that know
> anything about building bikes. Granted they know a lot more
> than most people and their experience is invaluable, but the
> simple fact is there are a lot of people out there that are quite
> knowledgeable about the process, but don't have the time, too
> ls or facilities to do it themselves and are willing to pay somebody
> to do it for them.
i wasn't gonna go there, but i agree with wookie. we all
have hearts of gold, so it is in fact fair to state that there
is an "Ora" thing going on here atmo.
otoh, mebbe he means "Orca". i do know 2-3 builders that
are real large, as in larger than life...
> In my case, I gave the builder a set of parameters that "I"
> wanted and asked him to build a bike around those, which he
> did a marvelous job of doing. It's very out of the norm and a lot
> of "Established" builders would probably scoff at my bike.
> However, I could give a rats butt about what they think since
> the bike was built for me and what I wanted not for them and
> what they wanted.
i think you're overthinking this - or at least assuming you
know alot about what we all do and will do, and whether it's
the kind of work that'll sustain a commercial enterprise. note:
this is when woody allen grabs marshall macluhan who, in turns
says the the audience:
"you know nothing about my work..."
anyway, we are all professional, despite the aura surrounding
what we do, and can be quite understanding at times. so why
not post a pic of what you ride, and also explain how you articulated
all the info as well as how the chosen one got it all done for you.
> Thank you for your invaluable comments on this discussion.
> I am in fact...Not blonde, but I'm sure that makes little to no
> difference to you. I guess if somebody doesn't think like you
> do or want a bike designed like you design them they are "Blonde"
> or as you were hinting at "Stupid". This coming from one of the
> more esteemed builders out there? BTW...It was supposed to be
> "Aura" but I'm sure you were smart enough to figure that out,
> at least I hope so.
you agreed and disagreed simultaneously (in the post above...)
hence the hair color wild guess. sorry. for a moment there i thought
i sensed some levity. i must be in the wrong room.
> If you did a quick search under my user name you would find
> out plenty about my bike, why I wanted what I did and pictures
> of the bike that I ride. Heck, clicking on my user gallery should
> bring up pictures of my bike.
thanks -
it's all so clandestine! (note: that was levity). i wasn't interested
in jumping through a hoop anddoing the industrial espionage
thang, thus i axed for a pic. now i have to decide whether to
pursue this search stuff...
> As I said to the original poster, and several times in this discussion:
> when going with an independent frame manufacturer if you have
> something out of the norm ask them if they will do it or not. If they
> won't, move on until you find somebody who thinks/builds like you
> want your bike to be.
i'll find a pic somehow, but what did you want that was
out of the norm, and why?
> How about this one:When you first started building frames,
> whose frames were you trying to emulate? At the Handmade
> Bike Show I got answers ranging from "Waterford" to "the
> classic Italian steel frames of the 60's and 70's".
i have had only 2 framebuilders-as-muses in my life. initially
it was bill hurlow, a man that made/sold me 2 frames even
before i worked in a bicycle store. were it not for wb hurlow,
those frames, and the way he seemed to take everything along
the way so personally, i would never have wanted to pursue
all this. he was the original role model.
years later, after i had made waves on my own and felt that
there must be more to all this, i adopted mr nagasawa as a
muse. i already had been drawn in to the japanese culture thing
(apologies for trivializing it. i'm really trying to be concise...) after
seeing a film and reading about how the nation gives certain
craftsman national living treasure status (and i dug that concept),
so i found a place in mylife for a nagasawa and his framebuilding
ways to somehowget into my psyche and allow he (and his ways)
to, er, percolate.
as far as i am concerned, these 2 men were/are framebuilder's
framebuilders, and - in my mind - can do no wrong.
of course, most of this happened before the mtb era, but i am
easily reminded that we all come from something, and we all
copy, steal, and borrow along the way.
i think it's safe to say that, while i have looked at other
bicycles over the years - and very few have i looked at twice,
my only industry role models were the 2 men mentioned here.
> It's that last sentence that perplexes me. Or strikes me as being
> oddly reactionary...or maybe arrogantly ignorant (though I swear
> I'm not saying that just to insult you).If I'm talking to an experienced
> professional in *any* industry, even the same industry that I've
> spent years working in myself, and they tell me that some idea
> of mine "won't work", I am way too curious, way too hungry for
> information & knowledge to simply move along without at least
> engaging in a (perhaps brief) dialog about *WHY* they think it
> won't work. And maybe, just maybe, I'll learn something. But
> you're not even talking about an industry you've worked in
> (framebuilding), you're talking about an industry whose products
> you consume. And while an experienced cyclists, someone who
> has ridden dozens of bicycles in their lifetime, can certainly
> develop a lot of refined information about the type of bicycle
> they prefer (as clearly you have), does it really strike you as
> odd that someone who has built hundreds of bicycles in their
> lifetime might have some insight into the behavior of the materials
> and/or their execution that maybe just might have eluded the
> end user?
this resonates with me.
to wit there is a certain breed of cat that only sees framebuilding
as some craft or trade, and owing to the consumer-goods nature
of the way bicycles are sold, thinks it's more than fine to tell folks
how to make them. i understand the mindset that gets one to this place,
even if i don't endorse it. it's the same reasoning that gets folks alarmed
when i suggest that they, "...wouldn't tell a physician what to prescribe
for what ails them" because they think of us as far less trained than
a person who has a diploma hanging in the office. all professional
f'builders that i know are gracious, accomodating, and quite concilliatory.
but they are also opinionated, and rightfully so; they are the ones
dispensing the goods and (most) have been doing so for decades
and have designed and brazed up thousands of frames. if we ultimately
pull rank on an order, it's not just to hear ourselves bark. people come
to us because we have experience and a body of work. for those
that can't comprehend this, it's a good thing thing there are
entities that will do anything for the money, because that's
what this issue boils down to. as an experienced builder and
also a racer with a cat 2 license, i am not afraid to say that some
designs wrt fit and how a bicycle works are not rationale and i will
not make them,and have had this tact since 1978 - the last year that
i accepted an order designed end-to-end by a client. as dave inferred,
it simply is not worth it to have one's name attached to what we'd
feel is inferior work.

2007-05-24T21:02:00.000-04:00

from a thread about why use lugs...

> A large part of the reason that lugged construction became
> the norm was that it was better suited to large scale production
> by semi-skilled labor - not because it was always "better."
since the 80s and the mtb era changed everything and took
any convention that bicycle aesthetics had and tossed them,
tig has became the norm and is better suited to large scale
production by semi-skilled labor. it's an economic issue,and
nothing more. welding is an accepted look, and more folks in
tech schools (and other venues) are trained to weld then are
to braze, this providing a steady labor stream intoany factory
that chooses makes bicycle frames en masse.
> "Still" is not a verb, and thus has no infinitive form. That said,
> no, there's no reason at all still to use lugs. It is so, so much
> easier to make a glue-bike in a mold; even kids can (and do)
do it. Just do that.
uh -
with that logic i can may i deduce that we no longer need
ovens as long as microvaves exist? better yet, why cook
food when we can get the stuff that mixes with water. well,
for that, we'd prolly need military stripes! do we eschew
mechanical watches and all get quartz? that kinda' sums
it up here.
> I read recently that some words and phrases are going away
> because they are used so little. Counter / anti clockwise was
> one.I haven't worn a watch in over 6 years. If I do need accurate
> time I look at my cell phone. But then again I haven't had to do
> that in years either.I no longer have any lugged bikes.I like the
> look of my sloping top tubes, on my smallish frames. No doubt
> different skills are needed to tig rather than braze.I have a lot of
> respect for someone that can lay down a frames worth of tig
> welds as there is no where to hide. Plus the mitres are as tight
> if not tighter than lugged frames.Watching a skilled tig welder is
> amazing. Besides using both hands, they get to use a foot too.
fwiw - i am tig lover, not its anti-christ.
i don't wear a watch, and i don't care who cooks my meals or how!
so this isn't (for me) an issue about if one method is better than another.
as a bicycle maker, ibelieve that design and construction trumps all,
and that material is over-rated. and i'd rather have a nice cannondale
or C-50 than many of the so-called artisan made frames that are
so-called lovingly built with lugs. lugs constitute a joining process,
and their inclusion validates nothing atmo. but when used by a
skilled builder, they can still grab my attention.
> All my bikes are lugged, and I built about half of them myself.
> I couldn't think of a good answer, so I gave a bad one. In truth,
> I have no idea why we still "need" lugs, or why anyone still uses
> them at all. I think they're nice. I like the way my bikes ride, but
> I doubt it has all that much to do with the joinery method. I work
> for a shop that does pretty much exclusively TIG'd frames, and
> they all work pretty well, too.
one reason that some use them is simply that some use them.
it's true - they make no difference at all. they are just a visual
when the frame is built. however, for some (me...), it's not
about lugs, it's about brazing. and i know that as a brazer,
i can make a better frame than if i transferred my skills to tig
welding. when a client orders a frame from me, it's not because
i use lugs, or make my own lug designs, or anything closely
related. a client chooses the entire body of work; design,
execution, history, longevity, etc. not to parrot lance, but it
really isn't about the bike at all. it's more likely about the maker.
and if the maker is a brazer, and a good one,there is no reason
at all to veer simply because the cat across the hall has a
pulse welder.
> I've been around a while and started racing back in the days
> when everyone rode lugged steel frames and everyone knew
> what chromoly meant. That was also back in the day when a
> typical race bike weighed 23 pounds. The steel is real crowd
> forgets that when newer frame materials were being developed
> in the mid-80s, many pro teams actually chose to buy these
> new frames rather than accept a steel frame sponsor...
can we get some examples of teams that bought frames with
"newer frame materials" rather than accept free steel frames?
> That used to be Look's slogan (the only bikes in the peloton teams
> buy...). Like arguing against a creationist, there's no way the steel
> is real crowd will ever be persuaded but there's a reason why
> every pro team rides carbon frames--it's a vastly superior material,
> and getting past traditional lug designs is one of those superior qualities.
i believe the reason "every" pro team rides carbon frame is that
the parties involved cut equitable business deals, and the the
unit cost (not selling price) of an asian made nonferrous material
frame is quite low, and that thesebad boys are practically disposable.
that's quite a good price considering these are just tools.
> The question was, is there a reason to still use lugs. The
> answer, from a performance perspective, is a definite no.
> Non-lugged construction is structurally superior.
be that as it may (even if i don't know how one would quanitify
that non-lugged construction is "structurally superior", the
performance is equal parts design and design, with a small
dose of construction skill thrown in for good measure (and
that good measure will only matter if you desire a frame with
longevity), and the smallest measure of the equation is material
choice. don't get me wrong, it's all good, but pros ride what
they ride because of deals cut for economic reasons. mj coulda'
got it done in cons, but nike paid him more yada yada.
> i'm not denying that if you choose tradition, craftsmanship,
> etc., a steel frame is a fine choice. Just don't pretend steel
> can go toe-to-toe on any performance characteristic of
> newer materials.
i'm not pretending. it can.
> E-Richie, the notion that pro teams ride carbon just
> because it's what their sponsors tell them to ignores
> the history of the development of carbon frames. None
> of these are sponsored frames-simple sponsorship economics
> doesn't explain it. It is because carbon frames have a distinct
> advantage that teams are willing to pay for out of pocket.
> I believe Kelme or Once bought their Look badged frames
> instead of a sponsorship.
here's a little anecdote for you -
in the film sunset boulevard, the william holden character meets the
gloria swanson character at the staircase of her hollywood mansion.
startled, he says -
"you're norma desmond. you were in pictures. you used to be big."
to which she replies -
"i am big; it's the pictures that have gotten smaller."
by and large, the industry has veered away from steel because,
using nonferrous materials, it can eek out higher profits from
better production numbers using more automated processes
and leaving more of what was the skilled work force behind.
listen - i am not anti-profits or anti-progress, but look around
the rose colored glasses and realize that the sport is also
underwritten heavily by industry, and the racers use what
they are paid to be seen with - and i have no issues with
that either.

2007-05-24T20:07:00.000-04:00

from a thread about the handmade show...

> I am a bit confused about some cities qualifying as "East Coast".
> For example, I know Philly is in Eastern PA and is within a hundred
> miles or so of the ocean, so thats "east coast", however, Pittsburgh
> is still in the same state but is a few hundred miles away from the
> Atlantic, so is that more "midwest" or is it still east?Where, geograph-
> ically speaking, is the cutoff of "east coast" versus "midwest"? I am
> sending out my "feelers" for 09 and beyond.I like the possibilities
> in a few cities in PA, Maryland and NY, although I think a virtual
> central point in VA might be the way to go...anyone have any feedback
> on the VA idea (ONLY)?
after one trip to the midwest followed by three to the far west,
it'll be a pleasure to stay in the east for at least three contiguous
shows. atmo east is anywhere i can drive in less than eight hours,
even though i might fly.
> When did we go to the Midwest?
er houston is geographically nearer the atlantic than the pacific atmo.
> Oh, but its so far South, I thought it was "the south"
ct to houston = 1758 mi
sj to houston = 1888 mi
four years out there is plenty;
i say 3 years in the east min atmo.
well, you asked. hey - thanks for asking.
> Denver is my vote.
> Plus the added bonus of combining bikes with the fledgling
> North American Handmade Whisky show.And it is far enough
> away that the hangover has gone by the time I get off the plane.
i heart this cat.
so - after 3 years in the east, i vote for denver atmo.
dee-dub in 04 when we all began chatting about the show,
a mission statement, and what would be ideal, some of the
discussion touched on what my wife, aka the lovely deb,
had encountered in her life as a craftsperson attending similar
shows. here is one venue where thingswere perfect, and went
off without one hitch:
http://www.vfconventioncenter.com/
the promoter's site is here:
http://www.goodrichpromotions.com/designer_craftsmen/index.html
> See, thats what I am trying to avoid. Any other type of tradeshow
> would pay the big bucks, but framebuilders are always crying poormouth
> when it comes to hotels. I have to keep it "on the cheap" or risk
> losing some budget minded exhibitors and attendee's.
[Rant]read: the builders will come, no matter. the consumers
will come, no matter. after four years, nahbs is a brand, and in
and of itself, a draw. this is not about money or location. it is
the only place inthe world that folks like us can kibbitz. it is the
only place in theworld that message boarders can kibbitz with
the kibbitzers. so stop worrying about what a room costs; we
are not talking about the carlisle or the pierre, or even about
manhattan atmo. are you feeling me?
the only real consideration is whether (or not) you can reasonably
ask a large contingent of your booth takers to continue getting
on planes and supporting a fedex habit. [/Rant]
> Come to think of it, velodrome vicinity should be a strong
> consideration. PA would get my nod in that case.
thusfar, the vicinity has not been local-rider-body-count
specific.this is a show that folks travel to. it's not about
the weather, or the area's riding features, or the like. it's
all about what happens at the venue, and especially at the
anvil booth atmo.
> Theres a buttload of builders back east who havent gotten
> involved yet...I think they will be on this like a dog on a bone
> when we move east...but they will be missing out on Portland,
> which is going to be the best exposure yet!
it'll be even more enticing for the easterners that you are
citing (above) when you keep it in the east for at least three
successive years. ps why are there not parallel threads on
the listserve, frameforum,and on the nahbs website? it's a
shame to leave the exhibitors out of the discussion atmo. banana.
> I'm lost. Shouldn't the show be for potential or repeat buyers?
> I realize that without builders there would be no builders show,
> but isn't the objective of the meeting to attract people to buy
> frames from the builders? Or is this just a builders get-together?
> If the show is for the builders then it might make sense to consider
> cheap hotels, bars, a remote location, or who knows what (although
> I'm sure this is the case for all makers.) If it is for those interested
> in buying fine hand-built frames, then accesibility and a copious
> cycling community would make sense.
the show is for the builders; it was conceived on the listserve
as well as on frameforum dot net as a vehicle with which the
buiders would converge and spend a weekend sharing resources,
telling stories, and generally do whatever happens so that everybody
left smarter and more enthusiastic on monday morning. it was
conceived as a show at which there was (to be) no industrial-made
stuff, and no vendors who made frames before there were clients
for said frames,and certainly no one would be allowed to show if
their stuff bordered on being made in a subcontacting arena.
oh - and of course - it was for builders, not clothing makers, or
brake makers, derailleur makers, yada blah blah. oh, to have a
time capsule in houston atmo. atmo, that show, though small,
was the ideal. but what happened? well, it made no sense to
not let folks in, so the show was also open to the public, and
the rest is history.

the issue here is how does don walker, saint-in-residence
that he is, make money now that the original mission statement
has jumped the shark? heck, i certainly don't know. but the odds
have grown,the light shining on all this is brighter than ever, ya'
have corporate entities that wanna glom off of what seems like
a success story and even offer to sponsor it if we jump through
a few of their unreasonable hoops. hey - shut me up already.

the show is now its own brand. atmo, as i wrote already, it can
and will be a success no matter where it's held. i would even
place a wager on that fact.

but at the core of all this is that the show is of the builders,
not of the consumers. any builder that misses it will be missing
a possible chance to book most of the year's order from the press
and goodwill that comes from these 3 winter days. ironic, it is to
me, that folks are somehow worried about room rates and locations.
atmo, what walker has done is mapped out a formula in which mebbe
80% of the booth takers are either fledgling newbies (5-10 years or
less) or part timers, and his retreats have allowed these cats the
publicity machinery to become cults of personality if you will. as
noted on another thread, the message boarders, in turn, take all
the flicker sites and the youtubes, combine these with their own
accounts, and viola, guys are backed up 1-3 years without ever
having bought an ad anywhere or even having what some would
consider a business plan. no real harm, i s'pose.

well, what now? this thing (i can hear kate calling it this sicilian thing...)
is huge, but it really is no bigger nor more important than a trekie
convention. i'm a believer. i have been since we started talking about
a show on neil's site in 2004. my primary interests are that it not get
(too) commercial and hence lose its roots, and i also want to see don
be able to make a salary from it. but the minute it becomes
interbike-esque, or if some cat offers to buy the property and
don leaves the helm, that interest will waiver atmo.
> I'm not saying that the original idea doesn't have merit, just
> that it never happened.
it did happen atmo.
> So what happened between Houston and San Jose, other than
> the event growing larger? (asking, not arguing) To me, they appear
> the same. But I wasn't at either so maybe I'm missing some nuance?
1) the need to make $$$
2) standards are lowered (or changed) for the sake of 1 above.
3) folks that have invested in this emotionally and intellectually
from day 1 start rethinking their priorities.

oh - and i am not refering to (only) myself atmo. btw, as i wrote
above, we (the constituants) have a listserve, a website, and a
forum on that website, and the show itself has a website. there
is also 1) a full cc email address field that often receives emails,
and 2) an inner circle of about 12 builders that routinely discusses
and er, shapes, some of the show's more in-your-face features.
so, my puzzlement is about why this message board is (now)
being used to table a discussion about something that is a year
away from a show that will occur in the winter of 2008. while it
puzzles me on several layers, one that is prominant is that through
several pms exchanged with a mod here, i was informed that the
board (and/or its host) did not see the value of this show and
would not attend.
mp atmo.
> thanks for the perspective... i've checked out the framebuilders
> listserv, but i don't post because i have nothing to contribute.
> That's your (meaning *all* the framebuilders, not just atmo)
> world and I just look through the window.
of course. it's business mike, nothing personal.
hyman roth always made money for his partners atmo.

2007-05-23T20:21:00.001-04:00

from a thread about steel as a material of choice in the current market...

> I would say that it could be that steel still has its limitations,
> whereas a ti, carbon or ti/carbon mix can give you a similar
> ride quality without the limitations of steel.
there is only one limitation with steel: since it lost its cache as
the go-to material in the manufacturing sector, most factories
and folks have moved away from it. the industry has concluded
that more units can be made for less money, and can extract a
higher profit, when nonferrous materials are used. when the
market forces are at work, ultimately an entire way of doing
something can be lost. it's no real bigee atmo since most industrial
made frames are higher quality than those made by hand even
as recently as 10 years ago. no matter. the material itself is not
what is limited. what we have here is a Sunset Boulevard situation:
JOE GILLES - "You're Norma Desmond, you used to be in pictures.
You used to be big."
NORMA - "I am big, it's the pictures that got small."
> I envy you, atmo. I wish that I could be that eloquent when I write.
thanks -
it's easy - parrot popular culture as often as possible atmo.
plus, i lived through all of this and watched the industry
deconstruct all through the embers of the mtb era years.
deconstruction works in fashion houses, but not always
in the sporting goods industry.
> well, I would have to add that it's hard to get sub 2.5lb frames
> with steel, afaik. with ti, alu and plastic, you can get 2lbs or less
> (although the 2lb ti frames are noodly). plus there's very little aero
> tubing available in steel (and only a bit more in ti), which is a
> disadvantage for TT bikes. those are the only two disadvantages
> I can think of, though. and with the right components, you can
> still get a 3lb steel frame down to the UCI limit. now, all that might
> change with more research.
and why is this 1+ pound differnce thing a disadvantage? are
you benchpressing the bicycle? a frame is stationary weight
and, assuch, is not subject to the same arguments that come
when we discuss wheel goods, or cranks, shoes, or anything
that rotates.and as far a shapes go, that is a mill spec, not one
that is determined by a material. and then there was alison steele ,
aka the night bird. she was hot, and a seminal voice in fm radio's
history. she'd have never reached that level had she been called
alison titanium atmo.
> if you're in the TDF, it is a potential disadvantage (assuming
> your total bike weight is 15.9 and your nearest competitor's
> is 14.9). every second and every watt does count. yes, for the
> hoi polloi, it doesn't matter in an objective sense, but the
> question was asked.
and in a grand prix race, my outback wagon would be a
disadvantage atmo. using the tdf, to me, is not a valid
qualifier wrt this material discussion, but that's just me.
the folks who ride and/or supply these frames that yield
14.9 or 15.9 pound bicycles have no expectations of them
other than to get to a finish line. even what happens the
next day hardly matters since the team (and supplier) most
likely has a tree in asia where all the frames are harvested.
note: this is not a political statement. it's just my pov about
why the nonferrous material are now (andhave been for a
while) the go-to material in the manufacturing sector atmo.

anyway, it's casual friday so cheers and bananas m'kay?
it' be an interesting exercise in its own right to find out if
the tdf "winners" are always the cats on the lightest bicycles
or if even watts call the shots. bicycle racing is a team sport,
and not just man against man or man against the clock atmo.
> Hypothetically speaking here - lets suppose pro cyclists
> could ride anything they wanted to - what would they choose?
therein lies the rub -
they are paid, salaried workers.in essense, they have (and there
is) no choice. in my personal jesus moments, i fantasize about
larry bird in braggards, not hi top cons. ymmv.
> ... and steel will be redisovered at some point.
cool atmo -

> Grant, isn't the negative image based largely on weight? If you
> could make a 1-pound steel frame it would put other materials
> out of business IMO.Relative weight on an MTB is more important
> than on a road bike, hence why the demise of steel there first.
> Just my opinion.
cliffnotes -
it was the down-and-outers from the mtb era that,in their last gasp
for air, decided to take a chance by diversifying into the road market,
something they knew nothing about, that set some of this into action.
they took their nonferrous baggage and their forks-R-us mentality,
and the road segment hasn't been the samesince atmo. hey - no bigee.
those of us in the margins survive. what's lost (if lost is really even the
correct word) is that the demand for steel, the material, has a ripple
effect far past the orignal reasons it's not used in the first place atmo.
iow, when the big guys cease buying it for production work, the little
guys have less of a menu to feed off of. howard beele moment atmo.

2007-05-23T14:58:00.000-04:00

from a thread about what's for dinner...

may i visit your lunchtable atmo?
my wife, aka the lovely deb, mentioned the word tofu
in a sentence today wrt dinner. that is not good atmo.
help.

update -
there is talk of a bed of arugula with the unmentionable
food item atmo. i have stocked up on some sam adams
and a double bag of party mix atmo.
see example:

i have decided to be the fu and study with my new pals atmo -

> "Men who ate the most tofu during their mid-40s to mid-60s showed
> the most signs of mental deterioration in their mid-70s to early 90s.
> The consumption of tofu two or more times per week was detrimental
> to brain function, according to a study published in the April issue of
> the Journal of the American College of Nutrition. The new tofu study
> finds that poor cognitive test performance, and two measures of brain
> atrophy or shrinkage were associated with higher midlife tofu consumption
> among men. The cognitive tests measure attention, concentration,
> memory, judgement and several other indicators of brain function.
> "Makes you stupid. Take me to Smith & Wollensky. Open a nice
> bottle of Klinker Brick. Salute.
let's meet (meat) at peter luger's atmo.
> Brooklyn or Great Neck? Last time up to the city had an excellent
> piece of almost raw meat (yummmmmm - just show it the fire,
> don't actually put it on) at Michael Jordan's in the train station.
> Excellent cab to help it go down. Just tell me when. We'll ask
> for some small amout of tofu on our Ceasar salad to keep the
> wife happy.
i've only been to the great neck one atmo.
i have a bb and a seat lug to braze and then it's a wrap for
the night. if you don't hear from me,no worries - click here
atmo.
> Oh no...I'm sure you've been through this with Adam right.
> If not I'm sure he can give you some great cooking tips.
beautiful meat dishes make me cry atmo.
> I say make a strong stand and nip this in the bud...you let
> the tofu in now and fast forward 2 weeks you'll be strapped
> down getting a green tea high-colonic cleansing from some
> guy named Sanjaya.
hey i can dig that atmo.
but seriously -
i survived atmo. i mean i did call 911 and let them stay on
hold while i had dinner, but at the end of it all i took my
bowl to the sink like i do each night and i became the greek
god i am known as (say it fast): dodishes. and i used extra
ivory soap just in case...the meal itself was quite enjoyable.
my wife, aka the lovely deb, made a separate rice dish,
and the unmentionable food was prepared with garlic and
spinach, with some sorta sesame jizz atop. when i prepared
my bowl, all food items were assembled vertically because
i was not interested in actually seeing the you-know-what
in my favorite wooden bowl. add some kikoman and a pile
of pulverated party mix, and - viola, i created my own middle
eastern slash asian tailgate party. as heck the taste wasn't
so bad once all the items had a chance to do the meet and
greet in the bowl. someof it even grazed the roof of my mouth
as it went throatward. at the end of the day, it was much ado
about nothing; 'just mebeing a weenie. as she is known to be,
deb was right. the meal was enjoyable atmo.

tomorrow i get in touch with my inner sinatra atmo -

2007-05-23T14:40:00.000-04:00

this a post from a thread about whether it's important
for a framebuilder to ride (a bicycle). more here.

i'm coming it to this party late, since i just returned from nambla. atmo
we are all different. i got into bicycle making after i started racing; it was
the sport that got me interested, not technology, or engineering, or craft,
or saving the world from motor vehicles blah blah. racing and being of the
sport has definately made be more confident wrt what i do. it accelerated
the learning curve. it forced the epiphanies to come sooner (some in
three minutes or less...). it gave me the platform from which to make
decisions with more chutzpah and be able to stand behind them. when
we (my peer group) began, it was in an era that still had a place for
framebuilders to get the feedback that was necessary in order to use
the sport as a laboratory.through my earliest years, i could count as
many as 2 dozen national (and olympic) team riders (from here and
canada) among my client list. that all changed when the uscf got (too)
big and mandated that those chosen to represent must use the official
federation bicycle, whatever it happened to be in a given year. ironically,
the olympics in 1984 wasthe pivotal era after which it became near impossible
to see your stuff used from development through to the international arena,
but those were good times nonetheless, and much good came from cycling's
growth even if the feds took the sport away from the the clubs and their
sponsors and gave it to the corporate world. hey - shut me up already.
anyway, for me racing and the sport are inseparable from framebuiding
and other's mileage may vary. here in episcoville we remain tethered in
one way shape or form, and still chase stars and stripes jersies with
'cross now being our center of attention. we've got nine since 1997,
and hope a tenth comes along soon. add these/this experience to the
building process and it'd be foolish to overlook the sport's impact atmo.
oh -and yeah, i still race and dig racing. it's a way to remain in a state
of arrested development, and that matters to me atmo.

2007-05-22T22:02:00.000-04:00

here's a cool thread about waiting lists and it lives
in its entirety here.

> So what's the goal of these "one-bike-per month" builders?
> Is it pure exclusivity? Is it to exemplify the finest spirit of
> craftsmanship? Surely there's a better balance between
> Trek's "buy all you want we'll make more" heartless capitalism
> and 47mo wait-times for a bike.Are they trying to re-create the
> Confente scenario, whereby they think exclusivity and craftsmanship
> automatically create a classic? I gotta believe there's a better way,
> because eventually the pendulum is going to swing back and then
> the train has passed them by instead of vice versa.
who are these one-bike-a-month cats? i happen to know that sasha
is way more productive that that? myself - i'm generally at 5-7 a month.
the confente reference is completely wrong. i'd wager in his short stint
working his eponymous firm, he did at least 12-15 a month. heck, back
in those early years i was a 4 frame a week guy, and that number slowed
down by the mid-late 80s when i began to realize how much longer it was
taking to build once the improvements in design and manufacture were
(more) known and hence incorporated into the gig atmo. the learning
curve doesn't always breed efficiency; when you finally find out what you
didn't know and bring it to all frames there after, it adds time to the build.
if it didn't, we all might be making the same thing we did when we started.
> It just seems really odd, this massive backlog thing. If the orders
> are coming in faster than they are going out, then something seems
> out of balance. I'm sure someone who knows more about business
> than me will tell us something about market price and supply and demand...
this came up at the show. this backlog thing is not an issue.you all
here are making it an issue. if you added up all of us who had a long
backlog (say - more than 2 years), there really would not be that many
people in the scheme of things. maybe 12 to 20, give or take. if you
added up the annual output of all of us in that group, the frames may
total about 1,000 or 1,500 a year (and that's a stretch) at most. in the
industry economy, these numbers are too small to matter. we/these
numbers live outside the lines of any economic or market trend. the
builders are making frames as fast as they can, and tending to their
businesses equally as fast atmo. if the long waits get under your
(whoever the you is), the blame must rest on the those feeding the
machine, not us on the other side of the counter atmo. we can't make
them any faster, and hiring folks to do our work would be self-defeating.
atmo good for the sasha's and the jonny's and all the others that are
getting long lines from the zeitgeists that are message board aided.
none of these issues would occur without the internet atmo.
> This forum, with it's collective knowledge, constantly "Promotes"
> certain brands which in and of itself "creates" demand.
and on other forums (http://www.frameforum.net/ for example)
i began promoting others after nahbs 1.0 when i realized we are
in a great time for framebuilding, and making waves is effin cool
atmo. to wit, there is no freaking reason on earth that some builders
are busy and others aren't, especially with message boards and viral
marketing being so ubiquitous.
> i've said this to richie in the past: i wish he had an apprentice so
> his knowledge would be passed on.
spend time on the framebuilder listserve or frameforum.net and
you will see that i do more than my share of mentoring as well as
keeping it all in the public eye atmo!
> richie, i hope you didn't feel my comments were a criticism. i know
> you share info freely.
not at all - really! it's just that, especially after a long weekend at
nahbs,i realize fully the magnitude of the virtual word, and a gazilliion
folks read posts and threads and often have no idea past one sentence
or one thought atmo. i figured i'd punctuate yours with mine atmo.
> Sacha will run his business any way he wants to, but the market
> is telling him to raise prices.
you may be misconstruing the situation; there are no prices. what
is being charged today, in mar 07, for frames ordered ?? years ago
is not what the guys will pay in ??? years after queueing up this week.
you can use the 07 price as a barometer, but rest assured that there
is no way that anyone can lock ina price a year out, much less several.
sacha and i, and others, talk about this often. he's likely still asleep, so
i'll take the heat for this information atmo.
> I have a dozen knives on order with Tony and Reese Bose (3-5yrs),
> knives on order with Horn (who knows), Phil Boguszewski (4yrs),
> Kit Carson (who knows), Tom Overeynder, Bill Ruple, Ryuichi Kawamura,
> PJ Tomes. I've ordered knives from 29 makers in the past two years
> without ever paying a deposit.
curious in chester -
would you have still queued up for these if there was a required
deposit of, say - ten percent atmo?
> In response to climb's request to E-richie...
> I asked the same of him. Would you ever take on an apprentice
> to pass on your skills. He voiced that he was of the opinion that taking
> on an apprentice would not work. His feeling is that one needs to be
> involved in production bicycles first. That way, one could learn the skill
> of each individual operation by performing it hundreds of times in a short
> time frame, rather than once every couple of weeks as it would be done
> in his shop. I pointed out to him that there were no production facilities
> building lugged steel frames. His response, with a rather wry smile,
> was the builders like himself were a dying breed. He voiced only a
> few extremely gifted individuals would be able to learn the craft from
> a limited mentorship or a course at UBI. So, I guess the answer is
> to get yourself on the list for the old masters before they are gone.
> Then, as someone else stated, get yourself on the list for the next
> Sacha White. I so lucked out in finding him before the rest of you did.
> I've got my eye on who might be the next one.
stackie - great meeting you atmo. i think you may have misinterpreted
the conversation. my point was that framebuilding, per se was not
relevant (anymore) when juxtaposed with earlier eras. the mtb and
its ilk turned industry upside down, netting mega-huuuuuuuuuuge
improvements across the board in terms of material, design, and
manufacturing quality. industrial made bicycles are quite good these
days; i think i noted that i believe many are better than those that
(may) come from hand-builders. anyway, the history lesson is/was
that the need to go to a frame-builder to get high quality is far less
than it was back then. inthe wake of all this, the, er, craft, has lost
market share, and breed reference may have been part of that
thought atmo.
> And besides, if not wanting to wait so long encourages potential
> customers to look elsewhere, to patronize the newer framebuilders,
> that wouldn't be such a bad trickle-down effect, eh?
no, it wouldn't atmo.
> I do not understand this "numbers game" at all.
> I presume that guys like atmo, Sacha, etc. are building, at their
> capacity, +/- 6 or so frames a months, +/- 60/70 a year, so +/-
> 240 in 4 years. Is it so unreasonable to think that 240 other people
> have the same desire for one of these bikes? Hell, there are probably
> 240 on this board alone, so I think not; in fact I bet these wait lists will
> either go up or orders will not be taken.
agreed atmo -
> i wonder how much of long waiting lists is caused by the "tulip" effect.
> ever-longer wait times create almost a bubble of (slightly) irrational
> exhuberance. i'm not saying that the bikes aren't worth waiting for but
> the wait creates an aura of self-generating desire.interesting to note that
> someone like carl strong has a wait measured in weeks, not months,
> let alone years. skill-wise, carl sure is up there. but for whatever reason
> there's no carl-mania. this observation is not meant as an sort of judgement
> on anyone. just an interesting insight into what makes something/someone "hot".
the wait list thing isn't a thing.the thing about the wait list not
being a thing is the thing. if you added up all the builders with
wait lists that exceed two years (as an example) there might be
12-20. if you totaled their annual output, there might be 500-800
frames. these numbers don't matter. what seems to matter is that
folks like making them matter. there are many more folks that want
than can make. the issue, if there is one, is that folks want. mebbe
focus on that. you're in marketing; there is perception and there is
reality. as we once discussed wrt the new balance account, some
product lines are easy to prop simply because the goods are top
shelf. the better framebuilders who have lists are all good makers.
but they are also small producers. what else can they do except
ask folks to wait? uh - they use their tulips and say wait atmo!
> If 60 read this thread and decide to pull the trigger on bike from a
> maker, the wait goes up another year. We kinda make our own
> market for these things.
this cat gets it atmo.
> Hopefully this show and all the great things to publicize what these
> last independent or non-OTS makers are doing will only spread the
> love around.
veer -
if nothing else, please thank don walker atmo. he brought you
this show, and the previous two. he deserves major-league props,
as well as a really big reward atmo. if there is a future for the current
and next wave, it'll be due largely to nahbs.
> Jean Baudrillard, one of his generation's most outspoken cultural critics,
> died on Tuesday. Here's a quote from one of his obits: He [Baudrillard]
> was also a fierce critic of consumer culture in which people bought objects
> not out of genuine need but because of the status and meaning they
> bestowed. If the shoe fits...
i love the, er, logo on his shirt atmo...
> In certain circles it's called logocentrism.
> p.s. hey, at least it's not screwed on.
seriously, doesn't the pose and the apparel contrast with his
statement? i realize it could possibly be a press pic, but still
atmo. thoughts?
> For me, it depends on how you're interpreting the meaning/status of t
> he pose, the logo on the shirt (which I don't recognize), the brand of cigarette,
> the book-lined background, etc. And I don't ask this as a rhetorical question,
> but out of genuine interest in how you interpret these symbols. There is no
> possible photo of him that would be devoid of meaning. Were he dressed in
> Carhartt overalls and a Mogen-David stained t-shirt, smoking a Swisher
> Sweet and sitting in front of a '72 Pinto up on blocks behind his double-wide,
> this photo would be equally pregnant with potential signals of status. How
> could his statement not contrast with his photo? That's the interesting
> question.
the gist of my earlier post had to do with the juxtaposition (atmo)
of his comment about objects bought for status versus need with
the fact that he appears to have given some serious thought to his
sartorial choices atmo. i do that, but i am vain. and i do buy objects
for more reasons than simply that i have a need for them atmo. and
i suspect archibald and jmewkill do as well.
> Well, I guess you're gistified in pointing out a potential contradiction
> between his words and how he's dressed/posed in that photo. However,
> I'm not so sure that he's trying to dress to impress in that photo. Doesn't
> look that fancy or vain to me. Can you describe how he'd need to be dressed
> so that you wouldn't sense a contradiction? So that you wouldn't feel that the
> photo belies his hypocrisy (which I think was your original impulse). But
> regardless of his personal pose, the idea that many people buy objects for
> reasons of status and not need is so obviously true that it's sometimes
> forgotten. I don't know, but it struck a chord with me in the context of
> this thread. It might be uncomfortable for us to think about this possibility
> with something like a bicycle that radiates an aura of relative innocence
> and downright goodness -- but hey, who of us doesn't lust after a handmade
> object from many of the artisans, toolmakers, and bike builders in this
> neighborhood? However, at what point does a lust for a certain object --
> based on it's perceived status -- become a type of hyper-consumptive,
> ruinous desire that Baudrillard is justly criticizing (regardless of his threads).
this is unreal. on a message board about fancy bicycles, there's
not a single post-er among us that buys out of need. we each may
attach a certain cache to a favorite brand, but we buy out of want.
i guess my original point in replying to you (about the obit quote)
is that i often tire when folks (often from the intellectual elite) pass
sweeping judgements in the fashion that i feel is represented
by this:
He [Baudrillard] was also a fierce critic of consumer culture in which
people bought objects not out of genuine need but because of the status
and meaning they bestowed.
i am not that well educated, but i do think my elevator goes to
the top floor. his statement is one in which we,as a demographic,
are asked to justify our existence.why do i/should i have to that?
i am a middle class male born into a consumer driven world. i feel
capable of making my own choices re what i can do with my money,
and i don't buy much. but often i buy more than i need, and much of
it makes me feel good atmo.
> Apparently you don't question the underpinnings of a consumer-driven
> world, but are made very uncomfortable by those that do. I just thought
> it was an idea worth discussing. And no, I don't consider myself above
> the influence of the culture we live in, but I don't feel threatened by ideas
> that undermine it.You have self-described your location as "out of the box."
> Sometimes we need to be prodded to move from an overly comfortable
> location. It doesn't hurt. Look, merely pointing out that he was photgraphed
> wearing a shirt with a (to me) undercipherable logo should not by itself cause
> us to dismiss his ideas out of hand. That's a short-cut that leads nowhere.
this is a message board, not life. and i post mostly while on the phone.
for you to infer that i "don't question the underpinnings of a consumer
driven society, but are made very uncomfortable by those that do...",
makes me think we need an annie hall marshall macluhan moment here.
"you know nothing about my work," he was heard saying. i'm not
threatened by any of this. if in fact the guy was "also a fierce critic
of consumer culture in which people bought objects not out of genuine
need but because of the status and meaning they bestowed", then part
of that means,to me, that he is judging everyone that buys anything
they don't need, no matter what the reason. that is what i have a
hard time with atmo.

2007-01-24T10:17:00.000-05:00

from a cool discussion about machine vs eyeball fitting.
the thread lives here.

>I've noticed that fiters that work with a computer tend to provide
>you with measurements and then tell you that you must adapt to
>the new position. On the other hand, builders that mostly fit you
>without the aid of a computer, tend to build a bicycle where you'll
>feel comfortable from the get go, except if he/she notices something
>that you may be doing which is flat wrong. Question: Which would
>you prefer? Question: Who creates the all-knowing computer fit
>programs? As always, thank you for reading, and thank you for
>your comments.
fitters might be in a more dominant role if they could look
past the fit part of the equation and also speak to how the
bicycle will/might work once you're atop. fit is only part
of the equation. it has to be part of a larger equation atmo.
your fit (contact points) only works superbly if it is properly
placed above and between the wheels, and if all the
dimensions of the frame overlap with its intended use.
ps -the that 70s show rocks.
>Er, what if you don't qualify as an athlete, atmo...?
>What's there for the Wild Turkey and Four Roses types...?
>Maybe I should be asking Bostondrunk, shouldn't I...?
>Hey, thank you for your thoughtful responses. And I
>apologize for initially writing "fiter" instead of "fitter".
>Uhhh... Oh well, thank you...
ya' see - that's the thing.
on a message board on which high end bicycles are discussed,
fitting usually pertains to what you'd assimilate for road riding
or even for racing. otoh, if you're talking about fitting for a mtb,
or a comfort bike, or even a normal road bike on which you have
absolutely no illusions of using for - well, for going fast enough
to need a heart monitor or 'puter - that's another story. i don't
think it's easy to have a discussion on how-to wrt fitting unless
we know what we are fitting to what atmo.

tell me ya' feel me catulle-issimo atmo.
>note: the next post to which i reply lives here
>and is too long to paste!!!!!!!!
rs-issimo
the issue is not "do you assimilate their position or their frame
geometry", it's "does a fitter design the fit or does he design the
frame?" at least ithink that is what catulle is getting at. atmo
most fitters don't understand all the nuances of what happens
to the general layout of the bicycle, its characteristics, how it
handles (etc), once the contact points are established. and to
cite grant and mebbe obtuse too (hopefully i am not not putting
words in their mouths), some fitters don't even get fit because it
is an ever-evolving thing. what works when your static on a
bicycle one hour may not work that (or as) well once you've
gone out on the finished product and gotten fitter, more flexible,
and are pushing it all with a sidewind atmo. so - euro trends aside,
mebbe consider that a frame be designed by someone who makes
them and - if need be - have a fitter tell you where your saddle should
be and leave it at that. personally, and i hate using terms like that
since it's all first person text anyway, i never understood why folks
that spend so much time riding to begin with are second guessing
themselves anyway atmo!
>...He was saying, I think, that the Euro-pro geometry that has
>evolved over the years (although it has changed quite a bit
>between, say, the '60s and '90s if I'm not mistaken - I'm listening
>to DBRK on this one) is the best almost universally for anyone
>who rides for more than an hour or two at a time.
it's not productive to have a fit thread when there is no such thing
as a baseline client. but as i said earlier, one assumes (i do, at least)
that on a message board on which cost-no-object bicycles are the
raison d'etre (that's french forreason d'etre), most folks wanna look
like like a pro when atop a bicycle; the shades, the tan lines, the assos,
the lycra booties...
well, again to side with obtuse, grant, and atmo atmo, it's that
the position has to be client specific, but the general layout of
those stage-race type bicycles is the best thing for most folks atmo.
someone asked circa what era. atmo the only clear answer is the era
prior to the americanization of the industry, that one before product
designers convinced european icons with decades of insight to tweak
their frames for the north american cat 3 and comfort market. when
that change fully permeated the industry, most bicycles had to be
re-thunk before a rider could possibly assimilate a rational position.
fast forward - get a fitter that understands all this, not simply one
schooled in laser beams and bar graphs. bicycle design (and history)
is part of the equation.
>Well, I got Stevep on the side I agree with and obtuse,
>richie-issimo, and Saab on the other and these guys are
>ALL due a great deal of respect. So, perhaps I should let it
>go, but what fun would that be, so I'll try it from a slightly
>different perspective.
i'm not on the other side.
we agree - let a fitter fit, assuming you trust him and all that.
but muzzle him once he tries to also design your frame unless
he makes them too atmo. fit and frame design are separate issues
atmo and i thought that was catulle's point.

2007-01-24T09:36:00.000-05:00

from yet another cool thread about the line between inspiration and swiping.
it lives here.

>Beauty, Truth, Goodness, Love, etc........
>Originality? The question still stands; how would you define the
>quality of "original", and is "original" even possible?
unless i'm mistaking all the big words here, as far as the recent
unpleasantness goes, there is a certain "originalness" that is a
pegoretti, despite the fact that he, too, is the sum total of his
experiences, muses, and inspirations. atmo, a peg is undeniably
a peg because i (read: all of us) know (or think we know) what
some of those experiences, muses, and inspirations of his are.
but at the end of the day, dario pegoretti is the one creating the
assemblage, and 3 decades of doing the assembling, i believe,
allows for him to be considered an original even though, like
others, he once looked around.

and ps that is about the worst constructed stream of consciousness
i can imagine streaming, but it makessense to me atmo...
>Yes, but when an idea is truly original, it has value and is treated like
>property. And people don't normally share their valuable property
>with others. We don’t usually give away our bikes, houses, land, or
>original ideas.
i'm using RPS's post to dovetail my thoughts on all this, because it is
very sensitive and extemely personal.

okay. here are my 2 cents...
atmo dario is one of the few originals, despite the fact that - as has
been noted - we're all the sum of our experiences. in the bicycle
industry, going back at least to the early 70s, dario is a one-hander;
the number of folks that have made the impact on the trade that dario
has can be counted on one hand. atmo, dario has earned his stripes.
here's a text i emailed dario last year in the midst of the tubing project
we were collaborating on. note: i had met dario several years prior
when he came to visit chester. whoa. so, there already was some
history between us before the project began. but in the middle of it
i pinched myself because i realized that i was working with an icon.
i wrote this:

hey dario-issimo...
i just wanted to add a note of thanks to all these emails, and the
phone calls too. the thought of us being "pals"fills me with good feelings.
i first heard your name in the early 90s. i believe it was either from
storino or tim maloney (maloney is an old, old pal of mine from new
jersey). regardless, whoever of the two mentioned your name informed
me that in italy, which was then still the bastion of all great framebuilding
ideas, this man "dario" was the next in line to all the famous tailors who
made the great bicycles through the eras.
since i consider myself an armchair student of these "great men", i
watched throughout the decade and into this century as you have
proven true what my pal (which one, i forget!) predicted would happen.
i watched all the frames that georgio imported, first as giordanas,
and later as pegorettis, and knew that mister dario truly is the best
of all builders.
i often wish i had other skills and more of a curiousity about what is
there in addition to steel. i believe it takes a craftsman with no self-
imposed bounderies to really know what the limits are. i have stayed
safely within the cocoon of steel, and you have tried and succeeded
with so many other material combinations.
as you know from some of our exchanges and the posts i make online,
i am not too impressed from within our industry; i haven't had much
inspiration come from bicycles since the 70s, despite still trying to forge
ahead. but you, dario, are one of the true geniuses of the craft, and i
admire you like you cannot believe. it is my pleasure to call you a friend,
and an honor to be making some of these decisions with you regarding
the future of quality steel tubing.
i want to thank you for all your dedication, for being the oneat the
vanguard, and for being the leader of an industry that should always
have italian roots. the bicycle is a beautiful object, and often the
americans can complicate its beauty. it's because of geniuses like
you that the beauty remains.
as we say here, "you are the man!"ciao, bro'.
e-RICHIE©™®

i s'pose my only point in posting this is to support any notions
that dario's body of work stands on its own, despite the jazz, and
the clapton, and the basquiet, and all the other influences some
of you see in it. he has taken all of his racing, and his art, and his
life experiences, and created something from scratch. that should
be respected atmo.
>let me reiterate what i pm-ed to s------- and he pasted in a recent post:
>thanks - before 78, mr masi accused derosa of copying him (nervex ref. 32
>lugs, fisher fork parts, etc...) and before masi, i guarantee you that someone
>accused him similarly. the public has to look past, WAY PAST, the part where
>all of us use a finite supply of similar looking parts and materials in order to
>make what looks (from 10 paces, at least) like a frame. to me, as a builder,
>it's like accusing guitar makers of all copying one another since they all use
>wood. i know you feel me on this!
you wanna know who's copying, or stealing, or rearranging, or
co-opting? well don't look nowand opine. that's shallow imo. wait
a generation, or mebbe 30 years atmo. it kinda sorta takes awhile to
distill it all. in the meanwhile, if you're basing your thoughts on a color
scheme, or a lug window, or a font, that is incredibly superficial atmo.
>actually, I was thinking of comments that you've made about that whole
>issue -- that on one hand, you've chosen to go one-man, one-shop, because
>its the choice that was right and fulfilling for you, but that you didn't think
>any less of the italian masters -- like colnago or pinarello -- who decided on
>the other route. I hope I'm not remembering and re-stating way out of context.
>we've been here before, but heck, let's go there again...better to be a design
>house that outsources, or to be the artist-craftsman flying solo? we have
>both on the board...hampsten and >pacenti in one camp, sachs and kirk in
>another. discuss....
discuss?
that's too civil.
hey only kidding.
as far as all this goes, i'm solo because i don't want the shackles
that come with the alternative. as far as framebuilding goes, it
depends on the definition of the term. ever since the mtb era, bicycles
in general have been such a well manufactured consumer good. the mtb
makers and market really upped the bar wrt what comes on a decent,
price-point type bicycle. heck, the stepchild to all this is that the role
that builders once filled is/was replaced by the so-called factory bike
with ultegra, or somesuch creature. don't laugh; it was once unthinkable
that you could race on a store-bought bicycle. and man has that changed.
framebuilders didn't/don't exist for the hard-to-fit crowd (although they
are served, too),they were/are laboratories where the timeclock is not
the issue, nor is the price. most of the builders i know and admire are
the ones that simply want to keep the bar high, rather than the price
low, or the volume growing. blah blah i gotta go ride soon.

so to concise-a-lize all this, in the 21st century a builder that wants to
forge ahead either has to have a good base to trade on,or else better
glom on to the entrepeneurial train asap atmo. it'd be real tough to make
it as a loner if you're starting now.

2007-01-24T09:22:00.000-05:00

from a cool thread about the line between inspiration and swiping.
it's all here.

>And yes, it matters to me, there is a line that shouldn't be
>crossed,but it gets fuzzy until you cross it. There is a "club" and
>a "heart" inatmo's fork, but nobody thinks it's ripping off Colnago
>or DeRosa.The windows in atmo's frames are very masi-esque.
>But a Sachs is a Sachs.
re the boldface -
well that's not kinda sorta what is going on here.
in the 50s and 60s, nervex had a workbook that hadscores of models
and combos, as well as a long listof stock cutouts. many, many
bicycle companies tappedin to these and other combos. any CR
devotee can tell you that masi, paletti, patelli, serena, tomasinni,
derosa, gartner select (austria), nagasawa, me, and any number
of builders all used the same parts. just sayin' atmo.
>As usual, you make my point more clearly than I do.
>Certain "traits" get associated with certain people, and
>those ideas or details get forever tied to one guys image.
>Even when lots of other people did the same thing at the
>same time, and it goes unrecognized or under appreciated.
and you can attribute the mental imprint to the 70s bike boom.
it's been discussed on the vintage list (but few there get it) that
italy had dozens, if not scores of high end builders that could have
filled roland salm's mission statement, but only one caved.

2007-01-24T09:13:00.000-05:00

from a thread about fitting entitled
"framebuilder IQ: 30 years in about 3 minutes"
the thread lives here.

>...in the end, isn't that what we're really buying, their lifetime of knowledge?
yes - you are getting their next frame, not their last one atmo.
>english subtitle, please.
i guess it means that one is only as good as their next effort and
should not rely on the past. as amatter of fact, the next one should
redeem all the prior mistakes, if you will. and so it goes. to your
point though - it does take a body of work to get to a place in all
this that one recognizes that whatworked then must be tweaked
to remain relevant now.in a way, that is why the thread about
gothard's rs framewent off course. remember that one?
>a question: when you're fitting someone/looking at them on their
bike, do you talk about what you see or just silently file away the details
you notice?
i talk if asked, but i never articulate it well.i feel it. it's like alvy and
annie discussing b/w photography in annie hall atmo: "hey listen to me
i sound like fm radio."
it's difficult to put it all into fitspeak because it has become a language
in and of itself. have fun - i'm on call at the local tap room atmo.
back at 1am...

2007-01-24T09:00:00.000-05:00

from a thread on frameforum dot net
(can be read in its entirety here):

> As a Newbie I would like the more knowledgible and experienced to
> pass that on in such a way as to explain where all these different
> criteria fit into the choice equation. Hence if weight, the feature
> that all the magazines, bike shops, etc, highlight, isn't the deciding
> factor, then what are the questions that ought to asked of the builder?
> It isn't sufficient for builders to do the measuring and questioning,
> i e., trust the builders experience solely, that's like general practitioners
> of old. These days riders want to play an informed role in the choice
> and design.

if riders are informed, than it's cool. most know, at most, their
contact points in a vague way. that info is easy enough for a builder
to work with. but when a client starts blueprinting a frame design
based on data he's culled from various road tests, it's a recipe for
disaster. and if the client wants a bicycle for the sheer market driven-
ness of it all, he should go to the mall rather than to a framebuilder
atmo. framebuilders typically are where they are because they eschew
the model year type hype that most consumers diet on. framebuilders
are small producers,and the pool from which we all get clients is hardly
the mainstream consumer base; we normally tap those who are more
sensible about their needs and indulgences. if it were otherwise,
everyone would b eout racing on $9,000 c-40s and similar mounts.
what was the question? oh - that. you can't tell a physician what to
prescribe, nor a surgeon what to cut out or leave in. you may be able
to get measured by a tailor, but you don't get to tell him what to sew.
the garment will fit and work superbly. if the style itself doesn't suit
you, don'task him to copy someone else's, just go to that someone else.

all of us who are career f'builders know what we are doing, what
material to use, and what goes where. since the components used
to assemble frames into bicycles are all available to anyone, the frame
is the only difference here. if the weight issue is of some importance,
consider that the net difference between a normal steel frame and
one made of - say, carbon fiber - is about a pound max. so, as a
cat 2 racer turned f'builder i wonder why anyone fusses over only
one pound of stationary-not-rotating weight. such a difference
simply does not matter.

proper fit and frame design trump all. material is tertiary atmo.
get a frame from someone who feels you and who you feel back.

2006-11-01T22:11:00.000-05:00

recently, there's been a string of posts on the framebuilder listserve
regarding the herding of folks near and wide into a guild of some
sort. here are some replies of mine (in the bold type):
>Perhaps there is a need to unite everyone to embolden the sense of
>community, and less of a place where standards are set and worked
>towards. More a place where standards and work ethics that are passed
>along from one builder to another aspiring builder.
if we are borrowing from history and tradition, the worker is
trained for the job by observing and carrying out routine tasks,
to the point that the operation is drilled into him and the repetition
brings an articulated hand-eye coordination which will serve the
worker forever more. once this is accomplished and the worker has
a skill set, he is more valuable. at that time, if a builder needs to
expand and take on an assistant, he can train the worker in "his
ways". and so it goes.
>However, i can see the need to create a larger community that
>recognizes all the builders in the states and can be a place for
>teaching/learning, support and sharing of ideas/process.
who are all these unrecognized builders? where are they? are these
guys toiling now and suffering in silence. a good part of this thread
thing for me is about wondering who exactly are the cats that this
guild thing is "for"?
>As an example-It is kind of odd that someone would take the time
>to include a ranking system on a website.
who did this? neil, and the website? i have no issues with using
a system to connate a post-ers place in all this. if someone posts
there routinely, the broad base of readers can search archives
and get a feel for this cat's m.o..
otoh, mebbe all post-ers should drop kick the screen names and
it should be mandatory to have a weblink as part of the signature,
thus allowing the reader to research the validity of an infrequent
post-ers thoughts.
and a day or so later i continued with:
as far as the frameforum.net "ranking", which it hardly is,
mebbe the best moniker would either be none at all, or new
member, contributing member, paypal-ing contributing member,
or some such bullshit. atmo, anyone that reads a text posted by
a bonifide builder with "newbie" attached to the icon, and
believes the guy really is "new", needs to get out more and
spend time reading history. if doug doesn't post there because
it'd say "newbie" on his first ??? posts, that's a loss for all the
real fng's that need learnin'.
as far as any guild and/or ranking system of builders that
somehow is tied to a way to command this or that price, i
can't see how that would work. not all builders build only
for commerce. bb makes money on paint jobs. fattic cashes
in on classes. i sell mostly complete bicycles and that profit
offsets losses inherent in "hand-work". some builders are
also retailers. the list goes on.
so, what now? i would love to see a post or eight from folks
that truly feel that they are being held back because the industry
has no place for them, and what that guild thingy would do for
them so as they could get a piece of the rock.
>I am not opposed to an organized group that has a specific and
>clear purpose, one that plays no favorites and does not involve
>any politics nor commercial ties in specific.
brian et al -
this listserve should have a mutiny! as it now exists, it offers
everything that one could want: non-commercialism. routine
disemmination of information through posts and hyperlinks,
a most equal participation from all by din't of no moderation,
no limits on daily posts, no penalties for off topic threads,
full access to all framebuilders and newbies alike. etcetera!
i see it as the ideal arena in which the er, craft, can be both
discussed and natured. while it is a virtual community and,
as such, cannot be brought to a bank to support a small
business loan, nor can the "list" get you a discount on insurance,
the folks here can certainly steer you in the right direction. as
i posted before, i like it here and i like it at neil's across the hall.
if we all continue to reply to posts, ask questions, supply links to
suppliers and pic pages and the like, al gore's internet can do well
by the framebuilding community both established and upcoming.
thoughts?

ps i am anti rating, anti quotas, anti prizes at nahbs, anti
everything except selling ourselves short. i say this often
and i know it's boring, but framebuilders live outside the
system, in the margins. if we really cared "that much", we'd
find a way to assimilate into the industry at large. nothing
wrong witdat! but think about this: if nahbs were to be used
as a baseline to even define a framebuilder, how many mainstream
bicycle companies would be "allowed" to exhibit due to the
fact they are factories, or job shops, or contract houses?
that is a rhetorical question, but my point is that organizing
a bunch of loners and "craftsmen" and folks that wanna live
without a model year or a price point to dictate what they
do - well, that would be a tough herd. and lastly since i watch
the horological world when time permits, their high end
organization (see www.ahci.ch ) took decades to form and
they only have 20 or so cats in it. i love the snootiness of it
all yo, so if bicycles and watches ever have something in
common, mebbe we can herd the boutique guys !! i won't
wait up. smiley face goes here ----> ________ .
and a day or so later i continued with:
i often wrestle with this "what is a framebuilder" thing
and i certainly wrestle with a guild thing. wrt the latter,
it's because i am curious about being in an organization
that fosters different points of view than i have, and whose
very raison d'etre lives in the grey area. there - i said it.
framebuilding certainly is a creative endeavor and it will
be impossible to set a standard for a guildworthy frame.
but i do not feel it is as difficult to set a standard for a
guildworthy framebuilder. atmo, while it is not possible
to discern when a builder finally "gets it", i do not think
one gets it after 10 or 20 tries. actually, my personal number
would be near the several hundred tries, but i am not running
for gatekeeper, only opining here. i also think that time spent
has value, and - i like the numbers thing - i am uncomfortable
with a guy that hasn't been at it for a good many years. there
is no question at all that a person can be trained and spoon
fed information that allows him to build a very nice frame
in a short(er) period of time, but true framebuilding is also
about problem solving and not only about crafting a nice lug
edge. when you make a frame for someone else, that frame
ends up on the open road, in traffic, and used at speeds that
approach the takeoff and landing speeds of a small airplane.
and, to be fair, it ought to last for a while too. i would love
to "endow" some term or some membership opportunity to
every freaking zealous member of this list and on neil's forum,
and call them all "framebuilders", but at the core of my own
personal demons about this is that - in essence - this is really
not a craft, it's a profession, just like yours is, and just like
real estate is, and just like teaching is. for most professions,
a certain amount of training, and working through routines,
and spending a certain amount of time at it, are are prerequisites.
while there are no real training grounds for building, there
remains the bicycle industry. (oh no, he's starting with that
crap again.). i have a difficult time getting past the fact that
folks want to "practice the craft" and or "keep the flame burning"
and try to get it with a drive thru, cliffs notes approach.
okay - that's what was on my mind. i typed it, and i will post it.
otoh, i remain vigilant in my efforts to spend time online and
share what i know and the resources i've tapped though the
years. i'll add whatever support i can to a guild thing. but what
i need to know is how others define the term "framebuilder".
my definition encompasses a certain degree of work
accomplished, a certain amount of years spent, and and
also the ability to exhibit a reasonable amount of conviction
to stand behind your work as well as to stick around long enough
to see it become an heirloom.
>...so when someone says that you have to build 100's of frames to
>"get it", then will you at the same time admit that your first couple
>100 sucked as well?
"sucked" is a relative term. but i recall not having a clue after
100, despite the fact that they were all sold and i had a steady
clientele. i never truly believed i had a real grasp on the complete
package until sometime in the 90s, about 20 years in. i continue
to "doubt", though i do believe that my bar is higher now than
it was then. so - if i ever do think i have it nailed, i would likely
not be that motivated to forge ahead. getting to that place is
why some of us play the game.
>...Like Richie said, "sucked" is a relative term. How long it takes to
>"get a clue" despends on a number ot things; most important would
>be what you were exposed to (framebuildingwise) before you begin
>to build frames of your own.
i want to avoid contentiousness at all costs, but since i was
the post-er that used "had a clue" in a sentence earlier and
it is peppered here in your reply, is this reply for steve and
the list, or is it for me? if you really had a clue from the start,
my hat is off to you. i mean that. i, on the other hand, always
recall what eva zeisel, at age 98, said in an npr interview in
2005. she was chatting with jennifer ludden about how her
years as a ceramicist ought to have somehow honed her skills.
her reply to this was:
"If you try to do something perfect, I think this is the last time
you do anything. If you feel it, this is you have now reached
perfection, there can't be anything beyond it."
when i re-read the text of that interview, i am reminded that
"having a clue" is more often than not something that occurs
at the very end. everything until that time is just practice.
you and i clearly live different lives and have different reference
points. despite what i wrote earlier about feeling comfortable
with all this by the 90s, which was 20 years into the gig, i still
live in wonderment of all the possibilities that exist when i try
to make a pile of metal become a bicycle frame. sometimes i
get pretty darn close, but i never really get it. i never thought
of the time spent as - to use your word - "floundering", but
i guess that's what i do and mebbe that's why i get paid the
big bucks! (the big bucks part of that comment is levity).
____________________________________________
now, if you have made it this far, please note that related
posts are pasted separately, mebbe 4-6 entries below this
one. get a cup of coffee and go wild!!

2006-10-31T20:56:00.000-05:00

here is a longwinded thread about fork material
and the debate centers around carbon fiber versus
metal. the entire text is here, and i will paste my
own replies below. they are the bold type:

> I don't get it , I know it's nostalgic to have a well made lugged
> steel bike, with a balanced look of a lugged steel fork but can't
> we agree that Carbon forks have replaced steel in this area of
> design where there is no dispute to the merits of carbon over
> Titanium , Aluminum or carbon steel in fork manufacturing.
generally speaking, CF is popular and ubiquitious (wrt forks)
because it allows for ease of manufacturing, profitabilty, and
acceptance via the 'buzz' level. the key word here is manufacturing.
forks have become a commodity. if you can accept this, there's
no reason not to use CF as a material. imo, when a maker chooses
to buy forks from a supplier, he's essentially hung out the white
flag inferring that he's conceded to market pressures.
> As we speak the industry is building new Cross Carbon forks
> with spacing for fenders and rack mounts
well there you have it. it's all tied to the industry, and i do
not say that in a disparaging way. the only way these cats
survive is to breed efficiency. heck - i defy anyone here with
a stock portfolio to show that they invest in any corporation
that is not lean, efficient, profitable, and responsible. but i
digress. bicycle companies choosing CF or pre-fabbed parts
in order to make their own are simply living life as part of
the food chain. if they don't go with the market tide, they'll
soon vaporize. i'm reminded of this little nugget attributed
to phillipe dufour who said,
"...everything is designed to be made on a machine."
the quote* is perhaps taken out of context to support my
opinion, but that opinion stands; the industry chooses
what it has to in order to survive, and the copycats and
pretenders and those next in line copy from the top down
in the hopes that they too can all ride out the trend.
* ps the entire interview lives here.
> not all carbon forks are the same. some are better and more expensive.
> not all steel forks are the same. some are better and more expensive.
> funny coincidence that.
trust me...
this thread may never have been about only
premium grade cf forks, but it was never about
inexpensive steel forks. even back in the day,
inexpensive steel forks were, well - they sucked.
> to voice pro-carbon sentiments often brings out a less than charming
> or charitable side of steel fans, IMO. why go there?
i think this debate is always inane without qualifiers.
cf is a material. a fork is a thing. there are reasons
that some things are made with some materials. all
too often, those reasons have to do with money, or with
the market - and both of which are hard to seperate from
each other, no?
at the highest level, quality=quality. but for nearly all
off-the-shelf stuff, a compromise exists somewhere.
> there is the "thing" (in this case, forks.) and then there is the debate
> that surrounds the "thing". i find that often the debate takes on a life
> of it's own that has not so much to do with the "thing" being debated.
> steel vs carbon often seems to trigger ancillary debates and feelings,
> IMO. that was my point; i have nothing intelligent to add to a debate
> about forks, because as you often, rightly, point out: a bike is a whole;
> i can't discern for sure, always, if a sensation is due to the fork or to
> something else.
the thing with me is that i try to follow the thread
to the letter of the law, and respond accordingly.
(well - unless jerk and doof meet me for happy hour).
when smiley first wondered aloud:
"...why you'd go the way of a steel fork with the
advancements that carbon has made in the last 10
years in fork designs."
i kinda felt that it's an emotional issue from the very
beginning. to wit, i think i summed it up well by infer-
ing that one shouldn't broadstroke the issue without
knowing all the details that led him to believe that
cf, had in fact, made these suggested advancements.
imo there is cf good and there is cf cheap. the same holds
true with anything made for a market. again, imo, this
issue is not about the thing - it never is. it's about the
standards set for the thing by the thing makers and
marketers, as well as the bounderies set by the consumers
who buy into this. it's all inseperable. that's why we have
light conversations about it.
> related question for e-ritchie. i always thought it was harder to build
> a good fork than a frame. any thoughts on this?
> i will pay you $.02 a word.... 20 word limit.
you think about this stuff?
> OK , Richie and all , Can you guys tell me if their exsists any lousy
> Steel forks that you've seen on bikes , not your own but by others .
> If so then I also heard that building of a very good steel fork is not
> an easy task but takes a master to really make one right. After all its
> like a tuning fork if its done wrong its wrong. Carbone Fibre is if done
> right is much better from a reapeatability standpoint of more right
> ones built then wrong ones coming off a mold. Your comments please.
there are "millions" of lousy steel forks.
good steel forks more likely represent a technique
than technology. cf forks, otoh, more likely repre-
sent a technology. that's not to suggest it's "bad";
my point remains that it has been embraced, even
co-opted, because it yields higher profits for industry
than does "hand-work", which is what it replaced.
i don't think i can say any more succinctly than this:
http://www.serotta.com/forum/showpost.php?p=190940&postcount=41
do folks want to have good products for less money, and
more choices too? well - it's the technology that allows
that to occur.
> All sizes of Colnago C50's have a 43mm fork too. This doesn't make
> any sense either. It's a mystery. Before everyone jumps up and says it's
> done to save money...
when they went to straight blades in '91, it
was to save money. oh - it was marketed
as 'eeeeez better', but it really was a move
to increase in efficiency in - get this - steel
fork making. ya' can't make this stuff up.
> sure, in '91 I can believe they were trying to cut costs.
isn't that linked to the entire thread -
when is cutting costs not an issue in manufacturing?
how can you seperate the thing from the thing meister?
> Wha? Define "easier".
> If you are prepared to invest millions of dollars in molds, testing
> machines, prototypes, material suppliers, computer design equipement,
> become an expert in scheduling carbon layup, getting certification in
> adhesive use ...
> sure , by that definition it's "easy" to make carbon forks.
they - "they" - do this because the expense ultimately
replaces the one component that is not available: a skilled
work force, one that it would take to make as many superbly
built, fine things, as is needed to satisfy the market "they" created.
> Steel forks? Call Kirk for some parts, and rent some tanks, and
> get a block of wood to bend the tubes. The skill of brazing is childsplay
> compared to designing the layup schedule for carbon. Just because the
> carbon fork may arrive to you in a box, doesn't mean it just magically
> popped out of a mold!!
i have a full day of play planned after breaky.
> It's all about volume and production investment.
> I have a few hobby builder friends who have built a few dozen forks...
> anyone here make their own carbon forks?
apple ibooks to molteni oranges.
> Maybe yes, maybe no. If Colnago buys a CF fork from Asia, all
> they've done is substitute one skilled work force with another.
> The Carbon work force has it's own highly skilled requirement.
> One is not "easier" than the other, each has it's own set of challenges,
> and costs involved.
> None of it means anything. What is important is control. If Colnago
> just slaps any fork on the front becuse they believe it's a bolt-on
> commodity whose design isn't intregral to the performance of their
> product, "they" have an inferior product. If "they" choose to outsource
> the manufacturing to experts in the field, their product can be better.
> Kinda like JB painting your frames.
i believe "business" dictates where the parts and vendors
are chosen from. if colnago and its ilk could still profit from
locally made products, made in the same way and of the same
materials (albeit with a 2006 quality) they would. but since
they can't, they bid it out to the subcontractors who complement
them the best. again, it's less about quality, or made-by-hand,
and more about efficiency. and, once again, i have no issues
with any of it. i simply see the timeline that got us all here
differently than most.

2006-10-28T17:40:00.000-04:00

here is text from an online interview with
jacob fetty of the bike game dot com -

Richard Sachs is a passionate builder of bikes who builds bikes.
Sachs is perhaps best known for his affinity for cyclocross and
cyclocross racing and his commitment to building top quality
steel frames. TheBikeGame dot Com recently "sat down" with
Richard Sachs to learn a bit more about the man behind the
frames. Thank you Richard, for visiting with us!

BikeGame: How long have you been making aluminum frames?
Richard Sachs: I'll work for lunch money.

BG: How long building steel frames? Where'd you learn?
RS: I went to London in late 72 and lived with the Witcomb
family who owned a framebuilding business. That is where
it all began.

BG: What did you do before bikes and how did you get rolling building bikes...and why steel?
RS: I was a student with an eye on pursuing journalism at a
mighty fine anti-war college in Vermont (Goddard College)
and a not-more-than-casual interest in bicycles saw me
take a fork in the road and go abroad instead.
Why steel? That's silly. I live in a vacuum. The choices I
make as a one man shop are hardly market driven. As
such, when the industry went "away" from steel in order
to survive, I said "see ya'" and continued to do what I know
and feel is best.

BG: Having a one man operated shop with hand made methods,
how do you compete with "modern" technology and methods of
mass production.
RS: I am the work force. In industry, nearly everything is designed
for a niche or a price point, or both. To that end, decisions
are made with regard to how to get it all done and also show
a decent profit for the factory and the company shareholders.
With a family tree like that, nearly every choice becomes a
compromise of sorts. I'd prefer to think that I make no (or
fewer) compromises compared to the big-box bicycle makers.

BG: Worst injury building bikes? ever lost a finger like a woodworker?
RS: A.D.D.

BG: From the time you began until today, what is the biggest change
in how you build bikes and/or conduct business?
RS: Confidence. I spent at least the first two decades enjoying my trade,
racing on the weekends, and spending Monday through Friday wondering
why my skill set was what it was. In other words, I kept thinking about
getting better "at this", yet the epiphanies were few and far between. The
learning curve was more like a straight line after ten or so years. I wrestled
with how to improve at what I do. It wasn't that I lacked confidence, but
I wondered why there was such a fuss attached to my bicycles when all
I could see was that they ought to be better given the time I had under my
belt. I saw the flaws more easily than I could see the salient features. Then,
in some kind of watershed moment in 1998 or so, it occurred to me that I
actually did have a clue, and that my frames were quite good and were so
because all the years of construction, and racing, and keeping my antennae
up had paid off.

BG: Where do you buy your coffee?
RS: Given a choice, it's a grande black-eye at Starbucks, but the
closest Starbuck-like coffee shop is 20 miles away, during the
week I brew my own in a French Press, usually from beans that
folks mail to me after I beg and grovel online. I have at least four
pending clients that are in the coffee industry, and they each keep
me tightened up. Last word - I always drink the coffee in a to-go
container, and with a straw. That's key atmo.

BG: Favorite online bicycle forum?
RS: I like the Serotta forum. I do some of my best work there! It was
an existing online community that began in 2001 (I think) but was
brought under the Serotta umbrella circa 2004. For the unwashed
who may read this, circa means around in Latin. I also spend time
on the Framebuilder forum. It has become an excellent surrogate class
for those wishing to speed upthe learning process, and all the framebuilders
who post are incredibly generous with their time and resources.

BG: How cool is TheBikeGame dot com?
RS: Is that Svatek's site?[ed--great]

BG: How many national championships have been won on your frames? Most recent?
RS: The team has won nine National Championships in 'Cross, the most
recent being Jon Page's 2002 victory in Napa. In non-'cross disciplines,
perhaps another eightto ten.

BG: What is your least favorite state in the US?
RS: The road season.

BG: Some Cross Gamers are going to Carbon Forks. As a steel guy
how does this make you feel?
RS: It must suck to have to make choices based on cost and the market
driven-ness of a product. CF forks are the industry's way of dumbing
down an important item in order to make it en masse and at a large profit,
attach some engineering drivel to it, and sell it to unsuspecting consumers
under that whacked out new and improved line of bullshit.
[ed--Good point. In researching this interview we inspected a Richard Sachs
steel cross fork. VERY nice. Great ride and craftmanship]

BG: Describe Cross Gaming in three words.
RS: 'CROSS EFFIN RULES.

BG: Do you think that the plugs in Adam Myerson's ears are blue tooth
enabled and if they are does this give him an advantage.....are they UCI legal?
RS: Eff you and that sophomoric sense of humor yo. I was at the 'Cross
Worlds in London in 73 and was hooked way back, but the reason there
is a Richard Sachs involvement in 'cross at all is because Adam approached
me in 96 about a sponsorship gig. Owing to the success of that liaison, it
all blossomed in to what followed.

BG: Jon Hamblen huh? Alicia must be a great asset for Richard Sachs to
allow her to drag him into the program, huh?
RS: Alicia's involvement and success in 'cross carried our team for years. She
is a charming girl and we all love her. Her enthusiasm is infectious atmo. If
Jon is good enough for her, then he passes our smell test without even
needing an application. Insert smiley face here ___________ .

BG: Do you think card counting in Vegas still goes on today? Why/why not?
RS: Sinatra or Dylan. Discuss.[ed--Zeppelin]

BG: What is your favorite beer?
RS: Dinkel Acker.

BG: Better movie Braveheart or Rocky 1? Do you think the new Rocky
movie that will be out in December will be super lame or cool?
RS: 21 Grams.

BG: What do you look for in a cross bike gamer that you would want to sponsor?
RS: He/she must be a team player and get along in a system that puts
attitude and participation over a long list of palmares. Our team is more
like a family - a troupe. We travel well (together) and everyone lives for
autumn atmo.

BG: What bike gamer had the most talent and just pissed it away? or would
you give the Waste of Talent Award to?
RS: Since we haven't officially met, I'll refrain judgment.

BG: Do you believe in Plate Tectonics?
RS: Isn't that the Belgian pop/rap/tecno band from the 80s? I'm serious.

BG: A lot of southerners believe that the North did not actually win the war
and/or that the war has not really been concluded. As a Yankee, how does
this make you feel?
RS: A mind is a terrible thing to waste.

More Richard Sachs? Check these links.
blog http://rscyclocross.blogspot.com/
team page http://www.richardsachs.com/rsachscybc.html
awesome 'cross porn http://www.volarebikes.com/richie/rgm/
lotsa pics http://new.photos.yahoo.com/bobbesrs/albums
official team name RGM WATCHES - RICHARD SACHS - REX CHIU
Richard, thanks a million for taking the time to chat with us!

2006-10-28T17:24:00.000-04:00

snipped:
> I'm not sure, but what I think the cats want is a place to go
> and become "official guaranteed OK frame building dudettes/dudes."
> Someplace to teach them, help them work things out to make what
> they want, and then additionally to give them confidence and back
> them up in front of the rest of the doubting world.
> As is there would be an industry "trade school" that would give
> them an idea of getting a guaranteed something after completing
> a stated curriculum and tenure of "X." There's nothing like that,
> and I don't know if there could be something like that, not in the
> world economy from which this would have to spring forth.

the "world economy" thing is key. it needs to be asked, "what is a
framebuilder and what role does fill now?". prior to the mtb
era, the need for a serious rider-slash-racer to get to a builder's
front steps was ever-present because the industry was pretty much
incapable of making high end and race worthy frames in a production
environment. well that hasn't been the status quo for at least two
decades. the advances in technology and manufacturing have all but
made getting a one-off frame in lieu of a store bought bike no longer
a necessity. factories and production frame shops are doing excellant
work. most are offering units whose quality exceeds what comes out
of many of the so-called custom shops. so - what is left? are you
selling the love? the "craftsmanship"? that fleur de lis or lug window
that took you 18 hours to shape? there's merit to all of this, but
there is no real market to speak of. and if there is no real market,
why herd? now don't misunderstand me; i am not suggesting that one
must be 1) a pauper to survive or 2) live a compromised existence.
what i hope the new guys think about is getting a job in industry and
learning all facets of the market and also of the sport. add some value
to what you bring to the table,and don't spend the next two years here
dissing seven and colnago because they sell easier, and for more
money, while you are in your shops lovingly crafting a super stiff 953
frame with an alpha q fork. i meeeeeeeeeen, this is not then, it's now. if
you want to be a framebuilder, learn all about bicycles, not lugs, and
not surface tables, and not mini fillets. all this talk about "being frame-
builders..."and grouping together to ease the way into a career
path. if you're not content to poke around online for the next 10 years
until all the search engines stop running, and if you are not brazing
and testing and riding and tweaking all your waking hours now in the
hope that you could be another sasha or zanc (to name just two guys
who i feel will survive inspite of never having worked in industry),
the best advice i will give, assuming you have read this far and want
more than a hobby out of this - is to get a job working in industry.
after you are bored shitless from the routine, find a more refined
arena to work in. some day you will be more accomplished than the guy
who took you in in the first place. that is how it works.
e-RICHIE

2006-10-28T17:21:00.000-04:00

snipped:
> With the "success" of the show, I believe the
> time has come to transform framebuilding from an
> underground cult thing to a legitimate, and
> influential, sector of the Bicycle Industry.

my opinion is that 1) it is not an underground cult
thing at all and never was, and 2) by the very nature
of a builder's yearning to separate himself from the
pack (ya' know, that mall stuff), he is not likely to
be interested in becoming a card carrying, influential
member of the industry. i realize the two points could
be construed as being diametrically opposed, but that's
how i see it.
the best way to ensure that life goes on is to keep giving
it the heinekin maneuver whenever it grasps for air. that
includes posting here and at neil's site, and documenting
your work for others to see, and answering phone calls from
fng's when then call about a procedure, and putting parts
into the marketplace when you believe there's a need to
add a lug or a braze on, and all the things in between and
on all sides of this. remain open-minded and never assume
you know it all just because you knocked off your 27th frame.
i have learned lots on this list, and most of it was from
new guys. folks like jonny and zanc and sacha and tony and
some others exhibit a drive to succedd at this - and they
will - because they are at the edge, just like we all were
when we began. i have no fear for the future. there are guys
here that get it, and many that don't. imo that's the natural
order of things.
e-RICHIE

2006-10-28T17:01:00.000-04:00

Originally Posted by B??????????? -
> That we are all supposed to use round bars because these 'Pros"
> use them? That round bars are somehow superior because these "pros"
> use them? That these pros are all using what their equipment sponsors
> happened to stick on their bikes?
> Use whatever kind of bars feel best to YOU. Kinda silly to be obsessing
> about this, atmo . . . sheesh.

that's not true.
anatomic bars are a product manager's nightmare gone awry.
the pros choose what they want, and while i haven't taped
them, i have hours of chats 'tween me and 2-3 component
makers about this very issue and each brand manager to a
man said that the pros' stash of bars are made once/twice a
year and they pull from that. otherwise (they said), since the
market from oem makers for ana bars is so strong - the reason
being folks perceive them as new and improved - that the big
consumers of bars, the treks, giants, specializeds, and cannondales,
of the world have called the tune that the bar makers play. as a
result, to stay in biz, said makers make these ana's. when i would
grill them about the short supply of non ana's despite 7 of 10 pros
are seen with them, the reaction, again, was that pros use the
trad bends but what keeps them in biz is the oem market, not
the aftermarket.
i agree - use what you want. but don't fool yourself into thinking
that pros use what they are given. their bicycles don't come from
the local mall atmo.

2006-10-28T16:55:00.000-04:00

Originally Posted by T?????????:
> I'm not sure about tough times... I know Dave's wait
> list keeps growing and growing. (snipped) I doubt any
> of the custom builders are getting rich building frames,
> but at least a few of them have a guaranteed income for
> awhile to come.

there has never been a better era in which to
be an independent framebuilder. it may have
taken awhile, but the pendulum has veered
back to the direction taken by those who ignore
time clocks and market trends and simply want
to do the best job possible atmo. it's not always
possible to do this in industry; too many mouths
to feed and hands to grease. framebuilders, by
nature, are take this job and shove it kinda' guys,
and the nearly all the ones who are in the mainstream
now have passed the smell test.

2006-10-28T11:01:00.000-04:00

sorry - i have left this page unattended to for too long
so i'll resume pasting now and continue until i'm caught
up. here is a reply from an interesting forum thread about
framebuilders and their thoughts wrt if their bicycles are
ridden, collected, or just bought as wall hangers. the entire
thread lives here: CLICK.

my initial post was...
framebuilders, i have always thought - and said - answer to
a higher calling. if they didn't, they'd be more in tune with
the market, more apt to worry about trends, concerned with
a time clock, or with building an ira. framebuilders live
outside the lines. the reason they do what they do is because
the conventional industry cannot; too many layers of corporate
this or model year that, etcetera. are you feeling me atmo?

when you come in to work and your only, or more aptly put,
your primary concern is to improve on what you did last week,
the only thing that matters is that you try to improve and that
you believe you have improved - that is, until next week comes.

it is not an easy thing to articulate, because at the end of the
day, bicycles are seen as commodities. however, most start as a
pile of stuff. often it's the same pile of stuff that the factories
use. so what's the difference? the framebuilders i know, and the
ones i don't know but fantasize about, all believe that they can
somehow add something to the pile that cannot be included by 100
people on 2nd shift at the yournamehere factory. yeah - i can see
a few heads nodding and thinking that this cat is deluded.

i'd agree. i know i suffer from this delusion. but i have no boss
to worry about, and most framebuilders are their own boss. let me
cut to the chase - framebuilders build frames to build frames.
if they finally perfect the gig, there'd be no effin' reason in the
world to come in and continue. to a man, the primary task of all
the framebuilders i know is to improve, and not to remain the status
quo yo.

does a framebuilder get depressed if the frame isn't used? despite
reading some of the above, i hardly doubt it. i believe all that
matters is that he believed he did his best job to fill the order,
and would do his same best job even if the frame were to be destroyed
once it was completed. to have this mindset, one must remain detatched
from everything except the pile of stuff on the bench. that is where
the energy is focused, rather than what happens after the frame
leaves his hands.

all this said, all of us do try, and we all hope the client gets it.
whether the bicycle is used or not, if we believe the client doesn't
get it, it doesn't matter how many miles are logged.

2006-04-30T20:48:00.000-04:00

from a thread in which some cat was trying
to compare the AHCI to the framebuilder's plight:
>I think the watch guys had an easier time of it...

watches aren't pedaled. telling time is not a physical
activity. being wealthy and willing to spend limitlessly
will not turn a guy with money into a cyclist, even if
he does know the time of day.
this entire thread is tethered to one single post-show
email about the state of things financial for the working
framebuilder. there are pages of replies to this across
the hall on CR. suddenly, there are dozens of experts
talking about the market and marketing. i came away
from the show very positive and look forward to more of
the same. i think before you worry about selling frames,
you have to know how to make them. from my vantage
point, the working framebuilders that know how to make
them are selling them. being a working framebuilder also
includes having people skills. maybe there can be two
days of posts suggesting how a framebuilder could interact
in a positive way with potential clients.
e-RICHIE

2006-04-30T20:45:00.000-04:00

snipped from post:
>The debate should be over whether it is possible to resurrect
>the lugged steel frame as a luxury product the way the Swiss
>watch industry resurrected mechanical watches

imo, "we" may not want to do that. at the end of the day, we are
making and selling bicycles, not lugs. the method of assembly is
inconsequential - and it's also trumped up. i'd rather have a
well made tig welded steel or AL frame than one made simple to
show that there are lugs at the pipe confluences. lugs are cool.
perhaps a small legion of makers can eek out a paycheck from
employing them. but they (lugs) are also part of an era that has
been transcended. that's not to infer that lug frames equal "old"
or "reissue". i'm suggesting that the handmade frame builder show
not focus on lugs as a calling card or drawing card. to be successful,
he'll have to keep in step with the rest of the industry with respect
to materials and "all that".

the lugs are not the frame -
the frame is the frame!
e-RICHIE

2006-04-30T20:42:00.000-04:00

from a thread about how it all started...
>Richard, when did you pick up the skills to meet the bigger challenges?
>It seems like those are the things you learned when you were out on
>your own. I have no idea what you were exposed to at Witcomb in the
>way of the bigger challenges ie how they did their sizes/geometries,
>what you learned about different combinations of materials, but again,
>it seems like the big discoveries were happening out on your own.
>Witcomb may have gotten you ready for those things, but I'm just
>wondering if the stuff that eventually became Rote was the stuff you
>got from being in the industry in the Witcomb days and the bigger stuff
>you tackled was the stuff while you were flying solo.

ps: as a data point, i was at witcomb for 9+ months. i did anything that
was asked of me in return for being able to be around it all and absorb
the atmosphere. i finally held a torch in my hand in the last month. all
i learned to braze there was dropouts, top eyes, and brake bridges.
when peter and i were pressed into service to make frames at witcomb
usa, neither of us remembered much of what we did in london, but we
had a VERY RICH boss who wanted to manufacture in the worst possible
way. he threw money at us like there was no tomorrow. what we did there
was the most rudimentary framebuilding possible.

the ancecdotal info i posted and you referenced here begins after i left
to start my shop in 75/76. at that time, i was building 3-4 frames a week
with no problem, still racing every weekend, and almost NEVER left my
shop. i reckon i made about 500-600 frames before i realized that i
really didn't have a clue. i spent most of the 80s trying to get a clue.

as noted yesterday, i didn't feel comfortable in my skin until the 90s.
note: during ALL of this time, the types of frames you are talking about
were ubiquitous. it was easy to go to a store, a race, or a trade show
and do "industrial espionage".

ask yourself, do you want to spend this amount of time in an era in
which there is less to see? are you prepared for such a learning
curve. btw - how many frames have you made to date? just curious.
i enjoy the dialogue too.
e-RICHIE

2006-04-30T20:39:00.000-04:00

from the framelist:
>...Should I just keep plugging away or give up frame
>building altogether since I haven't "paid my dues".

h?l -
being a "master" (which, btw the way, i think is an eff-ed
up word) is not only about how things look. when i started,
everyone was all wet and sticky about "thinned lugs" and
really cool dropout area confluences. since i was new and
had no experience other than a few years working in another
shop, all i could concentrate on was "thinning lugs" and doing
a bad-ass job on my dropouts. five years into the gig, those
(types of) things became incredibly rote - with a capital "R".
i realized that the challenges i faced had to do with construction
sequences, how different material combinations react within
a single frame, how to solve size/fit/design/geometry issues,
and "all that stuff". i don't think i felt comfortable in my own
until the mid 90s. your mileage may vary. regardless, and this
skin is not aimed at sacha (who's a pal) or dave (who's an email
pal) despite your using them as examples, but you really don't know
what is going on in a frame or in the builder's head simply by
seeing examples of the finish work online.
e-RICHIE

2006-04-30T20:33:00.000-04:00

from a thread following NAHBS 2006:
>We need to find out who the major players are,
>i.e. I.F., Seven, Serotta, Waterford, etc and see
>who has the best business model for the small guy.

dw - all the guys you listed may not be the model for
the small guy. imo, these cats succeed because they do
something none of us do: they are production shops that
batch-build frames, most of which are pre-sold to retailers
worldwide. that's a great gig and worth envying, but the
essence of "our" plight, assuming there really is a "we",
is that each of us never does the same thing from one day
to the next. there are no standing orders, no catalog models,
and most of the small builders are not really business minded
go-getters. my feeling is that the solution is attitudinal.
one must realize and accept that it's a near impossibility
to make money from hand labor, especially one's own. read
that again: "it's a near impossibility to make money from
hand labor, especially one's own".

i have found that the only way to do "all this", remain happy,
be able to have a creative outlet, etcetera, is to strike a
balance between producing frames and selling service(s). whether
it's softgoods, tools, completely assembled bicycles - or my
freaking toenails fercrisakes! - one must realize that these
resources must exist and be tapped. what else can i say about it?

as far as this thread's origins go, bruce was an effin' pioneer
wrt to this shit: he had the all-world favorite touring rack in
the early 80s, he had bicycles made for him in japan for abit
in the early 90s (iirc), and he embraced price-point sku's by
making tig welded frames in house to supplement frame sales.

these, and similar, diversions are the kinds of things a working
framebuilder must embrace in order to make a better living. making
money "just" from selling one frame to one client month after month,
year after year, will likely not work. if it has worked for someone,
would that someone please chime in to this post -
e-RICHIE

2006-04-30T18:56:00.000-04:00

snipped from a thread about learning
the "art" (sic) of framebuilding:
>...I would love to apprentice under someone. But personally
>it's not an option. I'm still going to pursue this with the
>available learning institution that I have (UBI). Will that
>make me a frame builder, no. But I believe it will give me
>the skill set or base to work with. I truly don't know what
>else to do. It's a dream and I'm try'n to make it work.

l?rry - i feel ya', and it's hard for me to ask this
because i think of myself as a nice guy - but what do
you want? do you want to build a frame, or do you want
to be a framebuilder? the two (replies) are not the same.
woud you practice medicine as a hobby? let's add "craft"
to this; were you to love custom eyewear, woild you make
lenses and frames at home and give them/sell them cheap to
those who need glasses? these bicycles go on the open road
- in traffic. who is going to pick up the tab if your hobby
learning results in a bicycle that suddenly steers to the
left, or simply falls apart? sorry. the answer remains; it's
not a craft like knitting is. i'm hear for ya' if you want to
chat. but i'll be honest with you.
e-RICHIE

2006-04-30T18:54:00.000-04:00

snipped:
>The future is customer options and personal configuration.

no it isn't. the future, as was the past, is about using
your experience to let a client know what works and
what is best. do you tell a physician what to prescribe?
as far as the rest of the post goes:
who is gonna make this stuff?
the framebuilder is the point man here that has the
experience to know what goes where and, in most
cases, why. if "industry" wanted to slow itself down
and make less, it would co-opt framebuilders. at
what point in time do you see builders working as
behind the scene assemblers? oh - and if you meant
that welding and industrial/machine shops would be
the fabricators of said custom spec-ed orders, where
do these folks get the information to produce a reliable
frame design. your hypothetical is interesting but i see
no way it could ever be real.
e-RICHIE

2006-04-30T18:52:00.000-04:00

snipped:
>I don't know. Don't you think this is something
>that you can learn via a school like UBI? Don't
>they teach you these things?

you'll learn how a frame is built if you go to ubi.
you might even fully build one for yourself under
supervision. after that - the ONLY way you are going
to progress and use the ubi experience is to work
at a frame shop, at a station, doing repetitive work.
after you're sick of brake bridges you'll do dropouts.
after that you'll tap bb shells. larry - there is no
other way to learn unless you work at some framebuilder.
all of them/us are loners, or small businesses, or
inefficient, or undercapitalized. yadadayadadaaaa.
it will take FOREVER to learn framebuilding from
a framebuilder.
keep asking - i'll reply asap.
e-RICHIE

2006-04-30T18:48:00.000-04:00

from a framelist thread. i think the subject
was, as usual, about doing things the old
way, but in this century.
this was my reply:

look - what's gonna happen is what ALWAYS has happened
in this and other industries. in the bicycle business,
up unto a point (i'd wager the mid 80s at the most
recent) framebuilders were at the vanguard* and all

trends could be traced to the workbenches of the famous
ones. that changed in the mtb era and has continued to
evolve ever since. the industry, almost all industries,
co-opt "smallness" because the rank and file thinks the
artisans and design centers do the best work. but that
work is the most expensive, the hardest to get, the most
inefficiently produced, and just plain out of reach of
the masses. industry finds a way to glom onto the finer
points of this and distills it into a neat little package
that can be made easily and sold for a profit. it does not
have to reach the fountainhead proportions discussed already;
the top makers like trek and cannondale are already making
frames and bicycles that are every bit as good as those
builders made only a generation ago. where does that leave
the framebuilder? he sells himself based on his experiences
and skill set and never looks at what the mainstream is
doing. once you decide to measure youself against it, it's
over. it's two seperate life forms, despite the fact that
the product is a bicycle.
it's an impossibily difficult time to be starting out, so
learn your chops, make a lot of mistakes, pay attention,
watch the sport, and do your best work. if you wait long
enough, it'll happen.
e-RICHIE
* i love using catch terms like "at the vanguard" yo.

2006-04-30T18:45:00.000-04:00

in a thread about framebuilding in the 21st century,
a listee posted this:
>I am all for lugs, that's why I make them! But if I
>were to set up shop today as a FULL TIME builder, I
>would focus my energies on other methods/materials
>and in other directions than strictly building lugged bikes.

agreed agreed agreed.
this all makes me wonder what the priority is here;
is it to learn about frame-building or to "love" lugs.
when we all started, lugs were ubiquitous, and all
bicycles of all grades were made with them. there
was ALWAYS something from which to be inspired.
now - there is practically nothing left to copy, and if
you are starting, you must copy. whether you admit it
out loud or suppress it, it is this way.

with other materials and joining techniques pretty much
putting lugged building out to pasture, it is all a small world
getting smaller.

if i were starting now, i would've stayed in academia. if
i was too stubborn to resist it all, i would do what i did
then: work in industry and learn stuff. back then, it all
included "lugs", and now it doesn't at all.

i won't cast aside all that got me to this point, but i'd be
dishonest if i didn't say that it's a near impossibility to
recreate it. lugs are cool and "all that shit", but they are
part of an era that has less relevance now. the folks that
are successful and do make frames with lugs - these folks
are not selling "lugs", they are selling the sum total of many
life experiences.
e-RICHIE

2006-04-30T18:42:00.000-04:00

here's a reply of mine to a framelist
thread - a LONG thread - about framebuiding
as a career:

okay, will?#m -
i had to read this twice to make sure i grasped where
you're coming from, or at least where i think you're
coming from.

i don't agree with you on the all the romanticizing going
on with lugs because of what i wrote in the post you re-
plied to. but there's one thing i will agree with you on:
we have a similar streak inasmuch as both of us do what
we do/want to do regardless of the warning signs around
us. is that commendable? i don't know. but it works for me
and i hope it works for you.

that said, i think the thread has drifted a bit. framebuilding
is about framebuilding, not lugs. fine that you/we want to
exercise this method for creative reasons, but part of all
this is about learning what goes where. i and others too,
have posted that it's near impossible to succeed by self-
teaching. you can copy lug designs and window variations
until the cows come home but it's not clear to me how you're
improve your skill set if you've never worked for someone else.
just to prove how self-absorbed i am, i'll link to a 2002 CR list
post in which i replied on a thread where a bunch of vintage
sycophants were praising a whole mess of old frames, all
factory made, and all on the butch side, simply because
they loved lugs and lamented their era's passing. here:
http://search.bikelist.org/getmsg.asp?Filename=classicrendezvous.10210.0505.eml
e-RICHIE

2006-04-30T18:36:00.000-04:00

a listee posted:
>It seems that the bicycle can be seen as a "solution"
>to a problem (providing the perfect riding experience,
>etc...) as opposed to a product. The framebuilder is
>sought out by some as the "alchemist" (your words I
>think) that can transform a pile of tubes/bits into
>the vehicle for this desired experience. The combined
>years of knowledge and wisdom from repeatedly solving
>this problem in thousands of nuanced variations makes
>his/her skills sought out in the marketplace. (snipped)

i'm not sure i follow the literal meaning of the text.
to cut to the chase, there is no real problem that is
being solved by the framebuilder's "solution". in my
experience, the demand is based on want, not need,
and it's an emotional purchase rather than one that
a consumer "must have". looking back over the years
or even through the orders now pending here, maybe
2% of them are placed to solve fit issues, and the
98% are for folks who perceive that a framebuilder
(or me, or both) can offer a product - based on a certain
experience level, etcetera - whose quality level excceds
what's available in the commerical marketplace.
apologies in advance if i've misread your intentions.
e-RICHIE

2006-04-30T18:23:00.000-04:00

from the frame list:
i wrote -
ow?n - you're late to this thread, and those points are covered
in yesterday's posts. see the archives. my pov is that you get
your skill set working on the line, or in industry, or for other
buiders along the way - after which, you leave and begin to
distill the experience(s) and refine the work and style.
do you love to cook? most successful restaurants are
are run by chefs that have worked in many, many kitchens.

a listee then posted -
>That's a very valid comparison. So, as a wannabe
>framebuilder, if I travel from Scotland to the US
>or Australia, with serious intent, would any of you
>open your 'kitchens' to me? I plan to attend Doug Fattic's
>frame building course in April but how do I get exposure
>to other thoughts, techniques, skills and experience?
>England (or Scotland) doesn't have the wealth of frame-
>builders that it did in the 60's and 70's and the most
>fertile area for handmade bikes is the US (with apologies
>to Darrell). There has been talk of the benefits of working
>in a production line environment but I'm never going to be
>a Zagat top rated chef by working in Wendy's or MacDonalds.

my reply to that was:
we are not the kitchens. we are the guys that
left the kitchens we worked in! regardless,
our "kitchens" are open to you by dint of the
information sharing here and on neil's site.
if you're near chester, come for lunch!
e-RICHIE

2006-04-30T18:22:00.000-04:00

snipped from a framelist thread:
>Customers are in general paying for the PRODUCT,
>not the TIME it took to make the product."

n?el -
i believe this to be true 100% in the industry/market
driven world, but in the framebuilding world (that sounds
lame) the product is not the bicycle, it's the framebuilder.
that maker's experience and subsequent choices are the reason
there's a line at his door.
e-RICHIE

2006-04-30T18:20:00.000-04:00

from a debate on the framebuilder email list:

RS typed: "i realized that the challenges i faced had to do..."
SW typed: "But the bar that he set for _himself_ included..."

i think a point i am/was making is overlooked here.
it is this: i had no right being in business for myself
when i started. i WISH i could have unrung the bell
at age 24? and either stayed in england much longer
and/or tried to work for other builders/shops for a good
long time so i would have a foundation on which to start
my own gig. i would never repeat the the process i went
through and have advised against it all through the years.
it works/worked for me in the end owing to serendipitous
reasons rather than framebuilding ones. i have no kids.
i live in a town with a low cost of living. i had no real
ambition to ever succeed commercially. all i ever wanted
to do (once i entered the frame "world") was to know more
about fine road bicycles and to be able to make them.

having live abroad when i did was a mighty fine experience
for a middle-class suburban kid. it was a life-altering time.
but don't misconstrue any of my posts with these soundbites.
i started my business too soon. i knew nothing. and it took me
at least 5 years and 500 frames made under my own name
to realize how little i knew and how much value there is to
working in industry and getting MUCH more adept at "this"
before i set my bars anywhere.
e-RICHIE

2006-04-30T18:14:00.000-04:00

my text from a long thread about everyone becoming
a new-age "Contructeur" and co-opting the term as well:

well i guess i can agree with this, especially in
lieu of all the ;<) things you punctuate with. but
to continue on the semantic theme, when you write:
"It would be for the same reason one would buy
a Singer or Weigle over a production touring bike."
i'd still have to ask how a guy who's a new builder
or a guy who's never built _this type_ of frame/bicycle
can be a constructeur or have his bicycle called a
constructeur bicycle. i've been to singer's atelier
and that place reeks of generations of evolution.
clearly, he and herse are names that define the genre.
peter is the american incarnate of that ilk. now - and
i know this is left-handed rationale, but if jan can
opine that the japanese iterations look and are likely
to fragile to handle all that these bicycles are built
to handle - and they have been at it for a looooong time
- how can you put faith in someone who is doing this in
his first season? does it not take a certain amount of
problem solving to be considered a constructeur? and not
to be coy, but as i suggested earlier, you can't put on
a leather jacket abd "become" a thug.
i'm just trying to understand the market-driven-ness of
this construcreur craze.
e-RICHIE

2006-04-30T18:12:00.000-04:00

posted:
>There has been discussion lately suggesting the
>greatest asset custom builders offer is bicycle fit.
>If a customer only gets a frameset (frame and fork)
>and nothing else from you, how do you, the builder,
>ensure that the frame fits well when they put their
>parts on? If they are supplying all of the
>human/machine interfaces, is it still a custom fit
>performed by the builder?

the greatest asset offered isn't custom fit.
fit should be part of the equation, not the
equation. a builder's asset is being on the
edge of the industry and not bound to a time
clock, model year, "etcetera", and can strive
for a higher quality without the pressures that
come with these. from material selection, to
construction quality, and through to finishing
details, builders - "hopefully" - answer to a
higher calling.

as far as the assembly of parts by others onto
frames supplied as, well - frames, you can't
control it all, so either sell the complete rig
or concede that the client can take it from there.
e-RICHIE

2006-04-30T18:07:00.000-04:00

asked:
>I also think that a person modestly current with the world
>economic sitiuation and media can reasonably infer that most
>of the folks assembling carbon bikes in Asia are probably not
>riding them.

let's look at it from this angle:

what is wrong with the guy in asia making ??? frames a
day - whether he cares about bicycles or not? what does
that have to do with framebuilding? my point is this: to a
certain degree, everything is commoditized(sp?). and
whether we like it or not, it's really not a a sin if some guy
high bids $7000 on a colnage made by the fellow in the
brain article. can you, hal, or myself make as many frames
as it would take to satisfy the market? can we do it efficiently,
and affordably? someone has to make those frames - and no
one is confusing what that asian is doing with what we are
doing. to use historical anecdote to make an analagous point:
are you/hal/others upset when you find out that most of hetchins
(to use one "hand-built" frame as an example) has, from the
begining, used pre--fabbed parts to create the illusion that their
"hand-made" frames are, well, hand-made?

what i am getting at is this: in the 21st century, there are more
efficient ways of getting "it" done. it's no more face-less for a
cat to toil in a factory and do his best than it is for a sub-contracor
for a famous f'builder to use lugs that were decorated by a punch
press.
e-RICHIE

2006-04-30T18:04:00.000-04:00

a listee posted:
>a thought on perfection: i grew up with a navajo family.the navajo are
>known for high quality weavings.the women would always incorporate a
>deliberate flaw so your soul would not be forever trapped in the work
>piece. thankfully,as framebuilders it sounds as though we will be immune
>from this.

i'm not immune from this.
the more i know about handmade items, be they watches,
tailored suits, sweetgrass baskets, wabi-sabi, yada-yada,
the more i excuse anything that shows up in my frames that
i may have once considered a "flaw".

i would not intentionally incorporate a flaw; having been
raised a jew, the guilt would haunt me. but i am of the mindset
that the frame will be what it wants to be, and i am comfortable
with that and accept it.
e-RICHIE

2006-03-21T07:48:00.000-05:00

(here are some pulled posts from a forum discussion i
was involved in. the subject matter was linked to columbus'
new neobium material. my replies are in boldface.)

Originally Posted by S*ndy
> I still have the same question as I asked earlier in
> the thread. Other than weight, what are the advantages
> (if any) of Niobium? Or any other steel.
if the quality of the material is up-ed,
you can use less of it with no penalty.
Originally Posted by c*tulle
> Isn´t that a tautology?
no. it's gnosticism yo.
Originally Posted by c*tulle
> Ooops, sorry, I'll be right back, I just got a demiurge.
i had one yesterday. it took 3 weeks to get
an appointment with a licensed demiurgist.
but my skin is softer and tingly yo.
Originally Posted by c*tulle
> Phew, I hadn't had a demiurge in an Aeon.
they recommend an annual demiurge after you hit 50 yo yo.
Originally Posted by S*ndy
> Two questions please:
> 1. If the diameter is the same and the tube wall is
> reduced, then the stiffness is less. Why is that?
> 2. What makes the tubing of one bike stronger than
> another, tube diameter?
1) because there is less material.
2) all things being equal, yes, increasing o.d. will make
the tube a stronger "unit".
remember - you don't "feel" the tube wall or the butt transition
or the lug or the tig bead. you "feel" the sum total of the care
with which it's all assembled into a rationally (one would hope...)
designed bicycle. to wit, i don't even think you "feel" the frame
seperately; you feel the sum total of all of the components chosen
for a particular frame's assembly, and you also "feel" the condition
in which that particular sum total has been maintained with regard
to mechanical wear. i.e., the cable and chain stretch, tire tread
wear, loss of spoke tension, loose springs on pedal/cleat interfaces,
etcetera. trying to discern what's what based on what a particular
tube is made of, its guage, o.d., if it's heat treated or not;
these are impossibly arcane nuances that may be seperated out in
lab-like situations but mean far less in the real world.
Originally Posted by S*ndy
> Thanks for the answers and explanation of them.
i'm catching up on the tech talk via a correspondance course.
today's u.s. mail contained an intro to stiffness primer that
i read over a nice hummus and sauerkraut based lunch.
Originally Posted by Cl*mb
> when someone like columbus works on a new tubing, what are
> they hoping to accomplish? is it something about the actual
> nature of the steel itself, or is it about the way the steel
> can be shaped? i'm not sure i know the right words to ask the
> question intelligently. tubes have two "properties": there is
> the molecular structure of the steel itself; and then there is
> how the steel is shaped, i.e. diameter, butting, ovalization,
> etc. true? if so, when someone like columbus works on a new
> tubing, what are they tweaking? thanks!
i think the honest is is that it's all market based. the sun set on
nearly all of the ferrous-based sales a decade ago. there is little
reason for a company to throw a ton of resources at steel today
because so few people use it - in the scheme of things, that is.
so - to answer your question: columbus is interested in its own
history too, and realizes that the framebuilders made the firm
what it is, and it cannot completely foresake that connection, even
though it's not a rainmaker. regardless, sometimes a market leader
has to go against a trend simply to jumpstart a new one, or revive
one that used to be a cash cow. i think columbus realizes that
there's a zeitgeist-issimo going down in north america since its
ground zero for the best steel frames still being made (pockets
of northern italy and osaka notwithstanding), and they want to
serve that niche. why would they tweak or innovate something that
they've proven works so well -though unchanged - for the past ???
decades? there is only one reason: weight. the quality of the
ferrous material is now high enough that the total weight of a
frame made from steel can be low enough to matter to a 21st
century consumer. this is not a slam against other brands, but
imo, nearly all attempts at lowering the overall weight of a
steel frame made in recent years has been at the expense of some
reliability and some longevity. from my discussions with the
columbus folks, they are ready to supply steel that will do all
that steel is known to do - and not have any of the liabilities
that are associated with the mad rush others brands have faced
in trying to stay au courant* in the face of declining steel sales.
* a french term i got in my home-schooling course.
Originally Posted by Cl*mb
> that home-schooling is really paying off! to deal with weight,
> i'm guessing they_somehow_make the steel "stronger" so that it
> can be drawn thinner, yes? what is that_somehow_? do they change
> the "mix" of elements in the steel? change how it is phsyically
> drawn? do some kind of heat- or other-treating? i get how thinner
> walls lightens steels, but how do they "tweak" the steel to allow
> it to be thinner yet still strong? as always, merci.
they most likely tweak that last .00004% of the
last .772% of the metalurgical makeup. to be honest,
how they do it is of no interest to me. it's not a bicycle
or even a framebuilder related pursuit imo, it's geek
engineer pursuit. nothing wrong with that. i think the
bicycle framebuilder is concerned that he can trust a
vendor. period. i know i have lost faith in vendors over
the years due to situations that would make your hair
curl, and i've seen you without a hat, so it's no mean feat
yo. the small bits that materials folks do to get the stuff
i use to market is normally so science-based that i have
no way to interpret it. i simply trust, or i don't. the rest
of it is intuition. i know some want to know about trace
elements and guys in labs pouring stuff into beekers that
somehow end up at the steel mill. that's a universe away
from my own private hoboken imho.
Originally Posted by w*nderingwh**l
> (snipped): Depending on the expected load, you can reduce
> either the tube cross sectional area or the section modulus
> (Pi*D^2*t/4) so that the new bike with the stronger material
> ends up being just as strong but lighter than the original bike.
ya' see...
that's the conundrum. everyone thinks it's cooler to have a
lighter bicycle, even though the frame - which is stationary
weight - is the key part of the gestalt-a-thon. stationary
weight simply is not that important if the difference between
the extremes is only a pound or so. however...
if everybody's bicycles are lighter than they were a year or
a generation ago, the playing field remains level. so - where
is the consumer left? he can brag about his 16 pound bicycle,
but will its low weight come at the expense of shelf life?
imo, yes. does that lower shelf life matter? apparently not.
i'm often amazed that folks would buy lighter and lighter
parts/bicycles so as to reduce the effort it takes to propel
them, yet these same folks do not ride more as a result,
they simply complete the ride faster. that being the case,
doesn't it negate the very reason most of us ride in the
first place - exercise? perhaps aalow a humerous jab at the
race to make lighter and lighter bicycles: soon, they'll be so
light, pedaling really will be effortless, and bicycle riding
will have fewer and fewer of the beneficial side effects
that it once had. shut me up atmo.
Originally Posted by gpd*vis
> When I say 'stiff', I am saying 'too stiff for me'. Most of
> my rides tend to be in the 35+ mile range and I would feel
> beat-up when I would get off the bike. That is too stiff.
> Don't have the problem with my current rides. Stiff? Good if
> I was riding crits. But, I'm not, so was a problem for me.
> That is why I stated that YMMV. All depends on the individual
> and what he/she/other wants.
wouldn't that issue be more tethered to frame
design? if you're getting beat up and aren't
comfortable, i don't think it's a materials-based
problem - and i don't think "stiff" is the word
i'd pick to describe your situation. the ride is
harsh and the frame design is such that it doesn't
allow you to finish the ride or go further.
i'd go so far to say that "stiff" is not a word i'd want
to use to describe a crit bike (whatever they are) either.
if the bike is uncomfortable for either 10 or 110 miles,
it doesn't matter whether it's an ms ride or somerville,
something is wrong with the bike, and it's not the
material. i only mention this to stay on topic.
Originally Posted by gpd*vis
> Whatever it is. Harsh, stiff, pick your term (unless I'm
> violating the bicycling definition of 'stiff'). And, also
> stated in my original post in this thread that it is much
> more than 'niobium' alloyed steel. As you state, is geometry
> of the frame, tube diameter, wheels, tires, saddle, seatpost,
> etc., etc. And, very heavily depends on the rider. Harsh/stiff
> for me is double-century comfortable for others. I'm not knocking
> the CdA (or any other bike). CdA has beautiful craftsmanship and
> terrific looking bike. Just didn't work for me. Too harsh.
my point was that i don't associate any of these issues with "material".
Originally Posted by gpd*vis
> e-RICHIE - Are you saying that one of your frames built from the
> tubeset that you currently use and one built using a niobium-steel
> tubeset that are otherwise identical would not have a noticeable
> ride difference?
yes - except that i'd expect a net weight difference*.
keep in mind and don't lose track of this datapoint:
niobium is the material, not the pipe. the columbus
sets can be produced in varying guages and diameters
in order to appease market demands. saying a frame
is made of it means as little as saying that a frame
is made out of 531 or tange prestige. these are materials
too, not tube sets.
*assuming i used less of it to make a frame.
Originally Posted by gpd*vis
> I would guess that you are substantially correct. Perhaps a
> finely tuned pro would notice something different. But the
> rest of us would likely not.
i doubt it. pros are paid athletes, not equipment
geeks. they know what you know - if the design
is irrational, they can't efficiently push the bicycle
down the road. that is all that matters. your 35
miles rides are no different than theirs, except
yours are shorter and they get paid!
Originally Posted by sp*nc*cle
> I don't know what the differences between Niobium and the
> new Reynolds 951 are but steel is steel and material is
> immaterial. I stole the material is immaterial from e-richie.
> The main point of my Niobium versus Reynolds 531 post was that
> the new steels have higher yield strengths than the old steels.
> You could substitute any modern steel for Niobium and come to
> the same conclusion. They all have the same modulus of elasticity
> so no steel is less or more compliant than the next. Section
> modulus is what counts and that's determined by outside diameter,
> inside diameter and how they are butted. All of that is independent
> of the material properties (assuming you're talking steel to steel
> comparison). The new steels let you get the same performance with
> less material to a point. Hope this helps.
the latest iterations of well-made steels are finally a
version that combines high strength and lower weight
without have a penalty wrt elongation. imo, most of the
late 80s and the subsequent 15 years saw a rush to
offer lower weight sets needing major league finnessing
(did i spell that right?) like heat treatments, etcetera, and
the net result was pipe after pipe that was overly brittle.
getting the elongation factor correct and still keep the
weight low/strength high is the only way to go.

2006-01-15T21:32:00.000-05:00

a thread about steel types prompted a post and this quote is snipped:

>"So, the issue is how to select a tube to get the ride characteristics
>desired - which in most cases resolve down to resilience/stiffness
>and weight."

i replied:
i have always felt that the materials discussions were trumped
up in a way to promote a "brand". when i was new, i was intimidated
by the issues because i don't come from academia nor do i have
any engineering history. once i got to a certain point i simply
ceased to buy into the brand thing or the shape thing or even
the heat treated thing. to wit, i never "knew" how to tune a ride
by picking a certain combo of pipes/pipe characteristics. i still don't.
98% (if i dare seperate it out) of my frames are/were built with the
lightest steel of a particular era that i was confident would last under
the rider. i haven't use a box-slash-prescribed tube "set" since about
1979, preferring to mix this top tube with that chainstay, etcetera.
for the recent 7 or so years, that 98% material has been dedacciai zero
but with zero uno chainstays some of the time, and double tapered
seatstays in 2 different diameters all of the time. all my forks have
single guage threadless steerers from reynolds. having recently finished
8 cross frames for the team, i used some columbus fork blades and main
tubes in them as part of a sponsorship deal.

hey - it's not about the bike. it's about the bike maker!
e-RICHIE

2006-01-15T21:31:00.000-05:00

snipped from post:
>"What they do have in spades over the vast majority of
>US builders is a complete vision of the bicycle as a whole.
>Most US builders seem to think of the frame only and not
>as integrated unit. This is where they excel and US
>builders tend to fall short."

my reply:
that's not entirely true. the so-called "constructeur" rigs that mike
refers to were made famous in the era that preceded the concept
of a component "gruppo" from the various suppliers. the need to
source or "invent" one's own brakes, cranks, lights, etcetera was a
fact of life pre 1970. in that respect, the french guys had to think
of the unit as integtrated because so many seperate suppliers were
part of their food chain. it is no longer a necessity to take this route.
also - far be it from me to have an opinion on such a nebulous issue
as "workmanship", but those old frames, while possibly charming,
rarely looked well finished by any standards, much less modern ones.
the french were notoriously ambivilant wrt "hand-work".
e-RICHIE

2006-01-15T21:30:00.000-05:00

a listee posted:
>"I think that comparing Mecano to Legos is a gross over simplification.
>Ditto for saying that lugged steel frames are nothing more than simple
>plumbing work. Mecano and lugged steel frames both involve cutting
>tubes and sticking them into connectors - how hard can that be! ;)
>As for woodworking, a REAL craftsman would march into the woods, chop
>the tree down themselves and then turn it into a piece of furniture.
>Plus they'd do it without all those fancy cheating tools like rulers,
>planes, saws, etc."

my reply:
'shades of grey there, i think.
in nakashima's book 'the soul of the tree', (a must-read
for every framebuilder) he mentions doing just that - going
in, felling, ageing, and, years later, producing.
framebuilding is a little different because material
doesn't so much grow as it is made. over time, the
distribution chain allowed builders to tap the chain
and get the goods they need without have to smelt
the metal in the basement.
the problem is - in the last generation industrial
made rigs have 1) become so popular, and 2) builders
have stopped building - that the chain is near dry.
end result? fewer tube sets for builders. fewer
accessories for builders. etcetera. use it or lose
it? think about it that.
e-RICHIE
ps
the book:

2006-01-15T21:29:00.000-05:00

a listee posted:
>"Here is my $0.05 (inflation factored in):
>As long as the consumer knows what they are getting, then they
>should be free to vote with their dollars. Sure, if outsourcing
>some of the construction makes sense and you don't tell people
>that it is 100% built by hand 'in house'.
>Here in British Columbia, we had a fuss about a grocery store
>chain carrying "BC Hothouse grown produce" actually coming from
>California of all places. Had they made clear where things were
>grown then it wouldn't be so bad."

my reply:
i agree with you. i agree with kp about
exploiting sources of revenue in all possible
and ethical modes. but i still pose the question:
the line between builders and industry; it's
blurred if "builders" use industry methods to make
frames, and its murkier still if a builder designs
a frame that's produced in asia or even the next county.

again - i have no real dog in this fight,
but this is a "builder" list and since time
immemorial, builders have strived to distance
themselves from industrial-made goods, marketers,
brands, and all that is part of the food chain
that feeds the bicycle store mentality.

if builders co-opt industry methods, is there
a vanguard left?
e-RICHIE

2006-01-15T21:28:00.000-05:00

there was a thread about setting prices so as
to balance a profit as well as a reasonable wait list:

the listee wrote:
>"I'm not sure you fully understand the point here - it's not a
>recommendation to do it, it's a statement that you could do it
>if you so chose, and that there would be a price level somewhere
>such that you would still have enough customers, but wouldn't have
>a long waiting period. That's all..... The trick would be to find
>that price level. Pricing is not a game, but there are many ways
>to skin a cat. Ask the fellow that sells the $25,000 rocking chairs
>if he'd prefer to go back to selling them for $1200 each, but have
>a three-year waiting >list..."

i replied:
i am missing something here.
what is the motivation to reduce the waiting list?
yes - raising the price up and up until the list no
longer grows exponetially will tell you something,
but what? that you've maxed the selling price? so
what?! the materials and options change almost
monthly as do the groups of interested parties
that call in every few weeks.

and as far as sam maloof goes, he got a macarthur
grant almost 20 years ago, has works in the white
house, and is beyond legend. why are we using
his 90 year old self to guage what newbie builder
charges in order to make ends meet?
e-RICHIE

2006-01-15T21:27:00.000-05:00

my reply to a post in which it was suggested that framebuilding
could become part of the "American Crafts" movement:

this is a very good post and i don't know if i can properly reply to
it because i am not sure there's as much overlap with the "craft"
movement as you may believe. there are a few guys that may make
a nice frame or two a year but there are not the minions to rival
the basketmakers, potters, weavers, etc that make up the craft/art
world. my wife was a basketmaker and handweaver and was named
one of the "top 200 craftspeople in the usa" in at least 4 consecutive
years in the late 90s/early 00s. she even made it into the white house
collection for her efforts.

as much as i'd love to see a parallel within the bicycle industry, i
don't. this may be due in part to that bicycles are not simply a
visual item, but a vehicle as well. knowing how to do all the decorat-
ing and embellishing is "...fun, and all that stuff", but the bicycle
has to work too. heck, it has to work in all sorts of situations that the builder
needs to be familiar with. it also helps if the bicycle fits well too. i can't
think of many craft items that would need this diversity of attention, but
i suppose there must be some.

because this post is dovetailed off of the thread in which a firm such as
IF is called into question as an exhibitor at san jose, i am reminded that
there are many folks on this list that'd prefer to keep things more
touchy-feely (i don't mean that in a negative way) by eliminating
companies that gravitate towards the production genre. btw, i just
wanted to use that word in a sentence.

it's not easy for me to express this clearly, but i have a hard time
when i see the "bigger guys" get dissed simply because they tool
up to make more frames and use workstations to improve efficiency.
in a way, i believe the only way to be a competent framebuilder, much
less a great one, is to have parked your rear end at one of these shops
for a stint of a decent amount of time. i've written this lots, and it bears
repeating: you simply can't get through the learning curve fast enough
unless you done the gig at a production-type shop. framebuilding can
eventually become the "hand-work" and beautiful flourishes that may
one day bring it to atention of those in the craft world, but knowing
about the beneath-the-surface details are much more important and
harder to discern if all you ever do is whittle some lug edges and
dream about that next fleur-de-lis. to that end, i think that the larger
frame producers should be part of the party and that there should be
a relationship between that cottage industry and those who graduate
from it after an internship of some sort, because these graduates are
the ones that may be the craftspeople whose ware populate the museum
collections 20, 30, or 100 years from now.
e-RICHIE

2006-01-15T21:26:00.000-05:00

(part of a thread regarding inviting production shops
to exhibit at the framebuilder show in san jose...

a listee wrote:
>"Anyway, it doesn't really matter I.F. I.F. comes or
>not. If they're no threat to us as builders, then
>there's nothing to worry about. If they're blowing
>our work out of the water, then it's time to change
>the way we do things."

my free 2 cents?
this whole mentality of the "us vs them" is misplaced and
taking up alot of energy. i see no reason to make comparisons
with anyone of any size or output. you're there to expose your
goods or you aren't. there's no reason anyone should feel
threatened by anyone.
dw knows i feel this way despite our disagreeing on the issue:
i say whoever replies to his "call to enter" should be allowed
to get a space and show their wares, as long as they are in the
frame "business". as i wrote earlier to warwick-issimo, who cares
that some guys stand at a bench and use their own hands and
tools or if other guys use their intellect and entrepeneurial skills
to manage the labor of others, either domestically OR overseas?
if the exhibitor is willing to pay the freight and show some mighty
fine bicycles or even some made to a price, what is the harm?
e-RICHIE

2006-01-15T21:25:00.000-05:00

snipped from a thread re CF in the framebuilder's world:
>"i must have a carbon stay model" to remain competitive..."

me:
your pal was incorrect and that is flawed logic.
folks don't come to you to get your version of what
is sold at the mall. that wasn't even the case when
steel was ubiquitous. clients call you and arrive at
your doorstep because you have abilities and exper-
iences that enable you to translate their information
and construct a frame of higher quality and fine
design. material is NOT part of the equation.
e-RICHIE

2006-01-15T21:24:00.000-05:00

i was asked:
>"Are you suggesting Richard, that the "craftsman" approach to
>marketing was an attempt to distinguishing smaller builders from
>production builders in a lagging sales environment?"

actually, no - that's quite far away from what i am suggesting...
the essence of what i was saying is/was that prior to the 70s era,
an era in which one saw many young americans going to europe in
order to pursue a framebuilder's life, the vocation was always one in
which one was born into as in a family business, or one which one
entered after grade school because further education was not an
option. the line in the sand, if i may prophetic, is/was that a common
calling seemed to exist within the personalities of these yanks, none
of whom knew each other, that framebuilding was a "creative process"
that was worth pursuing. quite a few folks, myself among them, imagined
that the european culture that we'd soon be immersed in included frame-
builders that had like-minded paths. the truth is - and it took me at least
a decade to be comfortable with this - is that none of these european
builders could discern why any american with all the, er, opportunity
available to us here...why ANY of us would eschew it for a blue collar
job such as framebuilding. so, the short answer is that the "craftsman"
approach to marketing was NOT an attempt to distinguish, etcetera,
because what we ended up doing has little or nothing in common with
what our forbearers did except maybe that they are all "bicycle frames"
at the end of the day.
e-RICHIE

2006-01-15T21:23:00.000-05:00

posted on the framebuilder's list:
>"And you ask what happened to the bike industry? What happened to a
>common and rising level of prosperity? Dude, where are my customers?"

what happened? as a result of the mtb era and throwing all
prior convention out the window, all manufactured bicycles got
"better", thereby eliminating the need-slash-desire for many,
many folks to view the custom builder as the only resource
from whom that ideal purchase could be made.
e-RICHIE

2006-01-15T21:22:00.000-05:00

someone asked:
>"I've heard this said many times - use the fixture for tacking or
>pinning but don't do the final braze in the fixture. But now a
>question. Would it be possible to maintain accurate alignment while
>still brazing in the fixture if the centering cones holding the seat
>and head tubes were somehow spring loaded?"

no.
the tubes are never straight.
the interference fits are never known until it's "let's-go" time.
the heat cycle wrt expanding and contracting is never "exact".
you need to work though all the possible deviation and evaluate
your net results. only then can you adapt a predictable, repeatable
system that works with your skill set, tooling, and material choices.
e-RICHIE

2006-01-15T21:20:00.000-05:00

here is a quite-long exchange on an internet forum
regarding custom frames and what that term implies...

BEGIN
Originally Posted by S_____
"People talk about the design of a particular brand's bikes
and what sets that particular bike apart from other brands.
If you are custom ordering a new bike you can design the bike
as you wish, so that you can get obtain the ride characteristics
that you desire. You can specify the head and seat tube angles,
the length of the top tube, seat tube length, rake and hence trail,
head tube extensions, etc. You even have a choice of tube stiffness.
In other words, does a producer, like Serotta or any other custom
producer, allow you to basically design the bike as you want? How
much leeway is given?"
me:
what is custom?
if you design it, what do you know about the sum total of
all your choices that would allow you to guaranty the net
results - the gestalt of it all?
i stopped making custom frames in 1978 and the seminal
moment is described about 1/3 into this interview with grant:
http://www.richardsachs.com/articles/rsachsriv.html
the bicycle has to fit you and it has to work well. the
first part can be a collaborative effort between the client
and the builder and the second part is best left to the builder.
e-RICHIE
__________
Originally Posted by C______
"This is not rocket science and it's not magic - this is getting
the fit right and knowing how certain characteristics effect ride.
Plenty of customers can figure that out after a while, and plenty
of builders might interpret vague notions of ride quality different
from you. For my dollar, I want it spot on, and I know what I am
asking for."
me:
most people can ask for anything but may not be aware how the
resultant measurements from their requests come into play.
what charateristics affecting ride are you refering to?
e-RICHIE
__________
Originally Posted by e_____
"What if I came to you and asked you to copy what I have? The
geometry is from a stock road bike from a big name and has proven
to be a good design. I also feel very comfortable with my current
setup. Would you do that or would you take my seat and bar measure-
ments relative to the cranks and go from there? Would you keep my
stem length into consideration as well?"
me:
why wouldn't you simply buy another bike like the one you already
are comfortable with; the same one, that is?
e-RICHIE
__________
Originally Posted by b_____d____
"Well if people thought like that, no one would ever own more
than one bike(assuming they liked their original bike)........"
me:
WTF & DOH?!
the guy wants to buy another bicycle. my point is that the
original maker should be part of the equation.
e-RICHIE
__________
Originally Posted by b_____d____
"idiot!!!!
I'm saying that just because Joe Blow has a Colnago that he loves,
doesn't mean he wouldn't also like to have a Ritchie Sachs with the
same geometry. Am I reading this wrong (definite possibility....)!?
Man, the hostility on this forum is just sickening. You should all
be ashamed of yourselves!!!!!"
me:
have some decaf, eh.
if he has a colnago that he likes, what is the point for him
to have someone replicate it; the colnago was made in a factory
and the sum total of all the choices made at that factory is
what "he" likes; it is not just the geometry.
e-RICHIE
__________
Originally Posted by b____d____
"So anyone who has a bike they like, and they like that geometry,
they should never consider buying a Sachs or any other different
brand bike. That is what you are saying? That is pretty weird.....
Oh, I mean......weird-issimo...."
me:
don't put words in my mouth you substance abuser. follow the
thread; his "fit" is worth replicating. for him - the proverbial
"him" - to want the same bike he has to be built by another builder
is not logical because his frame is factory made and, as such,
those production assembly methods are part of the package that
he enjoys. should i be getting pre-heaters and automated equipment
to fill that order?
e-RICHIE
__________
Originally Posted b____d____
"I respectfully disagree, Mr Twizzler. Do we need to
'take a pill'???"
me:
how can you disagree?
the geometry is part of the bicycle "he" wants replicated.
what about the construction details, the alignment tolerances,
the nuances of the original brand? all these (and more) are part
of the equation. how can "these" be replicated? so...
let me make it simple for you: if augy busch gave me his rolodex,
could I make budweiser?
e-RICHIE
__________
Originally Posted by b_____d____
"...Is that what Indurain did when he got a frame from Dario?
He called him and said "Well Dario, you know, I like to climb
and time trial a lot. Build me a bike"..............or did he
call him and say "I need a bike with these measurements..........".
When senior jerk ordered his big leg emma, did he tell Dario to
surprise him with the geometry, or did he give him the numbers?"
me:
i bet you a meal at mcsorleys that dario designed the frame and
that the fit meaurements/contact points were indurain's, and they
prolly looked like what he had been using up until then. if he
needed a changin', then the new frame would incorporate it. if
i'm wrong, you can't just order soup and then expect to get dinner
on a return trip. (note: that was a seinfeld reference...). as far
as jerk goes, there's a case of fenway franks in this for you if
you find that jerk "designed" the frame pixel by pixel."
e-RICHIE
__________
Originally Posted by e_____
"1) Would you mantain my contact points and go from there?
2) Would you even want to know what the current geo I'm riding
is? 3) I was under the impression that the tube choice would
effect the ride I'm looking for in this situation because I do
like the handling of the bike."
me:
1) if they are correct for you and you are riding injury-free, yes!
2) nah. i'd "study" the position details.
3) i'm not sure if that is relevant because if it is,
then you also have to factor in the build quality
and sequences of the frame you love in the
first place - and "replicating" those details is
not possible.
e-RICHIE
__________
Originally Posted by S____
"Not that I'm an expert, but I think it's because people are stupid
(some people, at least--noone here). To put it a more gentle way,
they're short sighted. I would think that had the folks in question
said to there builder, "I want to be riding this thing in ten years,
leave me room to grow," they would've gotten that. But they probably didn't."
me:
i'm curious - what other consumer good would you purchase where
you'd ask for a similar concession?
e-RICHIE
__________
Originally Posted by S____
"I'm assuming that was directed at me. As I said, I'm no expert
(obviously), but if I understood Sandy correctly, he was saying
that he's seen bikes built for older people that leave them no
room to get older, less flexible etc. In other words, they fit
well for the time being, but are pretty well maxed out as far as
being able to raise the bars etc, which a person may want to do
as they get older. I was simply saying that if this request was
made to the builder, I would think it would be accomodated in
some way or another--after all, it doesn't seem to me (the non
expert) that there is only one position that the bars can be
in--there should be room for adjustment --a person would just
need to be thoughtful about what type of adjustment s/he might
want to make (e.g--up) and ask the builder to keep that in mind.
I guess I see it as an issue of having good communication with
your builder and telling him what you want, your concerns etc.
Why is that strange?"
me:
i was just curious; i didn't use the word strange.
but i am still curious! my experience with "all this" is that
the goods will surely last the 10 years you mention but often
the attention span doesn't. folks like to buy new things. no?
that suit you wear. the slr camera from the early '90s. fill
in the blank _______ . i just don't get the read on this issue
that folks purchase bicycles with a concern that they (the rider
and/or the bike) will change much in a decade.
e-RICHIE
__________
Originally Posted by S____
"Why should you have to go that route and use a positive rise
stem? What possible reason to cut the steerer tube, if not for
aesthetics? For me, the flexibility for change is far more important
than the look of the bike. I guess that you could always buy a
new uncut fork."
me:
stoopendous situation.
it begs the question: when was the last time you bought a bicycle
frame where the fork was made by the builder rather than forks R us?
e-RICHIE
__________
Originally Posted by S_____
"Never.
But what reason other than aestheics? It certainly looks better,
giving a more balanced look, without a stack of spacers. I agree
with that, wholeheartedly. Think about this- If bikes always came
with a stack of spacers, then if you introduced a bike without the
stack, it would look strange and odd without them. Just like the
"new" compact designs, compared to the more traditional with the
level top tube."
me:
there's a point at which spacers are merely a stop-gap solution;
the better fix would be to add head tube, but you can't. if the
fork is too short, and the "10 year" issue looms, why buy the unit
in the first place?
e-RICHIE
__________
Originally Posted by c__
"my custom builder refuses to make me what i want _ it's not fair!?"
me:
wierd thread.
do you tell a doctor what to prescribe?
do you tell a tailor how to cut a pattern?
...a teacher how to teach you?
what is custom anyway?
if sandy's first example was on the mark and he could specify
angles, etcetera, then the guy that builds it - well, jerk's
reply is not far off! (note - the jerk's sentiments were:
the jerk knows alot but he's not a frame builder and any frame-
builder who would build a bike based on a customer's design spec
is not a frame builder either. he/she/it is just hired out-sourced
labor if you ask the jerk)
e-RICHIE
__________
Originally Posted by v______f______
"It also seems that even the builders who blatantly advertise
the ability to do "custom" are not really anxious for the customer
to meddle..."
me:
the few that use the term custom are doing so innocently and
realize the term is quite ambiguous. i think the word/term is
a stepchild to the industry jargon born out of the 70s bike boom.
e-RICHIE
__________
Originally Posted by R__ E.M_____
"Will some builders get these retarded specs from a client and
push back for something not so wacked, or even decline building
the frame?"
me:
in reality, and based on pm's with several other builders on the
forum, most folks really don't send the retarded work orders that
are being bandied about in this thread. an informal survey leads
me to state comfortably that the builders collaborate with the
client on fit issues and er, pull rank, when it comes time to
blueprint the design.
e-RICHIE
END

2006-01-15T21:11:00.000-05:00

some more drivel from another debate
re insurance on the framebuilder list...
my two posts:

if you just make ONE frame and even if you give it away,
and never own a car or have a savings account, get product
liability insurance nonetheless. your bicycle will be used
by others on the open road. there are risks involved. if
you can't afford to assume the risk, make a basket!
e-RICHIE
and
rather than worry about how you'd fare accounting-wise,
get some insurance out of consideration for the one client
of yours who might need you to have been covered?
building a frame that someone else will use?
get product liability insurance.
e-RICHIE

2006-01-15T21:10:00.001-05:00

there was a fairly lively debate on the serotta forum
regarding the firm's discontinuation of a popular (sic)
lugged frame. here are some posts that i was involved in:

post-er:
"don't lay this one at the door of advertising/marketing. we
in the biz certainly have our sins. this ain't one of 'em."
me:
then expand on this thread...
why would an enlightened being think there is merit
in buying a really, really expensive consumer good
that is 1) made on a production line, 2) has no proven
record of lasting a generation, and 3) does not race
seriously? as far as the '3' goes, because i am "of the
sport", i understand the even-the-playing-field mentality,
but for a layer of retail consumers to be drawn into
this stuff? to me, it is a marketing coup. btw, i like
marketing and i do think it is good for a consumer
based society, but the essence here is: are folks
buying these newer bicycles because they think they
are better or because of hero worship. either way, as
long as they like the bicycle, it's win-win.
e-RICHIE
----------
post-er:
"1) but i think its unfair and misguided to say that steel is outsold by
other materials due simply to advertising. yes, marketing plays a role.
2) but so does what riders experience out on the road. and out on the
road many people simply prefer the ride of other materials.
3) but since serotta spends virtual zero on advertising, something other
than marketing must account for the ottrott outselling the CSi. the answer
lies, i think, in human nature, not in the power of marketing."
me:
1) steel is outsold, etc. because it is no longer a viable
way to produce (as in "production") bicycles and maintain
a good margin. i won't even mention the level of skill that
the work force once had that no longer is called into question
since all parts of all bicycles are now produced to "be man-
ufactured". it is outsold because it is not there anymore!!
2) on the whole, there is no "steel" out there for folks to
ride so that a baseline comparison can be made. the industry
and its need to move forward has concluded that nonferrous
materials lend themselves better to ease of production and
ease of profitibility.
3) the mistake of this thread is lumping ben's decisions in
with the same type of cat that would make the same call
at, say, intergalactic bike inc.; ben has a boutique brand
and can hardly be lumped into the same world as the c'dales,
trek, giants, and others whose bicycles are the ones the
masses see on tv and in newsprint. like all the rest of us,
he is a pawn in the choices made by the sheep that follow
all "of this" and apparantly he has concluded that it is
time to draw a line in the sand re the "lug" frame thing.
someday he may do the same with steel too.

we all live in the same community and some, by dint
of their size, are immune from the inane trends that
shape the market. i think ben has more in common with
the framebuilders than he does with the suits that run
the corporates, but he still has to remain profitable.
e-RICHIE
----------
post-er:
"The lugged steel builders* have shot themselves in the foot. On
the one hand, they want to talk about "old world hand craftmanship"
and the "way things used to be done". Then they wonder why people
don't consider them when they want something modern and technologically
up to date."
me:
that's not true at all. it may be true about vintage
hobbyists, but builders that use lugs do so because
it represents, to them, a more prudent joing process
(aftter, all, the pipes need to be connected) than
other processes available to industry. don't confuse
the detail work that is inherent in a small percentage
of lugged frames with lugged framebuilding. it is not
alway pretty. it is not always efficient. it is not a method
that lends itself to production building when juxtaposed
against other methods. etcetera.
but puleeeeze, do not say that folks that use lugs for joining
pipes are doing so for the sake "of craftsmanship". it just
happens to be an extremely high quality method of
getting the job done.
e-RICHIE
*ps this issue is not a result of lug steel builders; it
is a result of choices made by mass producers.
argh!
----------
post-er:
"Okay. Think of the consumer. He has X amount of hardearned money
to spend on a bike. If he goes with a tigwelded bike, he can buy higher
end components for the same price vs. getting a lugged bike with higher
labor costs and no benefits except for aesthetics."
me:
you're not gettin' this. i'm with you. for mass market
bikes it is better to use the most efficient way "to
produce". i AM thinking of the consumer. but, again,
don't bring aesthetics into this. it is not about looks, it is
about construction nuances and incremental quality
differences. oh heck - i wasn't gonna do this, but
now i'm gonna paste some text from an email i sent
to climb that touches on this. here:

you also need to factor this in:

lugs are not lugs for the sake of beauty or touchy-feely conversing about;
they constitute a joining process. it is this joining process, coupled with
certain types of quality steel as well as with the "maker's touch" (stradivari's
varnish?) that produces the "incomparable" work that folks associate with
all lugged frames - but really should be associated with quite few.

yeah. i know that is self-absorbed drivel, but i don't
know how else to make this point.
e-RICHIE
----------
post-er:
"Remember, to most people, bikes are just toys, not objects d' art. They
want the most bang for the buck. To re-use my earlier comparison about
handguns. There is the aesthetic vs. the functional. Would I rather walk in
the local gunshop and buy a $525 plastic-molded, stamped steel, ugly,
perfectly dependable Glock or put in an order for a $2500 Colt .45 with
its forging and meticulous hand checkering that'll take 2yrs to get here?
I'll take the Glock and in the bike world most'll take the al/cf wunderbike.
That's just the way it is..."
me:
basta.
we're on the same page for the most part.
the guys that (still) skillfully make frames using lugs
to join pipes are a blip on the screen and do not count
in industry and market flow charts. i/we are fine with
that. i/we do not exist for "the market". back to the
original point, ben does.

and again - this issue is not about aesthetics

e-RICHIE

2006-01-15T21:10:00.000-05:00

what have been doing besides working my
tush off, training, and racing on the weekends?
here's one example. click on and try to follow
the logic:
http://www.frameforum.net/forum2/index.php?showtopic=975&st=0
thanks for indulging me!
e-RICHIE

2006-01-15T21:09:00.000-05:00

here's one for ya'...
under the heading of "i'd do anything for the team,
at least once", i am outing the following auction on ebay:
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=7162689103
hey - thanks for reading!
e-RICHIE

2006-01-15T21:00:00.000-05:00

here's another interview that can be seen in its entirety at
http://istanbultea.typepad.com/largefellaonabike/

Few names if any ring more crystal clear through the
legions of frame builders than that of Richard Sachs.

He has carved-literally-more personality, elegance and
lustful desire into his frames than nearly anyone else.
Like Stradivarius before him, Sachs crafts instruments
of ageless beauty that transcend the purposeful essence
for which they were born. Sachs is in the elite with very
few peers and these are his words...

1. How old are you?
52
2. Where were you born?
Jersey City, NJ
3. What's your earliest memory of a bicycle or something
bicycle related?
Riding my tricycle as a youngster at our Belmar, NJ
summer bungalow.
4. What was your first cycle?
As a youngster, red Huffy Convertible. I also had a
sweet Schwinn Jaguar MK3
5. How about first "high-end" cycle?
I bought a Frejus TDF from Tommy Avenia's and that
led me to ordering 2-3 frames from W.B. Hurlow.
6. Did (does) your family (parents, siblings, etc) ride also?
No.
7. Did you like to tinker with bikes back then?
No.
8. Did you ever work in a Bike Shop... if so, where/how long?
I worked at The Ski Rack in Burlington, VT
9. Have you ever done any organized racing?
Yes. I raced before I began building. I still race weekly
and have a USA Cycling Cat 2 license on road and track.
10. How about cyclo-touring?
I never had an interest in this.
11. What job(s) did you have before frame building and
also-do you have any other job currently besides framebuilding?
Except for the 8 or so months at the bicycle store,
framebuilding has been my only career.
12. When did you start building?
I went to Witcomb Lightweight Cycles in 72, returned
home to work with Witcomb USA for a few years, and
started this business in late 1975.
13. Who would you say is your greatest influence in
designing & frame building?
In my earlier years, I wanted to be Bill Hurlow. That
fantasy morphed into including Mr. Nagasawa into the mix.
In the last 15-20 years, I've lost interest in this industry
and take my cues from crafts-people from other venues.
14. Did you apprentice... if so, with who?
I worked at Witcomb Lightweight Cycles in London, but
it was not an apprenticeship.
15. What's your idea of the "perfect cycle" regardless
if you built it or not?
It's an unachievable entity. It can't be done.
16. Shooting a guess how many frames would you say
you've built?
I used to be very prodigious, and now I am not! I'd guess
there are about no more than 4000 frames out there with
my name on them.
17. Any cycles out there that you secretly wished, "Darn,
I wish I'd built that!"?
No. None.
18. Your idea of the perfect client?
The one that doesn't exist; I build the frames as though
I am the client and it must pass my criteria before it is
deemed "finished".
19. What defines a nightmare client in your experience?
Me.
20. Any words of advice to up & coming frame builders?
It's not what it seems.
21. What do you find most funny or peculiar (in a kind
way-not brutal) about the cycle-buying public... what
don't they get or aren't they seeing?
Most folks think all high-end bicycles share things in common,
be they similar component groups, tube sets, geometry features,
and the like. Making a frame by hand, to order, has no peer in
the industrial-made, bought-at-the-mall world.
22. What do you think of mass-produced bikes (without naming names)?
They are extremely good and do the job well. Way back when,
this was not the case; you simply could not get a bicycle from
a retailer and go off racing and/or touring on it. It had to
come from a framebuilder or specialty shop. In the late 80s/
early 90s, all that began to change.
23. What cycle don't you have anymore that you wished you did?
I wish I still had my first W.B. Hurlow frameset.
24. What cycle do you currently ride most, even if it wasn't
built by you?
My RS Signature bicycle, fully kitted out with 2005 Campagnolo
Record Carbon, Oval Concepts stem and handlebars, SSM Aspide
saddle, and Joe Young built wheels with all DT Swiss components.
25. When did you last ride your bike and for how far?
I raced on Sunday (60 miles) and these past 2 days I rode 30mi each day.
26. What's your idea of the perfect ride?
Racing cyclocross. Period.
27. Could you ever see yourself being Car Free and just
using mass-transportation and your bike to get around?
I like my car.
28. Why do you think so many folks have romanticized bicycles
and bicycling?
It's an activity that you learn about as a child, and one
that you never forget or leave. Riding is a beautiful aesthetic.
Racing, even moreso...
29. Any (other) passions or hobbies in your life?
Except for family, it's "building and racing..."
30. If you could say one thing to Lance Armstrong what
would it be?
I'm not buying it.
31. In a pinch... McDonalds or Burger King?
Neither.
32. What kind of shampoo did you last use?
Grandpa's Pine Tar Soap.
33. Favorite libation: wine, beer or fire water?
Italian reds, and/or Dinkel Acker beer
34. Even though there seems to be a real tradition to it-what
do you think of folks who spend more time setting up their
cycle with just the right color saddle, bar tape, bags, hoods,
etcetera than actually riding or at least commenting on the ride?
I have no opinion other than to say it's theirs to do with
as they please.
35. Did you go to college, if so, what was your major?
I bypassed entrance to Goddard College in order to leave
the states and live in London.
36. Your favorite music while working (if any)?
It varies, but no day is complete without hearing Desolation Row.
37. If you had it to do all over again... would you be building cycles?
Most days, "yes". And most days, "no". Not getting to finish
academic life has always been a regret, and I ponder it routinely.
38. What's your favorite lunch food during a work day in the shop?
Hummus.
39. When it's all said & done-what kind of legacy will you
hope to have left behind?
I think Sinatra must be given all the credit here:
"...I did it my way."
40. How can folks get in touch with you to order a custom cycle?
Tel 860.526.2059
richardsachs@juno.com
www.richardsachs.com
richardsachs.blogspot.com

2006-01-15T20:54:00.000-05:00

From an upcoming interview in Vintage Bicycle Quarterly
www.vintagebicyclepress.com/vbqindex.html

(note: we were asked to keep ALL replies to no
more than three sentences. that was a tough one!)

VBQ:30 years ago, handmade bicycles were lighter and offered
more performance than mass-produced bikes. Today, superlight
(and very expensive) mass-produced bikes are available. Why
should somebody buy a handmade bike?
Richard Sachs: Industrial-made goods of any type are limited
in their quality. If one seeks quality, a hand-made bicycle is
a decent consideration, providing that the hand-maker has the
experience, set skills, and sensibility to get the job done.
Hand-made does not equal "better".
VBQ: Most people's bodies have similar proportions. How
important is it to ride a custom bike?
Richard Sachs: It's not that important at all. "Custom" need
not be about 1 mm here or 1 mm there, although it helps. "Custom",
a term grossly misused by the industry press, is about producing
to a quality level and to tolerances that cannot be met on an
assembly line.
VBQ: How about other materials, like carbon fiber or titanium?
Richard Sachs: They are all excellent. Bicycles of the highest
quality can be made using these materials.
VBQ: What "look" do you prefer in handbuilt bicycles? Should
they be as perfect as something made by a machine, or should
they show evidence of handwork?
Richard Sachs: I think it's up to the maker. There is no such
thing as a flaw, if it's in the original plan. However, most
artisans strive to produce "flawless." If they ever meet their
goal, they should quit; there'd be nothing left to attain. But
I have never seen a flawless bicycle.
VBQ: What do you think of investment-cast lugs (compared to stamped lugs)?
Richard Sachs: Unfortunately, some folks think of investment
cast lugs in a "use as-is" mentality. The process should be thought
of as a starting point to achieving excellence rather than a shortcut.
VBQ: Can you envision building fully integrated bikes with
custom racks, integrated fenders, designed as a complete unit
rather than a frame with "accessories?"
Richard Sachs: No. I trust the component makers
realize their part in the equation and can get the job done.
VBQ: Many of the old French cyclotouring bikes used very long
fork offsets (60 mm and more) with head angles of 72 or 73
degrees, to arrive at very low geometric trail figures (40 mm and
less). Do you think that is a useful geometry for long-distances?
Richard Sachs: My racing bicycles rarely have forks
with less than 50 mm rake, so my trails are less than most.
You could say that I agree.
VBQ: What do you think of modern steels compared to the old ones,
like Reynolds 531 or Columbus SL/SP? And what about oversize tubing?
Richard Sachs: On nearly all levels, steel tubing for frame making
is exponentially better than it was in the Reynolds 531 or Columbus
SL/SP era. It's better quality, can be made lighter (you need less
of it to make a reliable bicycle, and there are no compromises in
strength or stiffness. All my frames, except for a few retro/reissues
each year, are made from modern OS thinwalled tubing.
VBQ: What is your opinion on silver vs. brass brazing?
Richard Sachs: This debate is one of the most ludicrous subjects
that's tangential to frame making: no one "brazes with silver".
There is/are a myriad of percentages with which silver can be
alloyed with many other elements in order to produce a filler
compound that flows, fills, and works at the temperature range
and within the tolerances set by the brazer. In all working environ-
ments, it is the skill of that brazer, rather than the brazing rod
he employs, that contributes to a well-made frame.
VBQ: Name one or two things we can learn from past craftspeople and their bicycles.
Richard Sachs: To surpass the master is to repay the debt.

2006-01-15T16:30:00.000-05:00

(regarding another thread in which the
insurance issue was being skirted):

these are all valid points.
here's a question: how do you feel about
the risk involved in making a frame that
someone else uses on the open highway? if
advice is shared openly, and it's misunderstood,
overlooked, or not taken, do the consequences
lower the bar for all involved?
it's a rhetorical question; i don't have an
agenda. well, yes, i do have one agenda: my
pet peeve is "culpability" and "insurance".
it often bugs me that folks would not think
to get good coverage along with the tanks,
fixtures, tables, etcetera.
how do you feel?
e-RICHIE

2006-01-15T16:29:00.001-05:00

it would be interesting to know if there are
(and how many) any professional builders that
never worked as an underling/helper/apprentice
at another builder's or manufacturer's shop
for a decent amount of time.

i think it's impossible to learn framebuilding
from text; the only way to forge a path forward
is to be routinely exposed to all the variables
involved in producing frames. once gleaned, the
choice is yours regarding what to make of it all.

it is possible to make a frame or two on one's
own. but then what? if you sell one, or even if
it's given to someone to ride, are you covered
for the consequences once the ride hits the open
road? once a customer comes into the equation,
all this newbie stuff forever changes.

imo, this list would have a different tone if
folks realized that framebuilding is not "the
art of..." or the romantic notion of "keeping
the flame burning...". it's noble to want to
see the seeds grow and help them blossom when
possible (jeez that sounds stupid) but frame-
building is also commerce and it's people
skills and it's market driven and many other
things in addition to the surface tables, cast
lugs, emery cloth and basics that are often
debated here.

from my perspective, and coat-tailing on kp's
post, it is sometimes trying when someone inquires
about "how to..." and then takes a snippet of advice
that took decades to learn, and then is dismissive
when that advice is added to or expanded upon.
i don't have a specific example to support this,
but i do feel that it occurs.

i think kp's idea has alot of merit, but as he said,
it doesn't spell the end of this list.

thanks for reading.
e-RICHIE