Saturday, August 16, 2008

Rapha descends on the shop

These guys aren't just wearing styling threads, they are the company....well , on the road anyway. They are the folks from Rapha....if you like the jerseys ( and who wouldn't ?) look them up on the web. If you want to hear about thier travels, check out 'Rapha Continental' on the web. It's more than clothing and I wish I could tell you more. All I know is that these guys are putting in the miles and visiting shops like mine and telling the world about it on the web...the great rides and the crusty builders. They even brought their own photographer.-Like I said, it's more than the clothing , although the clothing could stand on its own, especially with 107 plus miles of sweat !


Tuesday, August 12, 2008

The rack is full again

August is here and the new painter has finally belched forth the summer crop of new 'cross frames. What you see here is about one third of what I build in 'cross frames from June until November. There are still more at all three painters that I use, giving me the distinction of being able to build them faster than they can paint them. I wish it were the other way around as I do not like keeping folks waiting for thier frames.

Lightning does strike twice, at least in this case. Two years later I build another Alfie but not for anyone in particular. The proceeds of the sale of this frame will go to breast cancer awareness. Shimano has asked five framebuilders to produce five frames that Shimano will equip with thier 'Alfine" line of components. The bikes will be displayed at Interbike and then be raffled off with all the proceeds going to the aforementioned cause. This is one of the examples how occasionally a very large company in the bike buisiness will team up with the little guys to do something good. My hat is off to Shimano.

Friday, August 8, 2008

More pictures form Ashland


Here is a view through the trees on a smoky afternoon. I was up at about 5,000 ft. on the Lithia Loop fire road, kind of lost looking for singletrack. I did find some but double-flatted on the long fire road decent and wound up riding a rear flat for about seven miles. Good elevation and frustration training for the upcoming single speed worlds.....
Most of the road rides were at twilight as the mid day was consumed with teaching the framebuilding class. Riding late had its advantages as the mid-day heat reached 95 degrees almost every day. Even at 6 pm I didn't see anyone breaking out a vest or even a long sleeve jersey.
The Horn Gap trail.......after about eight grunting miles of climbing. I didn't see anyone on this road and I turned around not long after this as they were reporting black bears and cougars in the woods here. I don't think it would be good for me to get eaten before completing my teaching duties at UBI.

Sunday, August 3, 2008

Riding in and around Ashland

While I was up in Ashland in July I had a lot of free time after class and on weekends to explore the riding. Any ride in the area will require climbing and frequently I found myself above 5,000 feet , breathing a little harder than usual. The first picture is of a fire road decent from Horn Gap. On this road minutes from when I snapped the picture i hit a big rock and flatted both of my tires. I was carrying only one tube so I rode a rear flat on my single speed downhill about 7 miles back to my lodgings.....it pretty much sucked but it was riding, nevertheless. The second picture is of a bench near Horn Gap where I stopped, took a photo and turned around for the long downhill that I wound up riding on one good tire at about 10 mph. The next two rides pictured were on hwy. 66. I was able to con a couple of students onto my daily escapades and various riding misadventures during the two week stay in Ashland. Having company out on the open highway was a big plus.



Thursday, July 31, 2008

Where have I been, you may ask.....




Howdy from Ashland, Oregon. I have been up here teaching at United Bicycle Institute for the last two weeks. I am a visiting instructor for the first time and I have the job of teaching a tig-welding framebuilding class to eight students, almost all of them with no welding exoerience at all. In two weeks they learn to weld and construct a complete bicycle frame...it's a tall order but the school can claim nearly 100% success in achieving this. United is perhaps the best place on earth to learn bicycle mechanics and/or framebuilding and I am privaleged to be allowed to be an instructor here. I'll put up photos of the experience soon. Looks like I'll be back next year if all goes well.....it will delay some of your frames a couple of weeks but it is something that will help the new builders coming up and help me to be better at what I do in my own shop. I have probably learned more in the last two weeks than in the last year about streamlining my building procedure so this has been time well spent and all future Rock Lobster customers will benefit from what I have learned here at UBI.

Friday, July 18, 2008

the fleet is done

Kansas city, here they come, to be ridden fixed in the dirt. These three frames have no brake mounts of any kind as it will be all in the legs for the riders of these steel chariots of pain.
I had to do a lot of 'manipulation' to the stays....i.e. bending and crimping to get the desired crankset and tire room. This project truly shows what a custom bike is-something that you can't find from the big companies. Bikes like this are very minimalist in appearence but there are a lot of little details that might go un noticed by anyone except the owners.


Wednesday, July 9, 2008

slidin' in steel.


Here's a single/geared disc only mtn. bike frame in progress. It's old style in some aspects , mainly the tubing and the fact it will have a rigid fork. The sliders are definitely new style and the disc only aspect is not something one would see back in the fully rigid mtb days. This is one of four mtb frames iIwill be building before I leave to teach at UBI later this month.