Shameless bike [censored]

Phoar! A tad too early in the morning for this kind of thing. 😉

Superb attention to detail, Suzy, top work!

Suzy Jackson said:

Hi guys,

Like all parents, I like to bore people to death with pictures of my
babies. Here's a few of the one I'm doing at the moment (one of those
awful bikes with gears).

One of the head-lugs (the bottom one, if it matters):

http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/audax_head_lug_1.jpg
http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/audax_head_lug_2.jpg

A nice shiny derailleur tab (made from stainless – this one won't be
painted):

http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/derailleur_tab_1.jpg
http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/derailleur_tab_2.jpg

A super close-up of the solder join between the chain-stay and
stainless dropout:

http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/HJ_solder.jpg

Cheers,

Suzy

Double Phoar! Shhhhhh! artist at work

what's this one gonna be?

flyingdutch said:

Double Phoar! Shhhhhh! artist at work

what's this one gonna be?

It's going to be a sort of cross between a race bike and a touring bike. I call it my "Audax" bike, because it's main role will be long distance, fast rides, of 100+km (stuff like the Audax Alpine Classic etc).

It uses Columbus Zona tubes, with much the same mix of lugs as I used on the track bike, but with Henry James stainless dropouts this time. The angles are 72.5 head and 73 seat, with 42cm chainstays. I've made up nice stainless rack eyelets, which I'll solder into the seat stays once they're done.

I've bought a set of forks for it (45mm rake Look HSC3 plastic ones) and intend on using mainly Campy Chorus components (tho with a Phil Wood bottom bracket, as my experience with the Phil BB on my track/fixed bike has been very positive).

It'll be a good few months before it's going, as I don't exactly work fast. It's _so_ much easier the second time around. I'm tempted to redo the track frame now, as I'm sure I'd do a much better job of it.

Regards,

Suzy

suzyj said:

It's going to be a sort of cross between a race bike and a touring bike. I call it my "Audax" bike, because it's main role will be long distance, fast rides, of 100+km (stuff like the Audax Alpine Classic etc).

It uses Columbus Zona tubes, with much the same mix of lugs as I used on the track bike, but with Henry James stainless dropouts this time. The angles are 72.5 head and 73 seat, with 42cm chainstays. I've made up nice stainless rack eyelets, which I'll solder into the seat stays once they're done.

I've bought a set of forks for it (45mm rake Look HSC3 plastic ones) and intend on using mainly Campy Chorus components (tho with a Phil Wood bottom bracket, as my experience with the Phil BB on my track/fixed bike has been very positive).

It'll be a good few months before it's going, as I don't exactly work fast. It's _so_ much easier the second time around. I'm tempted to redo the track frame now, as I'm sure I'd do a much better job of it.

Regards,

Suzy

Beautiful work Suzy, I am impressed.
John Bosevski has offered to lets me use his equipment to build my own frame. I'll have to get my but into gear and do it.

Cheers

Suzy Jackson said:

Hi guys,

Like all parents, I like to bore people to death with pictures of my
babies. Here's a few of the one I'm doing at the moment (one of those
awful bikes with gears).

One of the head-lugs (the bottom one, if it matters):

http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/audax_head_lug_1.jpg
http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/audax_head_lug_2.jpg

A nice shiny derailleur tab (made from stainless – this one won't be
painted):

http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/derailleur_tab_1.jpg
http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/derailleur_tab_2.jpg

A super close-up of the solder join between the chain-stay and
stainless dropout:

http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/HJ_solder.jpg

Cheers,

Suzy

Now that is impressive - it was a great leap forward for me to collect things that other people had made and put them together. It is an entirely new level to make the things to put together. Sensational!

Ritch

"Suzy Jackson" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Hi guys,

Like all parents, I like to bore people to death with pictures of my
babies. Here's a few of the one I'm doing at the moment (one of those
awful bikes with gears).

One of the head-lugs (the bottom one, if it matters):

http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/audax_head_lug_1.jpg
http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/audax_head_lug_2.jpg

A nice shiny derailleur tab (made from stainless - this one won't be
painted):

http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/derailleur_tab_1.jpg
http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/derailleur_tab_2.jpg

A super close-up of the solder join between the chain-stay and
stainless dropout:

http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/HJ_solder.jpg

Cheers,

Suzy

Suzy...that is pretty awesome.......how long did it take and where did you
learn to solder up bike frames (ie. is there a course at TAFE or
something??).

Being an ex electronics technician and now an electronics engineer I can
solder components to a circuit card but I have never had a crack at brazing
(I assume that is how you are doing it).

How do the total costs (excluding your time as obviously it is a labour of
love) for a frame compare to buying one retail??

Keep up the good work.

Ride On,

Gags

Gags said:

Suzy...that is pretty awesome.......how long did it take and where did you
learn to solder up bike frames (ie. is there a course at TAFE or
something??).

Being an ex electronics technician and now an electronics engineer I can
solder components to a circuit card but I have never had a crack at brazing
(I assume that is how you are doing it).

How do the total costs (excluding your time as obviously it is a labour of
love) for a frame compare to buying one retail??

Keep up the good work.

Ride On,

Gags

It's not as hard as you'd think. I have had no formal training at brazing or soldering (except for a high reliability soft-soldering (electronics) course I did once as a tech). I pestered a welder here at work to show me the ropes, and read a lot (you'd be surprised at the amount of good stuff there is on the web) and other than that just use common sense. Soldering with silver solder is very similar to soldering with lead/tin. The only difference is the temperature and using a flame rather than a soldering iron. Just make sure everything is perfectly clean, fits together well (silver doesn't fill gaps), use heaps of flux, and heat carefully. Practice makes perfect. If you look at the solder joins on my first frame, they're nowhere near as neat as these ones.

I wrote a bit of a blurb at http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/bike_frame.html about my experiences building my first frame (the pictures I posted in this thread are from my second) which I should probably update, but it says most of what needs to be said.

I'm not very fast. I've been working on this one on-and-off for a few months in my spare time. The previous one took maybe four months all up. I like to savour the experience, get it just-so. It's a good thing I don't charge myself for my time, or else I'd never be able to afford it 🙂

I thoroughly recommend you give it a go. It's not anywhere near as hard to do as you probably think it is, and you can get away with a surprisingly small set of tools, if you're patient. The tubes are fairly cheap, and the lugs and braze-ons similarly. The metal for this frame only cost me ~$300, and it's pretty high-zoot stuff. The one thing it does take though is time.

Regards,

Suzy

"Gags" <gags_44nospamatnospamtpg.com.au> wrote in message news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

"Suzy Jackson" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Hi guys,

Like all parents, I like to bore people to death with pictures of my
babies. Here's a few of the one I'm doing at the moment (one of those
awful bikes with gears).

One of the head-lugs (the bottom one, if it matters):

http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/audax_head_lug_1.jpg
http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/audax_head_lug_2.jpg

A nice shiny derailleur tab (made from stainless - this one won't be
painted):

http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/derailleur_tab_1.jpg
http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/derailleur_tab_2.jpg

A super close-up of the solder join between the chain-stay and
stainless dropout:

http://www.atnf.csiro.au/~sjackson/frame/HJ_solder.jpg

Cheers,

Suzy

Suzy...that is pretty awesome.......how long did it take and where did you
learn to solder up bike frames (ie. is there a course at TAFE or
something??).

Being an ex electronics technician and now an electronics engineer I can
solder components to a circuit card but I have never had a crack at brazing
(I assume that is how you are doing it).

How do the total costs (excluding your time as obviously it is a labour of
love) for a frame compare to buying one retail??

Keep up the good work.

Ride On,

Gags

It's a pain in the [censored] Gags, just buy a frame.
And yes it's just brazing, no biggie there, the hard part is the truing of the frame during the welding. If you're just
a little out during the weld then the frame's rooted, de-solder (heat factor not included!) then start again. Way easier
to purchase a frame from someone with a jig!

G.

In aus.bicycle on Sat, 14 Aug 2004 15:51:16 +0930

GDS said:

And yes it's just brazing, no biggie there, the hard part is the truing of the frame during the welding. If you're just
a little out during the weld then the frame's rooted, de-solder (heat factor not included!) then start again. Way easier
to purchase a frame from someone with a jig!

Don't need a jig, just need a sort of anal perfectionism and a lot of
clamps...

http://www.atnf.csiro.au/people/sjackson/bike_frame.html is the story I
believe.

Zebee

GDS said:

It's a pain in the [censored] Gags, just buy a frame.
And yes it's just brazing, no biggie there, the hard part is the
truing of the frame during the welding. If you're just
a little out during the weld then the frame's rooted, de-solder
(heat factor not included!) then start again. Way easier
to purchase a frame from someone with a jig!

Of course it's easier to buy a frame, but you're missing the point entirely. It's also easier to pay someone to ride the bloody thing for you!

As for jigs, they're useful in a production environment to cut the setup time down, but they aren't necessary. If you're patient and careful, you can do a better (straighter) job using some simple clamps and bar stock than someone slapping the thing together with a jig.

Framebuilding, list most any activity, is something where attention to detail, patience, and good old fashoined anal retentiveness go a long way.

Regards,

Suzy

Quoted message said:

suzyj wrote:
Framebuilding, list most any activity, is something where attention
to detail, patience, and good old fashoined anal retentiveness go a
long way.

.. and that is why this little impatient black slacker duck wont be building
frames any time soon! 🙂

Awesome work as usual Suzy! You are a credit to DIY cyclists everywhere!

hippy

suzyj <[email hidden]> wrote in
news:[email hidden]:

Quoted message said:

It's also easier to pay someone to ride the bloody thing for
you!

And if anyone out there is lazy & rich enough that this idea appeals, then
I'm willing to ride for you. I'm happy to give detailed ride reports, don't
expect great speeds though :-)

Graeme

Hippy said:

.. and that is why this little impatient black slacker duck wont be building
frames any time soon! 🙂

But, but, I thought that wonderful file (angle grinder?) work on your fixed gear was the beginning of something wonderful (or is that something truly scary - not sure which)...

Quoted message said:

Awesome work as usual Suzy! You are a credit to DIY cyclists everywhere!

Fankew.

Regards,

Suzy

Quoted message said:

suzyj
But, but, I thought that wonderful file (angle grinder?) work on your fixed >gear was the beginning of something wonderful (or is that something truly >scary - not sure which)...

hehehe lol.. If you saw me operating that grinder with no concern for the
poor frame being brutalised.. you would know "truly scary" is accurate 😄

Look.. I'll never say never (well, maybe.. s-o-m-e-times 😉) but in the near
future I can't see myself being able to mess up a join more than 2 or 3 times
before I throw the whole thing out for hard rubbish collection or something!

I could handle woodwork because it was a slow process and you'd have
to be truly "off" for a while for something to be totally ruined. With frame building I could see myself permanently ruining things.. quickly. 🙂

I don't have a workbench anyway.. no bench = no vice = no fun 😉

hippy :-)

suzyj said:

GDS said:

It's a pain in the [censored] Gags, just buy a frame.
And yes it's just brazing, no biggie there, the hard part is the
truing of the frame during the welding. If you're just
a little out during the weld then the frame's rooted, de-solder
(heat factor not included!) then start again. Way easier
to purchase a frame from someone with a jig!

Of course it's easier to buy a frame, but you're missing the point
entirely. It's also easier to pay someone to ride the bloody thing for
you!

As for jigs, they're useful in a production environment to cut the
setup time down, but they aren't necessary. If you're patient and
careful, you can do a better (straighter) job using some simple clamps
and bar stock than someone slapping the thing together with a jig.

Framebuilding, list most any activity, is something where attention to
detail, patience, and good old fashoined anal retentiveness go a long
way.

AOL!

And it's so much more satisfying to ride something that you've built
from the ground up. Not that I've ever built a bike frame, but sailing
a boat that you've designed and built (my vice) is, I'm sure, the same
sort of thrill.

--
Regards.
Richard.