Seat Fabrication

So with the pipes bent into shape and slotted onto the existing box section of the subframe, it was time to weld them in place and then go about skinning it with 0.9mm stainless steel.

 A qiuck prerp with a polishing wheel ensured a solid weld.

 Action Shots.

 The stainless sheet was roughly cut to shape them tacked on at the bottom. I used a hammer to roll the edges over the pipe to make the gap between the sheet and pipe as minimal as possible.

 To reduce heat concentration the tacs were spaced out at first and then repeated on the other side then we went over the original tacs to improve the all round strength. Note in the inage above there has been a stainless bar welded across this will be the mudguard mount once the mudguard has had some further butchering.

Shiny stainless underside looks pretty cool.

Fabrication wise there is still alto to do:

Tabs for the four relays.
Mounts for indicators brake light and license plate.
Finish off the mudguard mount.
Then fabricate the top of the seat unit and complete a frame work and skin it with more stainless steel.

Once the welding is complete it will be filled and rubbed down ready for paint.

Definitely worth a look

A good friend of mine has been designing a bamboo framed bike to eventually build a business out of it. Unfortunately he has just stumbled across the website below which has beaten him to it. Bamboo has some incredible properties you couldn't engineer into a material and its as sustainable as a banana skin.

http://greenstarbikes.com/ecoforce-1/

I will be looking to keep this blog alive with websites and ideas that are related to my projects. The bike that comes in white has the ideal wheels and crank set for our but parts like that normally come with a hefty price tag!

Road Bike Assembly Crank and Headstock

New cartridge bearings have  been fitted into our frame by Le Bicycle a local bike shop. I have cleaned and degreased the ball bearings and guides for the headstock and started putting the frame back together.

 Before the work was started.

 Headstock threads were cleaned up with a wire whell and it made reassembly much easier.

 Chrome bearings and locking nut were given a little clean and look really cool with the white paint.

 

A key way in the headstock thread work in conjunction with a spacer inbetween the locking nut and the beaing slack adjuster. really nice design that I haven't come across before. The washer doesnt spin when the locking nut is tightened. This in turn doesnt tighten up the bearing and effects the performance and life span of the bearings.

New shiny cartridge bearings look really neat fab job by Le Bicycle no scratches or marks and they had it done within the hour!

We are undecided on what cranks to fit on the bike. The original are in perfect working condition however they are silver and boring.

All the bearings were given a coat of brake cleaner and I rubbed off all the old gunk, then liberally filled them with lithuim grease.