Now with added Randonneur

A few weeks have passed in a blissful state of commute, the weather has been pretty spectacular and the winds kind. I have also gradually increased my fitness levels such that atop the trusty Surly I made it to the top of Dyers Pass without stopping once, and even passed someone! Admittedly she had a good decade on me and admitted that she was quite hungover, but still, take the victories as they come I say.

There have been many small changes to the bike, and it is now getting where I want it to be give or take a few bits here and there. I had already decided that the bullhorns were not doing justice to the classic look of the frame, so on a whim I bid on a set of Salsa Short and Shallow Cross Bars on TradeMe, mostly because they were very cheap and the right diameters for what was wanted.

This turned out a mistake really as the ergoness looked faintly ridiculous on such a classic looking frame. The reach was also a bit short for my stem, so I then decided to find the perfect bars, and an extensive internet search gave me this result;

The Velo Orange Randonneur bars along with the very similar Nitto 136A. I thought to myself that both of these would be pretty hard to find in NZ, but then I looked to see if there was a local distributor for Velo Orange, and lo! Contact Dave at Velo Ideale..... as it turned out Dave had the perfectly sized set in stock right there, so I snaffled them pretty sharpish.

They were put on last night and I am really quite pleased with the look;

A burgundy leather sofa, today

As much as this bike lends itself, I have observed correct etiquette with bicycle photography; valves at the bottom, crank aligned with downtube etc.

I painted the guards black as well, it looks much cleaner...

I love the slight upward curve of those bars

To clean up the look some more I did away with my cycle computer and relocated the light to the head tube. I also purchased those quite sexy little Tektro canti brake thingies from Dave as well, god I spend some money with that man.

My by now signature Blue Handlebar Tape (BHT™)

The stem has not broken yet, I am pleased

I reworked the Jtek Mount to be adjustable for both height and tilt, it is still slightly awkward to pull it back into 1st, and kind of in the way until you get to 5th, but I cruise in 6th and is dead easy to get there so it is an acceptable compromise.

The other slightly disturbing thing that has happened is this;

Fresh rust on a handbuilt bicycle frame, today

I fully expected it, but maybe not within 2 weeks of getting it coated. This just confirms my belief that paint is for mugs. I guess it is because the clear coat does not have an etch prime like paint does. I don't really mind as long as it does not get structural, but I am now toying with the idea of electroplated coatings. There is a particular one I have in mind, but it would mean sending the frame up to Auckland, which I am disinclined to do. We shall have to see.

The Fillet Brazed Stem and Campy Goodness

This weekend saw two of the final parts of this particular jigsaw fall into place; I finally received the Campagnolo square taper bottom bracket that I bought off Trademe, and I built a sexy new quill stem for the bike.

Getting the bottom bracket was great because it meant I could heave off the adequate but not really visually suitable FSA cranks and mount my decidedly second hand but still sexy 175mm Campagnolo cranks;

This pleases me quite a lot. The BB is a very narrow one and there is only a couple of mm clearance of the crank to the chainstay, but it means I can run the chainring on the outside of the crank and still get a straight chainline...

The next thing to sort was the stem, as I was unhappy with the visual bulk of the quill stem adaptor and BBB riser stem, I was convinced it would look better with a sleek raw steel number.

More 4130 goodness from Lianne

Some mitered tubes awaiting the balmy warmth of 3500°C

My first legit fillet braze - yay

I took an incredible amount care making sure the handlebar tube miter held the tube straight and true, there is no joy in a droopy bar.

Cutting the hole for the clamp boss - I had made the boss on the Grayson a bit earlier but forgot to take pics

Braze in that bad boy

Then spend much time filing the fillets to look pretty, and also slit the boss and handlebar tube to form the clamping detail

Another view of the results of laborious filing

Finally fitted up to the bike after a slapped on layer of clear coat. I also made a new slightly sexier bracket for the Jtek shifter, but this was not very interesting and I forgot to take a pic of it.

Much more in keeping I reckon, although I again apologise for the blue electrical tape - I actually went to buy some more and they didn't have any black, so it is not my fault. This will be rectified at the first opportunity, I assure you.

The semi finished article

I have probably been convinced that I need to paint those mudguards black, maybe this weekend will see some loving given in this direction. I also need to braze a brake light mount tab on that rack and lay down some clear coat on it, but in reality I think I am pretty much done. This is sad in a way, however it is hopefully the start of many years and miles of service for this trusty steed...

Soon I think I will get someone who is more competent than me with a camera (ie anyone over the age of five) to take some arty shots for me so I can frame them and send them to my family for Christmas.

Shifting along nicely

The updates are coming thick and fast now, this one is all about this sexy little beast;

Which is a Jtek Bar End Shifter for Alfine 8 Speed Hubs.

It is a pretty nicely made bit of kit, the engineer in me could not resist pulling it apart to see what the gubbins looked like - basically it is all about two hefty sprung detent balls hooking into the correctly spaced detents. Nice and simple.

Now I had already decided that I would try and mount this right by my thumb at the end of the bars, so this meant I needed to make up a bracket to hold it in the right place. I pillaged my parts bin and came up with this quick and dirty beast;

Mmmmm, ugly

Beautified with a coat of MattyB and poorly wrapped bar tape

Rather less intrusive than the original I think

So that was fine, but one issue remained, which was the fact that the shifter has no provision for adjusting the cable length. I looked at the situation on the shifter, and then at the hub, and decided a mod at the hub end would be the least invasive. I then hacked up an old Shimano brake lever which had the adjustment detail I wanted, and after a short while I had it filed to approximately the right shape to fit in the cable stop on the hub;

A poor shadow of Bob's filing skills, but fit for purpose

I removed the wee metal tab and replaced it with my bit of engineering art.

So this all looked like it was going to work pretty well, and in reality it did. My ride this morning was a real pleasure, and while the position of the lever is not quite right, it needs to be slightly lower and further forward, it is a pretty good effort all up. The shifting was easy and surprisingly positive - it actually feels better than the original shifter, certainly easier to bang up 3 gears at a time.

I will soon make a far sexier version of the mount now I have proven the concept... I will try and minimise the amount of space taken up by the bracket as it is slightly too intrusive at the moment, not too bad at all, just not as good as it can be.

Awesomely, my stem tubing has turned up as well, so I can alienate my lovely wife even more now....

It lives!

Things happen fast at Pogwards school of wizardry and bike building, so much so that the major effort since the last post has achieved so much that I have actually ridden my bicycle!

Totes awes as my children would say....

Firstly though I had to get through a few niggly details;

The brake cable brazons

I put the same brazons underneath the downtube (and one under the chainstay) to guide the alfine shift cable - much tidier than the cable ties of yore.

Shortly after my last post I went out to see the lovely Mr Bob, who has most of the tools needed to sort the finicky bits of the frame; cutting the fork bearing seat, cleaning the threads and facing the bottom bracket, cutting the headtube bearing cup seats, and tweaking the fork ends so that they faced each other correctly. Unfortunately Bob does not have a seatpost reamer, which is surprising given the number and completeness of the tools he does have. Knowing the incredible level of engineering that Bob is capable of I suspect he simply hasn't found a suitable source of Magnetite with which to smelt the required parts. Fortunately Dave does have one, so I dropped in there to sort that one out and purchase a couple of bits, ie a 27.2mm seatpost and a seatpost clamp.

A beautifully cut cup surface

Many, many brazons

Then came time to actually build it into a rideable bike...

There were a few issues, mostly around the recently discovered need for the riding position to be exactly like the Surly, as I may have mentioned before it is super comfy, and I wanted some more of that right there.

I popped around to a local bike madman's house and grabbed an armful of bars to try out to see what worked the best. Now as I will be using this for the 10km sprint to work every day I have no real need of drop bars and multiple positions, so the set of bullhorns that Stacey had seem to fit the bill, so this is where I am right now;

Mmmm, bicycle. Those cranks will be swapped out for my nice campy ones when I find a new Bottom Bracket. And the brakes will be those nice Paul touring canti's.

Horrible BBB stem that needs to be 50mm not 80mm, so I will get rid of it. I will probably make a custom stem once the riding position has settled down... Also see the sexy little Cane Creek cyclocross brake levers.

A pretty brake stop thingy.

The brake bridge is the chainwheel off something English and one hundredish years old - I have Jones to thank for that great idea that I had.

Stupid Alfine shifter that needed some time with the file to fit on 24mm bars and yet is still large and ugly.

The bars are still a little too high and forward, a smaller stem should see to that.

Mudguards will make it look a bit more gentlemanly.

One thing I have slightly bolloxed up is the angle of the brake bosses. I stupidly put these in line with the rim, not the stays, so the brakes angle outwards ever so slightly. It is not too bad, but I wish I had thought that through a bit more.

To get around the stupid position of the Alfine shifter I have ordered one of these puppies;

Which should solve some size and positional issues.

So there will be a gradual swapping out of unsuitable bits for lovely expensive bits, but first I need to strip it down and get it coated. And it needs bar tape, and new pedals, and all sorts of other rubbish.

And that is all, I have yet to take it on a bigger ride than the 500m around the block, but it hasn't broken yet, and feels really nice and solid. It is surprisingly light as well...